Phostrich

NIP-05 identifiers for Nostr, issued by signature.

Nostr is an open protocol for publishing and social messaging where your identity is a keypair you hold — not an account on a company's server. Nothing can lock you out, but your public identity is a long, unreadable npub1… string that no one can recall or say aloud.

NIP-05 is the piece of the protocol that gives that key a human-readable address. Phostrich issues you one — you@phostrich.com — and serves the mapping at /.well-known/nostr.json, so any Nostr client shows a verified name in place of the raw key.

What you get: One identifier per key, resolvable by every NIP-05-aware client. One key, one name, in v1.
Sign-in: No email, no password. You prove the key is yours by signing a one-time challenge — with a browser extension (NIP-07) or a remote bunker signer (NIP-46).
Release policy: An identifier with no lookups for six months becomes eligible for release. Stated here, at claim time — never delivered as a later surprise.
No signer yet: Nostr Signer is a desktop bunker for macOS, Windows and Linux — your key stays on your machine, encrypted by the OS keychain, and every request waits for your approval. Also ours. Download Nostr Signer

Authenticate by signing a challenge with your key — no password, no email.

Signs the challenge locally through your installed extension (e.g. Alby, nos2x).

No browser extension was detected. Install one such as Alby or nos2x, or sign in with a remote signer instead.

Connect a remote "bunker" signer. This round-trips over relays, so it can take a moment. No bunker yet? We make one — Nostr Signer, for desktop.

Remote signer connection

Challenge · sample

{
  "kind": 27235,
  "tags": [
    ["u", "https://phostrich.com/auth/verify"],
    ["method", "POST"],
    ["challenge", "ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff"]
  ],
  "content": ""
}

Your signer signs this NIP-98 event. Phostrich checks the signature against your public key; the challenge is single-use and expires within minutes.