Gab Social is set for upgrade this year and will be added with "exciting" new features, the organization's head revealed.
In his statement dated March 30, CEO Andrew Torba shared the plans of the company, bringing significant changes to the social media network.
"As part of our ongoing commitment to improving the security, scalability, and performance of Gab Social I wanted to let the Gab community know our plans for the next few months. In early March we began to lay the groundwork for Gab Next, a totally rebuilt Gab Social on top of our HYDRA infrastructure," he began.
He continued by saying that Gab users' content on the current platform will be transferred to the new system upon completion.
Moreover, the CEO stated that other Gab products are already powered by HYDRA.
"HYDRA currently powers all other Gab products including Gab Trends, Gab Chat, Gab TV, our Shop, PRO, and much more. HYDRA is secure, scalable, and has unmatched performance for a community as big as Gab," he said.
They are also working on new features and tools once the platform transfers to HYDRA infrastructure, including a Marketplace where users can buy and sell services, P2P payment system and video conferencing platform. In addition, existing HYDRA services, such as Gab Trends and Gab Chat, will be integrated.
"All of this is working towards our vision of building a new economy. Free markets inevitably emerge from free speech and the next evolution of Gab will provide the tools for that to happen," Torba said.
He further stated that their "roadmap" for the year is "tremendous and very exciting" and that the first step is transferring the social media platform to the new infrastructure, which will be done on the second quarter.
"We kindly ask for your patience during this time, it will be well worth the wait. Thank you for your continued support of our mission to defend free speech online for all people," Torba concluded.
The announcement follows after the incidents of hacking of Gab for the last two months.
In February, the incident affected the accounts of thousands of its users, including those belonging to Torba himself and former President Trump, as well.
The hacker compromised the private messages of 15,000 users and created a dataset of over 40 million Gab posts which include all private posts.
The data collected from the hacking was said to be a "gold mine of research" for individuals who are investigating people involved in the Capitol riot in January, according to a data-transparency group.
The hacker was identified as "JaXpArO and My Little Anonymous Revival Project," exposing the right-wing users.
But in his statement about the data breach on Feb. 26, Torba said that Gab takes only "little personal data," minimizing the effect on its users if hacking occurs.
The platform was hacked again in March, taking over 178 user accounts, including Torba and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The hackers reportedly sent messages through the pirated accounts, claiming to have gotten 831 "verification documents" and requested for Bitcoins in exchange for return of those data.
