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Superball Example: Anonymous Posting

Scenario

Alice wants to post a message under her real identity while hiding her location from surveillance.

Participants

Alice: Original sender (pubkey: alice123...)
Thrower A: First hop (pubkey: thrower_a789...)
Thrower B: Second hop (pubkey: thrower_b012...)
Relay1: wss://relay1.com (where Alice posts)
Relay2: wss://relay2.com (intermediate relay)
Relay3: wss://relay3.com (where final message appears)

Step-by-Step Flow

1. Alice Creates Her Final Message That Will Be Posted

{
  "kind": 1,
  "pubkey": "alice123...",
  "content": "The government is lying about inflation statistics",
  "tags": [],
  "created_at": 1702222200,
  "id": "alice_event_id",
  "sig": "alice_signature"
}

2. Alice Encrypts Instructions for Thrower B (Final Hop)

Payload for Thrower B (final hop - no p field):

{
  "event": { /* Alice's signed event above */ },
  "routing": {
    "relays": ["wss://relay3.com", "wss://relay4.com"],
    "delay": 15,
    "audit": "audit_tag_b_456def",
    "payment": "eCash_ZYX321..." // Optional payment
    // No "p" field - this means final posting
  }
}

Creates routing event:

{
  "kind": 22222,
  "pubkey": "ephemeral_key_2",
  "content": "<encrypted_payload_for_thrower_b>",
  "tags": [["p", "thrower_b012..."]],
  "created_at": 1703000100,
  "id": "routing_for_b",
  "sig": "ephemeral_signature_2"
}

3. Alice Encrypts Instructions for Thrower A (First Hop)

Payload for Thrower A (continuing chain):

{
  "event": { /* routing event for Thrower B above */ },
  "routing": {
    "relays": ["wss://relay2.com"],
    "delay": 45,
    "add_padding_bytes": 200,
    "p": "thrower_b012...", // Next Thrower in chain
    "audit": "1a2b3c4d5e6f7890abcdef1234567890abcdef1234567890abcdef1234567890",
    "payment": "eCash_A1B2C3..." // Optional payment
  }
}

Alice posts this to Relay1:

{
  "kind": 22222,
  "pubkey": "ephemeral_key_1",
  "content": "<encrypted_payload_for_thrower_a>",
  "tags": [["p", "thrower_a789..."]],
  "created_at": 1703000200,
  "id": "routing_for_a",
  "sig": "ephemeral_signature_1"
}

Execution Timeline

T+0: Alice posts routing event to Relay1

Relay1: kind 22222 event (p tag = thrower_a789...)

T+5: Thrower A processes

Decrypts payload
Sees: relay2.com, delay 45s, add_padding_bytes 200, next hop thrower_b012...
Creates padding-wrapper payload around the inner encrypted event
Queues for 45-second delay

T+50: Thrower A forwards with padding wrapper

Relay2: NEW routing event with padding wrapper
{
  "kind": 22222,
  "pubkey": "thrower_a_ephemeral_key", // Fresh key
  "content": "<padding_wrapper_payload>", // Contains inner event + padding
  "tags": [
    ["p", "thrower_b012..."], // Real next hop
    ["p", "1a2b3c4d5e6f7890abcdef1234567890abcdef1234567890abcdef1234567890"] // Audit tag
  ]
}

Where the padding_wrapper_payload contains:

{
  "event": { /* The still-encrypted inner event for Thrower B */ },
  "padding": "random_padding_data_200_bytes_worth"
}

Alice monitors relay2.com and sees her audit tag 1a2b3c4d5e6f... appear at T+50, confirming Thrower A is honest.

T+55: Thrower B processes

First decrypt: Gets padding wrapper payload - discards padding
Second decrypt: Gets Alice's event + routing instructions (relays=[relay3.com, relay4.com], delay 15s)
NO p field - this means final posting, extract and post Alice's event exactly as-is
Queues for 15-second delay

T+70: Thrower B posts Alice's final event (end of chain)

Relay3 AND Relay4: Alice's original signed event appears exactly as she created it
{
  "kind": 1,
  "pubkey": "alice123...",
  "content": "The government is lying about inflation statistics",
  "tags": [], // Original tags preserved
  "created_at": 1702222200,
  "id": "alice_event_id",
  "sig": "alice_signature" // Original signature preserved
}

Alice's message now appears on both relay3.com and relay4.com for redundancy.

Privacy and Security Achieved

Alice's location: Completely hidden from surveillance
Message origin: Appears to come from Thrower B's location
Traffic analysis: 65-second delay + size changes prevent correlation
Identity preserved: Alice's real pubkey and signature maintained
Plausible deniability: No proof Alice initiated the posting
Malicious node detection: Audit tags allow Alice to verify proper forwarding
Accountability: Bad Throwers can be identified and avoided

Audit Trail for Alice

T+50: Audit tag 1a2b3c4d5e6f... appears on relay2.com (✓ Thrower A honest)
T+70: Final message appears on relay3.com and relay4.com (✓ Thrower B honest)
Size verification: Event sizes match expected padding operations
Timing verification: Delays match requested timeouts

Alice successfully posts controversial content under her identity while protecting her physical location AND maintaining the ability to detect and avoid malicious routing nodes.

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