Several things have been going over at the corner where SonicScrewdriver is residing. First of all, they have rebranded to just SONIC, with a fancy new logo and everything, which you can see down below. Secondly, SonicVortex is finally here! Care to find out more?

Let’s start off with the rebranding process. Even though I really liked the name SonicScrewdriver, it’s not exactly marketable because of its length. SONIC on the other hand rolls of the tongue a lot easier. And I really do like the new logo as well, so kudos for that!

The biggest update is of course SonicVortex, which hides encrypted transactions by using steganography. Encrypted transactions are embedded in pictures taken by the user, using the f5 steganography algorithm which makes use of matrix encoding to hide the picture.

A slightly more detailed explanation was posted by the SONIC developer :

“Moreover, the encryption is state-of-the-art AES/GCM encryption, suitable for banks and governments. So even in the highly unlikely event that any communication becomes suspected, it is impossible for an adversary to ascertain the nature of the communication. Thus, your transaction is hidden and protected from even the most powerful adversaries.

Additionally, AES/GCM protects against any changes to the encrypted, hidden transaction. If just one pixel of the picture is changed, it will be detected and the transaction rejected.”

In order to use TimeVortex, you will need to install an Android application (iOS is not available at this point unfortunately), which can be downloaded here. Alternatively, this app has been submitted to the Google Play Store and should appear over the next few days.

There is also a Windows and Macintosh companion app for TimeVortex, which can be downloaded here. The source code for TimeVortex’s relay system is also available, and can be found here. Or if you want the Windows source code, click here.

Official announcement and screenshots :

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=755180.msg8951249#msg8951249