Cypherpunk
Also known as: Crypto-Anarchist, Digital Privacy Advocate, Cryptography Activist
A movement advocating the use of cryptography to protect privacy and promote individual freedoms in the digital age.
The cypherpunk movement is a community of activists, developers, and thinkers who champion the use of cryptographic tools to protect personal privacy and civil liberties. Emerging in the 1990s through mailing lists and zines, cypherpunks anticipated the rise of digital surveillance and developed technologies like PGP, anonymous remailers, and digital cash. The movement laid the ideological and technical groundwork for Bitcoin and modern decentralized technologies. Notable figures include Timothy C. May, Eric Hughes, and Hal Finney. Cypherpunks believe that 'privacy is necessary for an open society in the electronic age.'