The Cypherpunks - Digital Insurgents

The Cypherpunks were a remarkable group of cryptologists, technologists and digital rights activists operational principally in the 1990s. 

They were prodigious in many ways with their members either being responsible for, or heavily involved in, encryption software, anonymity networks (precursors to Tor), Crypto-currencies and leaking platforms.

Many of their names you won't know, though some you will, such as Julian Assange, John Gilmore, and John Draper (aka Cap'n Crunch).

Their digital club house was a mail list active between '92 and '98. Within its virtual walls the Cypherpunks debated the impact of encryption, civil rights in the digital age, assassination markets, and even political revolution. 

Over 98k posts originated from thousands of addresses over the years - given the anonymity practices in use it is hard to know exactly how many contributors there were, though likely in the high hundreds. Of those, I've isolated the most influential 40 to try to understand a little more of who they were. Of the 40, 6 operated under alias', or 'nyms', preventing analysis of their personas.

Surprisingly, as the below shows, the 36 Cypherpunks for whom geo date was available weren't just silicon valley types, but were equally spread between East and West coast. Only Julian Assange was based overseas, and his contributions were minimal.

They were also older than I had expected...

This chart shows of the 22 Cypherpunks for which it is possible to estimate ages most were between 20 and 45. The average age is 33.7, the median is 33. The youngest was Jim Choate, at 20 years of age, with Peter Junger being the oldest at 57.

So what did they do when not Cypherpunk'ing,

There's a clear tech bias as expected in their professions - Analysis suggests 35 of the Cypherpunks were technologists, yet only 22 were cryptographers. Cypherpunks didn't have to be cryptographers, or even technologists, there were many other ways they could put their skills to the cause of digital privacy, such as media engagement. 

Neither did they have to be anarchists, the following chart shows political ideology where it can be identified,

(In this chart most implied anarchists also called themselves libertarians, the latter label has been used when they have been clear on the latter but not the former ideology).

There was certainly an anarchic wing, in fact Cypherpunk co-founder Tim May once went as far as to say a 'thermonuclear cauterisation’ of Washington should take place so that a new, limited, government could be formed! 

But whilst some Cypherpunks held views many would consider extreme, they became among the most influential thinkers and actors of the emerging digital age.

Their actions provided a needed counterweight to government cryptography policies, and had they not acted as a digital insurgency, the reality we live with today, of free access to digital encryption, to the ability to protect the secrets on our phones and laptops, may have turned out very differently.

More insights from my upcoming book, 'CryptoWars - The Fight for Digital Privacy: A Political History of Digital Encryption' in the coming weeks and months.