"Proprietary software is an injustice. It denies users freedom and keeps them divided and helpless." — Richard Stallman (Free Software, Free Society, 2002) #proprietarysoftware #freedom

"Digital pseudonyms, the creation of persistent network personas that cannot be forged by others and yet which are unlinkable to the 'true names' of their owners, are finding major uses in ensuring free speech, in allowing controversial opinions to be aired, and in providing for economic transactions that cannot be blocked by local governments." — Tim May (Crypto Anarchy and Virtual Communities, 1994) #freespeech #anonymity #economics

"The keyboard is the great equalizer — better than the Glock .45." — St. Jude (Jude Milhon) (Modem Grrrl (Wired), 1995) #technology #empowerment #equality #defense

"Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech,' not as in 'free beer.'" — Richard Stallman (GNU Project, 1985) #freesoftware #liberty #opensource

"The tech powers that be are nothing without our data." — Carissa Véliz (Privacy is power (Aeon), 2019) #data #power #resistance #techcompanies

"By understanding that cypherpunk theory and practice each consist of two complementary dynamics—privacy/transparency, pro-active/re-active—it becomes possible to understand that the cypherpunk movement provides the basis for activists and citizens to resist large surveillance institutions." — Patrick D. Anderson (Of Cypherpunks and Sousveillance, 2022) #cypherpunk #privacy #transparency #resistance #surveillance

"Bitcoin seems to be a very promising idea. I like the idea of basing security on the assumption that the CPU power of honest participants outweighs that of the attacker." — Hal Finney (Cryptography Mailing List, 2008) #bitcoin #security #proofofwork

"The cypherpunks were troublemakers: controversial, radical, unrelenting, but also practical. They made things." — Jamie Bartlett (Cypherpunks Write Code, American Scientist) #cypherpunk #code

"We hope this will inspire others to work in this fascinating area in which participation has been discouraged in the recent past by a nearly total government monopoly." — Whitfield Diffie and Martin E. Hellman (New Directions in Cryptography, 1976) #cryptography #government #monopoly #freedom

"Again, we need to win political, not technological, victories in order to protect our privacy." — Hal Finney (Politics vs Technology, 1994) #politics #privacy

"The cypherpunk movement provides an intelligible, viable, and effective model of data activism and strategic agency." — Patrick D. Anderson (Of Cypherpunks and Sousveillance, 2022) #cypherpunk #dataactivism #resistance #agency

"Even more than monetary gain, personal data bestows power on those who collect and analyse it, and that is what makes it so coveted." — Carissa Véliz (Privacy is power (Aeon), 2019) #data #power #surveillance #privacy

"Most people are unaware of how visible email is. Email could be intercepted by a lot of parties along the way, it could be captured and logged, scanned and then used years later." — Philip Zimmermann (GrepLaw, 2003) #email #surveillance #privacy #interception

"That's why our primary defense isn't law, but technology." — Julian Assange (Forbes, 2010) #law #defense #wikileaks

"Building security from day one is much easier than adding it on as an afterthought." — Martin Hellman (Charles Babbage Institute Oral History, 2004) #security

"Cyberspace consists of transactions, relationships, and thought itself, arrayed like a standing wave in the web of our communications. Ours is a world that is both everywhere and nowhere, but it is not where bodies live." — John Perry Barlow (A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace, 1996) #cypherpunk #bitcoin #privacy #freedom #cyberspace #philosophy #digitalworld

"Trusted third parties are security holes." — Nick Szabo (Trusted Third Parties are Security Holes, 2001) #cypherpunk #bitcoin #privacy #freedom #security #trust #decentralization

"Privacy gives each of us more control over his own life—which on average, if not in every case, is likely to lead to a freer world." — David D. Friedman (The Case for Privacy, 2005) #cypherpunk #bitcoin #privacy #freedom #control

"Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech,' not as in 'free beer.'" — Richard Stallman (GNU Project, 1985) #cypherpunk #bitcoin #privacy #freedom #free-software #liberty #open-source

"What if everyone believed that law-abiding citizens should use postcards for their mail? If a nonconformist tried to assert his privacy by using an envelope, it would draw suspicion." — Philip Zimmermann (Why I Wrote PGP, 1991) #cypherpunk #bitcoin #privacy #freedom #encryption #conformity