From Fiction to Encryption: Cyberpunks and Cypherpunks, Rebels with Style and Rebels with Code in Web3

Katarzyna Hasnik
Aug 31
6 min read

Updated: Sep 29

If you have wandered into the world of Web3, you have probably come across two words that sound almost identical yet mean very different things: cyberpunk and cypherpunk. They are easy to confuse, but together they capture both the style and the substance that define the space, in some ways united in many distinguish.

From Fiction to Encryption: Cyberpunks and Cypherpunks, Rebels with Style and Rebels with Code in Web3

Cyberpunks: Rebels with Style

Think neon lights, rain-soaked streets, hackers in trench coats, and giant corporations pulling the strings. This is the stuff of sci-fi novels and films like Blade Runner. Cyberpunk is a genre, a style, an aesthetic, a world where technology is powerful but often dystopian. It shows how tech can magnify inequality and control, but also how rebels and outsiders push back. Cyberpunks are fictional rebels in dark futures.

Cypherpunks: Rebels with Code

Swap the neon rain for mailing lists and cryptography. Cypherpunks are a real movement of people who started in the 1990s. Their belief: privacy matters, and the best way to protect it is through strong cryptography. They built and advocated for tools like encrypted email, anonymous remailers, and eventually helped lay the philosophical and technical groundwork for Bitcoin. Cypherpunks are actual rebels using code to defend freedom and privacy.

In Web3

The cyberpunk vibe inspires the look and feel of many projects: avatars, art, and even marketing. But the cypherpunk philosophy is what is under the hood: decentralisation, permissionless systems, financial privacy, and the idea that code can protect people better than laws sometimes do. It is a bit like cyberpunks gave us the aesthetic dream, and cypherpunks gave us the toolkit to make parts of it real.

What means permissionless?

In the context of Web3 and blockchain, permissionless basically means that anyone can use the system, participate, or build on it without needing approval from a central authority.

Here’s a simple way to think about it:

Traditional finance: If you want to open a bank account or trade stocks, the bank or broker has to approve you, check your documents, and decide whether you can participate. That is permissioned.
Permissionless system: On a blockchain like Bitcoin or Ethereum, Solana, anyone with an internet connection can send transactions, create smart contracts, or interact with the network without asking anyone for permission. There is no gatekeeper.

So in short, permissionless = open to all, no central authority deciding who can participate.

It is a key cypherpunk principle because it ensures freedom, decentralisation, and censorship resistance. 1. Wallets When you create a crypto wallet, no bank or government asks for permission. You generate your keys and immediately have access to the network. You are your own bank. That is permissionless in action: anyone can create a wallet and start interacting with the blockchain.

2. NFTs Anyone can mint, buy, or sell NFTs on a permissionless platform. There is no central authority deciding who gets to create art or who can trade it. This opens the market to everyone, not just galleries or licensed sellers.

3. DeFi (Decentralised Finance) DeFi platforms allow you to lend, borrow, or trade assets directly with smart contracts. No bank needs to approve your loan, and no broker decides if you can trade. It’s all governed by code. That means even someone in a country without access to traditional banking can participate.

4. DAOs (Decentralised Autonomous Organisations) Anyone can join a DAO if they hold the token that gives voting rights. There is no HR department or CEO gatekeeping membership. Participation is open to anyone who meets the network rules.

Why it matters Permissionless systems make Web3 more inclusive, censorship-resistant, and decentralised. They follow the cypherpunk ethos: the network is open to all, and you do not need to trust a central authority to participate safely.

Permissionless systems are open to everyone without needing approval from a central authority. You can create a wallet, trade NFTs, use DeFi, or join a DAO freely.

The flip side: Because there is no gatekeeper, you are fully responsible for your funds and actions. Mistakes or hacks cannot be reversed, unlike in traditional banks or platforms.

It is freedom with full responsibility.

Liberty Statue stands firm together with Responsibility Statue and vice versa.

In Web3, permissionless systems give you liberty the freedom to create, trade, and interact without anyone saying yes or no. But that freedom comes with responsibility you must manage your keys, verify transactions, and protect yourself from scams or mistakes.

Think of it like two statues standing side by side: Liberty cannot exist safely without Responsibility and Responsibility only has meaning if there is Liberty to exercise.

In Web3, they are inseparable. You get freedom but you also carry the consequences. Freedom comes first. Safety follows from accountability.

In permissionless systems, the network does not rely on a central authority to enforce rules. Instead, the system itself, through code and consensus, ensures safety. This is why trust is not placed in a single entity but in the design and transparency of the network.

In other words, you are free to act, but the network’s structure holds everyone accountable, creating safety without needing blind trust, that's why is called trustless. In Web3, trustless does not mean you cannot trust anyone. It means you do not need to trust a single person or central authority because the system itself enforces rules through code and mathematics.

For example:

On a blockchain, transactions happen automatically according to the rules of the network. You do not need to trust a bank or broker to process it correctly.
Smart contracts execute actions exactly as programmed, so you do not need to trust the other party to follow through.

In short: trustless systems replace personal or institutional trust with verifiable code and consensus, making the network secure and reliable without relying on any one individual or company.

Cyberpunk Energy in Web3

You see it in the style: NFT profile pictures with neon visors, glitchy artwork, and dystopian taglines about breaking free from the system. Hackathons sometimes feel like mini cyberpunk conventions where everyone is building in dimly lit rooms, surrounded by cables and energy drinks. It is the mood, the rebellious edge, the idea that we are living in a high-tech future that does not quite belong to us yet.

Cypherpunk Energy in Web3

This is the backbone. The reason blockchains exist is straight out of the cypherpunk playbook: distrust central authorities, use cryptography to build systems that cannot be shut down, and let people interact peer-to-peer. Smart contracts, zero-knowledge proofs, and self-custody wallets are all cypherpunk dreams turned into working code.

Blended Together

A DeFi protocol might look cyberpunk with cool graphics and edgy branding but act cypherpunk with mathematically enforced trust and no gatekeepers. A DAO could feel cyberpunk like a ragtag guild in a futuristic world but be cypherpunk in practice with transparent, decentralised governance. Web3 is a mashup: the aesthetic imagination from cyberpunks plus the real cryptographic philosophy from cypherpunks.

Big Tech vs the Punks

Big Tech wants centralisation. One login, one cloud, one company holding your data for convenience. It is polished, safe-looking, and definitely not rebellious. Think walled gardens, app stores, and algorithmic feeds deciding what you see.

Cyberpunks imagine the nightmare version of that: mega-corporations owning the future, surveillance everywhere, humans more like cogs than free beings. They warn us through fiction, showing what happens if we do not push back.

Cypherpunks do not just warn, they build. They code around the problem so you do not need to trust Google, Facebook, or governments. If Big Tech says trust us, cypherpunks say verify in math.

Big Tech is centralised power, cyberpunks are the storytellers of what goes wrong, and cypherpunks are the coders who try to keep us from living in those dystopian stories.

The Takeaway

Cyberpunks warn us through fiction. Cypherpunks defend us through code. Web3 borrows its neon style from one and its cryptographic backbone from the other. The result is a movement that feels like science fiction made real, where cyberpunks and cypherpunks, rebels with style and rebels with code, are shaping the future together.

It is a world where freedom comes first, but liberty is inseparable from responsibility. Permissionless and trustless systems put power directly into the hands of participants, meaning users must manage their own security while benefiting from decentralisation. Web3 is not just about flashy visuals or edgy narratives, it is about creating open, accountable systems where anyone can participate, innovate, and build the future without waiting for permission. Read more e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypherpunk