Dave Hrycyszyn's personal website

Coronavirus tracking app privacy - an introduction

Fri, 24 Apr 2020 09:00:00 +0000

I work on an open source project which protects user privacy, so naturally my friends have recently been asking me about coronavirus tracking apps. They seemed to get some benefit from the answers, so I thought writing our discussions up might be helpful for a more general audience. If you find it helpful, please share it!

How is it possible to both track people and to respect their privacy at the same time? Intuitively, it seems like a contradiction in terms.

Sphinx + WebAssembly for coronavirus tracking app privacy

Tue, 21 Apr 2020 10:11:17 +0000

Many privacy geeks have long regarded mixnets as one of the ultimate technologies for user privacy online. Up until now, they were the unicorns of the computer security world: you might have heard about them, but you’d never actually see one in action.

If you need a simple introduction to mixnets, I’ve previously written one. The short version: like Tor, mixnets bounce messages around between networked nodes (computers) in different locations, to obscure who is talking to who.

What's next for Nym?

Mon, 30 Mar 2020 10:11:17 +0000

In my past few posts, I’ve talked about some of the core technologies behind Nym, the privacy project I work on.

How are we planning to apply these technologies? What’s our plan for 2020?

Broadly speaking, it looks like this:

alpha - mixnet + centralised directory
beta - mixnet + decentralized directory + mixmining
full testnet - incentivised decentralized mixnet + credentials + service providers
hardening - game of mixology and hardening of the system
mainnet - the fully running system.

The mixnet alpha is what we’re running now. It launched at the end of 2019, at the Chaos Communications Congress. It provides rudimentary traffic-mixing capabilities. It is currently tied together by a centralised server (https://directory.nymtech.net), which isn’t super desirable but allowed us to bootstrap the system into existence.

Nym's Coconut Credentials - An Overview

Tue, 24 Mar 2020 10:11:17 +0000

Broadly speaking, the internet privacy project I work on, Nym currently has two core technologies.

The first is a mixnet that protects transport data and metadata. Mixnets work against even very strong state/corporate level adversaries who may want to deanonymize users by recording all TCP/IP packets as they transit the internet.

The Nym mixnet fulfils the promise of end-to-end network unlinkability – not only can it protect the content of messages, it also hides who is communicating with who, and the routes taken by individual packets.

A simple introduction to mixnets

Mon, 17 Feb 2020 11:50:04 +0000

I work for Nym, an internet privacy company. One of our technologies, a mixnet, can defend users against even very strong adversaries, like governments or large companies. Here’s how it works, described in a non-technical way.

We have already put out quite a bit of technical documentation about mixnets and privacy, and with the upcoming release of our whitepaper there will be a lot more. Probably the easiest half-hour introduction to the technical guts of a Loopix mixnet is this Usenix presentation video, if you’re a security nerd and want to have a look at that.

Nym Testnet - Up and Running

Mon, 27 Jan 2020 13:14:51 +0000

During the Chaos Communication Congress a few weeks ago, a group of people downloaded and built the initial version (0.1.0) of the Nym platform. Along with some other friendly souls, they became the proud operators of the brand new Nym testnet.

A bit of backstory.

The Nym mixnet will (eventually) be able to protect network privacy even against very strong attackers. It masks metadata to make it difficult or impossible to see who is communicating with who.

Handling the complexities of decentralisation at Vega

Tue, 18 Sep 2018 14:14:29 +0000

Over the past decade, decentralised computer systems have changed how we interact with the financial and economic system. The Bitcoin network is owned by no one, but trusted by its participants as a means to store and transfer value. Ethereum offers automatic contract execution that doesn’t rely on any one centralised server or authority.

These are the beginnings of a movement. It seems probable to me that other elements of the global financial and economic systems will go the same route. Insurance, capital markets, banking, and payment systems all spring to mind. Despite all of their undoubted problems, Bitcoin and Ethereum point the way towards an open source economy. Things that we formerly thought of as being the sole preserve of governments or large companies become programmable.

About Me

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

I’m Dave Hrycyszyn, and I’m a coder. I also like building up teams and organisations.

Born in northern Canada, a land of endless trees, lakes and rivers. As a young man, worked at a museum reconstructing antique firearms and shooting smoothbore artillery. It gave me a taste for researching and building strange things. Double-majored in history and political science. Self-taught software developer.

Moved to Cambridge (the UK one), then London, and co-founded a business building software for major companies across Europe. Grew to about 60 people, built hundreds of projects. Sold the company, then re-sold to the behemoth software engineering consultants Cognizant and got out. I like small organizations. I’m more Maas Biolabs than Hosaka, if you like your William Gibson refs.

Contact

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Follow me, @johndoe.

Projects

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Nothing to see here… Move along!