Nav Toor@heynavtoor
TeamViewer charges $50.90/month.
AnyDesk starts at $22.90/month.
And every single connection goes through their servers.
Your screen. Your passwords. Your files. Your private conversations. All routed through someone else's computer.
TeamViewer was breached in June 2024. An APT group got into their internal corporate IT environment.
There is a free alternative. You host it yourself. Your data never touches a third party.
It is called RustDesk. 102,000+ stars on GitHub.
You download it. Share your ID. Connect. That is it. Works instantly. No account needed.
Here is what it does:
- Full remote desktop control across Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and iOS
- File transfer between devices. Drag and drop.
- Clipboard sync. Copy on one machine, paste on the other.
- Direct P2P connections through TCP hole punching. Faster than any relay.
- End-to-end encryption on every connection. NaCl cryptography.
- Works out of the box with zero configuration
Here's the wildest part:
You do not need to self-host to use it. Public relay servers are built in. Download and connect in seconds.
But if you self-host on a $5 VPS, you get something no paid tool offers:
Complete data sovereignty. Your screen. Your files. Your logs. All on YOUR server. Nobody else sees them. Ever. Unlimited users. Unlimited devices.
TeamViewer Business: $50.90/month. $610/year.
AnyDesk Solo: $22.90/month. $274/year.
RustDesk: $0. Forever.
Built in Rust. 356 contributors. 14,900+ forks. Translated into 39 languages.
AGPL-3.0 licensed. Self-hosted. Community-driven.
100% Open Source.
(Link in the comments)