Inspiration
Communication is one of the first things people lose during natural disasters, emergency situations, or network outages. Most messaging applications stop working once internet connectivity is unavailable, making it difficult for people to request help or coordinate with others. We wanted to build a solution that keeps people connected even when traditional communication infrastructure is unavailable.
This inspired us to build AEGIS, an offline-first mesh communication platform that enables secure device-to-device communication without relying on the internet.
Project Links
🔗 GitHub Repository
https://github.com/kripashankarcs3/AEGIS
🎥 Demo Video
https://youtube.com/shorts/cWWSGfoVFgE?si=_Aix_TOuokW-tIQf
What it does
AEGIS automatically discovers nearby devices and establishes secure peer-to-peer communication using WebRTC, WiFi Direct, Bluetooth Low Energy, mDNS discovery, and direct TCP connections.
The platform allows users to:
- Exchange secure offline messages
- Broadcast emergency SOS alerts
- Share resources such as food, water, and medicine
- Monitor nearby survivor status
- Relay messages across multiple devices using mesh routing
- Store all data locally without cloud dependency
Even when two devices are outside direct communication range, messages can travel through intermediate devices using multi-hop routing.
The complete source code is available on GitHub, and a working demonstration of the application can be viewed through the attached demo video.
How we built it
AEGIS was developed using Flutter for the mobile application.
The networking layer combines WebRTC, WiFi Direct, Bluetooth LE, mDNS discovery, and TCP sockets to establish reliable peer-to-peer communication.
Mesh routing was implemented using packet forwarding, TTL-based routing, and duplicate packet detection to ensure efficient and reliable message delivery.
Hive was used for offline local storage, Riverpod for state management, and Go Router for application navigation.
The backend networking components, including mesh routing, WebRTC communication, packet routing, identity management, cryptographic integration, mDNS discovery, and signaling infrastructure, were developed by Deepali Kumari.
Challenges we ran into
Building an internet-independent communication platform introduced several technical challenges.
Some of the biggest challenges included:
- Reliable peer discovery without internet connectivity
- Implementing efficient multi-hop mesh routing
- Preventing routing loops and duplicate packet forwarding
- Managing multiple communication transports together
- Handling Android networking permissions across different OS versions
- Maintaining reliable peer-to-peer communication across nearby devices
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We successfully developed a fully offline communication platform capable of:
- Secure peer-to-peer messaging
- Multi-hop mesh routing
- Emergency SOS broadcasting
- Resource coordination
- Survivor status monitoring
- Offline local storage
- QR-based device pairing
- End-to-end encrypted communication
The project demonstrates how smartphones can continue communicating even when traditional network infrastructure is unavailable.
What we learned
During the development of AEGIS we gained practical experience in:
- Mesh networking
- WebRTC communication
- Bluetooth Low Energy
- WiFi Direct
- mDNS service discovery
- Mobile cryptography
- Offline-first application architecture
- Flutter development
- Riverpod state management
- Networking protocols and routing algorithms
What's next for AEGIS
Our future roadmap includes:
- Cross-platform Android and iOS support
- File and media sharing
- Voice communication
- Offline maps
- Improved battery optimization
- Enhanced routing algorithms
- Large-scale mesh network optimization
- Additional disaster response and rescue coordination features.
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