The year 2025 was a special year for diva.exchange. Important and defining events took place both within diva.exchange itself and in the digital environment surrounding it.

Let’s face it: in 2025, there is no fully distributed exchange for digital values available which is granting users privacy. There are some exchanges around which wrap transactions into smart contracts, but the underlying smart contract networks (like Ethereum, Solana etc.) do not protect users’ privacy at all. And then there are some of the escrow “solutions” around, which are usually Tor-based. But escrow is just another form of trust, and the concept of trust is unusable in the context of privacy. And never forget: Tor is by design neither secure nor private – as many researchers have proven.

So, at diva.exchange, we started mid 2025 (and it will go on for a while) to rewrite large parts of the source code. To implement what we have learned in the past 5 years. What we published three years ago is visible as a simple demo on https://testnet.diva.exchange. It was a nice try, and it even works somehow. But it is not what we mean by creating a “truly private, fully distributed exchange for digital values like Bitcoin, Monero, Ethereum, or Tether”.

However, at the end of the year, we summarize the results, analyze past and future trends, note successes and failures, and make plans for the future. Naturally, we view the events and phenomena mentioned below through the prism of our own understanding. Let’s get started.

AI: A Revolution or Just Another Bubble?

The year 2025 was marked by mixed movements in relation to artificial intelligence.

On the one hand, there was unprecedented growth in interest in AI and tools that use it. This interest was accompanied by huge investments, growth in the capitalization of AI development companies, and an increase in the number of AI models.

On the other hand, experts expressed well-grounded doubts about the revolutionary nature of AI. For example, François Chollet points out that even the most advanced models today are unable to solve middle-school-level mathematics problems. In essence, modern large-scale language systems are not capable of imitating the functioning of the human brain.

An additional argument put forward by skeptics is that further development will require greater energy consumption, while the energy resources of countries developing these technologies are already at their limit (for example, data centers consume as much energy per year as an average European country, such as the Netherlands).

In any case, this field is in the early stages of development, and we are confident that exciting discoveries lie ahead.

AI Versus the I2P Network

Like any tool, AI can be used for criminal purposes. Experts are recording an exponentially growing number of crimes committed with the use of AI.

Diva.exchange, together with a young researcher from HSLU, Luca Rohrer, carried out a research project
aimed at testing the resilience of the I2P network.

During the experiment, I2P network nodes were attacked using machine learning models and neural networks. The network successfully withstood the attacks.

The study thus confirmed the reliability of the I2P network in the face of external attacks. Diva.exchange will continue to develop based on a secure and resilient network.

What’s already confirmed: in 2026, there will be a follow-up study regarding “AI-versus-I2P”.

Scientific Foundations of Practical Work

At the core of diva.exchange’s development lies on a solid ground of scientific work and academic research. diva.exchange sees the success of its future product precisely in close cooperation and collaboration with scientific institutions.

Three important projects were implemented over the past year:

1. A lecture series was held at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU),
   delivered by diva.exchange co-founder Konrad Bachler. The lectures focused on the architecture of distributed systems, their resilience, and security.
2. A project to test the resilience and reliability of the I2P network, carried out jointly with Luca Rohrer.
3. A practical guide on installing and running the I2P network on a personal computer.

Conclusion

Against the backdrop of rapid technological change, growing digital risks, and increasing demands on energy infrastructure, diva.exchange has stayed true to its path: relying on scientific knowledge, technological sustainability, and modern software engineering of fully distributed and trustless systems.

The events of the past year have confirmed the correctness of this approach. Research, strengthened academic cooperation, and practical testing of network reliability have demonstrated that sustainable development in the digital sphere is impossible without a solid scientific ground.

Join diva.exchange in 2026 – new and exciting discoveries await you.

THIS IS DIVA.EXCHANGE

The non-profit association diva.exchange, Switzerland, uses a barrier-free and collaborative approach to create free banking technology for everyone. Open-source technology ensures the privacy of all participants in the financial system of the future. The blockchain-based system is fully distributed. Everyone can participate in diva.exchange.

Diva.exchange is committed to the belief that only commercially free technology can reliably protect user privacy.

Collaboration with the scientific community plays an important role in the development of diva.exchange. The results of diva.exchange research are constantly being validated by academic institutions and publicly presented at specialised conferences.

LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR WORK

All technical information is available at: https://github.com/diva-exchange/

I2P beginner’s guide and installation guide (Version 2020):
https://www.diva.exchange/en/privacy/introduction-to-i2p-your-own-internet-secure-private-and-free/

All videos are here: https://odysee.com/@diva.exchange:d/

Introduction to I2P: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I2P

Testnet of diva.exchange: https://testnet.diva.exchange

CONTACT US

Twitter: https://twitter.com/@DigitalValueX

Mastodon: https://social.diva.exchange/@social

If you still have questions you can always find us on Telegram: https://t.me/diva_exchange_chat_de (in English, German, or Russian)