The Tor Foundation is developing the Tor Instant Messaging Service (TIMB), which allows its users to remain anonymous using the Tor browser while they message each other.

The development of TIMB started back in July of 2013, after it was learned that the NSA was monitoring the traffic associated with instant messaging services. An experimental version is supposed to be available in March of 2014.

With TIMB you will be able to connect with specific Tor IM servers, which are specified as “hidden services”, and they will also be able to access IM services that are more commercial and available via the open Internet.

The people or organization funding this project have elected to remain anonymous, and the IM service will be based on Instantbird, which is an open source IM tool based on Mozilla’s XULrunner, which is a run-time environment that is cross-platform.

[via Ars Technica]