Supported by
What Is Discord, the Social App Where Leaked Pentagon Documents Were Found?
Discord gained popularity among gamers. But as it has become mainstream, it has run into controversy over the past few years.
Kellen Browning, based in San Francisco, writes about the video game and tech industries.
Discord, the eight-year-old social media and messaging platform popular among young people and video game players that has increasingly become a mainstream part of the internet, has once again run into controversy.
Leaked Pentagon documents were said to have been circulating on the platform as early as March before appearing on other sites. The leaks are the latest incident in recent years in which Discord has played a key role.
How did Discord get its start?
Discord was introduced in 2015 by Jason Citron, a video game player and computer programmer. Mr. Citron’s game development studio was struggling to find traction, so he created a chat application that people could use to communicate with one another while playing games.
The platform was a niche product until the pandemic, when young people were searching for ways to chat with their friends and joining online communities. By late 2021, it had more than 150 million active users each month, up from 56 million in 2019. It was most recently valued at $14.7 billion, according to PitchBook, a market data provider.
What is a Discord server?
Discord is similar to the workplace tool Slack. There is no central social feed or timeline with posts for users to scroll through. Instead, it is split into servers — essentially, chat rooms — designed for specific groups or interests. Those servers are divided further into individual, topic-based channels.
Advertisement