Private Together
At Nym, we believe that privacy is a fundamental right for everyone. Our mission is to create technology that empowers individuals to take control of their digital lives, to overcome barriers to information, and to foster a global community dedicated to making it possible.
Nym's principles
Decentralized
No central point of failure. A network designed to protect everyone's data and activities from surveillance.
Trustless
Private by design. Nym's zero-knowledge network takes trust out of the equation when it comes to who handles your data.
Tokenized
Incentivized network performance. Powered by the NYM utility token to ensure the economic sustainability of operators who make possible the most anonymous network available.
Open Source
Publicly auditable code. All Nym software can be audited by anyone, anytime. Peer validation ensures that it is secure and of the highest quality. And no backdoors!
Permissionless
Anyone can join and run Nym software. Spin up a Nym node yourself and contribute to Nym's mission of providing privacy to all.
Collective
A private network built together. The Nym network is possible through a global community of operators, privacy enthusiasts, and activists.
The Nym team
Harry Halpin
CEO and Chairman of Scientific Board
Harry is the CEO and co-founder of Nym Technologies. He was previously a senior research scientist at MIT where he led the standardization of the Web Cryptography API, and at Inria de Paris on socio-technical systems and privacy. Harry earned his PhD in Informatics and Philosophy from the University of Edinburgh.
Alexis Roussel
Chief Operating Officer
Alexis is Nym's COO and co-founder. Before Nym, he established Bity, a Swiss crypto brokerage and financial services firm, and led the Swiss Pirate Party in support of privacy rights. He has had roles at the International Court of Justice and the United Nations. He earned his Masters in Law from the Sorbonne University in Paris.
Claudia Diaz
Chief Scientist
Claudia is Nym’s Chief Scientist Office and a part-time Associate Professor at KU Leuven (COSIC). She specializes in developing and analyzing online privacy protection technologies, particularly those safeguarding metadata against surveillance. Claudia earned her PhD in Engineering, Computer Security, and Privacy from KU Leuven.
Jaya Klara Brekke
Chief Strategy Officer
Jaya leads the development of the Nym ecosystem of operators, community, business development, and comms. She is an advocate for privacy as the foundation for human rights and has spoken about and written numerous papers on decentralized technologies. Jaya holds a PhD in Digital Geography from Durham University.
Mark Sinclair
Chief Technology Officer
Mark leads Nym's Technology and Development teams, bringing extensive experience as a tech leader and co-founder of multiple startups, notably in sectors with high security / privacy constraints such as healthcare. He holds a PhD in Computer Vision and Image Processing from the University of Edinburgh.
Chelsea Manning
Security and Public Relations
Chelsea is a specialist in secure hardware and PR representative for Nym. As a former US Army soldier who disclosed classified military and diplomatic documents to WikiLeaks to reveal civilian casualties and human rights violations, she knows well the need for digital privacy and the scope of global surveillance capacities.
Ania Piotrowska
Head of Research
Ania leads Nym's Research team on security, distributed systems, and anonymous communication, including onion routing and mix networks. She also explores blockchain in the context of cryptocurrency privacy. Ania has a PhD in Computer Science from the University College London.
Robinson Jardin
Head of Marketing
Robinson is the Head of Marketing at Nym, leading the company to drive growth and brand awareness. He was previously NordVPN's Head of Digital and Social Media, turning it into a leading brand in cybersecurity. He has a Master in Design History from the University of Oxford.
Nym Advisory Board
Prof. George Danezis
Security and Privacy Engineering expert
George is the Co-founder and Chief Scientist at Mysten Labs, and one of the designers of Sui Blockchain. He is also a Professor of Security and Privacy Engineering at the Department of Computer Science, University College London, and a faculty member since 2013. With a research focus on secure communications, privacy-preserving systems, blockchains, and decentralization, George has authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications in leading international conferences and journals. Previously, he co-founded Chainspace, a pioneering sharded smart contract platform, before the team moved to work on the Facebook Libra project.
Prof. Aggelos Kiayias
Cybersecurity and Privacy expert
Aggelos is the Chair in Cybersecurity and Privacy and the Director of the Blockchain Technology Laboratory at the University of Edinburgh. He also serves as the Chief Scientist at Input Output, a blockchain research and engineering company best known for the development of Cardano. With research spanning blockchain technologies, cryptography, e-voting, and privacy Aggelos has authored over 200 publications in leading journals and conferences. He is a recipient of the BCS Lovelace Medal and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Ben Laurie
Security Engineer, privacy and civil liberties activist
Ben is a founding member of the Apache Software Foundation and the creator of Apache-SSL, which powers over half of the world’s secure Web sites. He is also a core team member of OpenSSL, the most widely used open-source cryptographic library, and an active contributor to FreeBSD. Ben is passionate about privacy and civil liberties, and was on the WikiLeaks’ Advisory Board. Recently, Ben has been honoured with the prestigious Levchin Prize for his contributions to cryptography. Currently, he works at Google as a Principal Engineer.
Prof. Bart Preneel
Cryptology and Information Security expert
Bart is the head of the COSIC research group at KU Leuven University. His work spans the design and analysis of cryptographic algorithms, information security, privacy, and secure hardware. Bart has authored over 400 scientific publications and is the inventor of five patents. He has served as president of the IACR and is a member of the Royal Flemish Academia of Belgium and of the Academia Europaea. He has received numerous prestigious honours, including the RSA Award for Excellence in Mathematics, the IFIP TC11 Kristian Beckman Award, and the ESORICS Outstanding Research Award.
Other Nym advisors
Prof. Daniel J. Bernstein
Mathematician, cryptologist, computer scientist
Daniel is renowned for his seminal contributions to cryptography. His work focuses on designing cryptographic systems to proactively reduce risks. His widely deployed designs include X25519, Ed25519, ChaCha20, dnscache, qmail, SipHash (co-designed with Jean-Philippe Aumasson), Streamlined NTRU Prime (with various co-designers) and Classic McEliece (with various co-designers). In 2003, he coined the term "post-quantum cryptography”.
Karthikeyan Bhargavan, PhD
Co-founder and Chief Scientist, Cryspen
Karthik is the Chief Research Scientist at Cryspen. Previously, he held the role of Research Director at Inria Paris. His work focuses on programming languages, software verification, applied cryptography, and the design and analysis of security protocols. Notably, he played a key role in the design, analysis, and standardization of TLS 1.3.
Prof. Carmela Troncoso
Computer security and privacy expert
Carmela, an Associate Professor at EPFL, leads the SPRING Lab, which focuses on Security and Privacy Engineering. Her research explores the societal impact of technology, the development and analysis of privacy-enhancing technologies, and the intersection of machine learning with security and privacy. During the pandemic, she notably spearheaded the development of the DP-3T protocol, enabling COVID-19 contact tracing while safeguarding individual privacy. Carmela has authored over 100 articles published in leading peer-reviewed conferences.
NYM Roadmap
2018–2020: Cypherpunks dream of mixnets
2018–2020: Cypherpunks dream of mixnets
- 2018: Inception of the Nym mixnet
- 2019: First mix nodes and validators onboarded after launch at Chaos Computer Congress
- Pre-seed funding round led by Binance Labs: 2.5M CHF
- Nym Litepaper published
- Mixnet built in Rust for better performance
- Tokenized “Nymph” testnet open to public
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- Nym wallet and explorers launched
2021: Year of the Mainnet
2021: Year of the Mainnet
- Finney and Milhon testnets completed
- Nym whitepaper published
- Closed Polychain led seed round funding: 6M CHF
- Closed a16z led funding round: 13M CHF
- Nyx chain launched
- Token generation event
- Nym tokenized mainnet live
2022: Incentivizing privacy
2022: Incentivizing privacy
NYM token and tooling
- NYM token public sale on CoinList
- Mix nodes, staking, token liquidity, and custody introduced into Nym ecosystem
- New Nym Wallet released
- NymConnect app released via SOCKS5 proxy
- Nym clients enabling custom integrations released
- Nym tokenomics paper published: Reward sharing for mixnets
- Telegram, Electrum Wallet, Matrix, and Keybase integrations via NymConnect
Community foundations
- Universal Privacy Alliance co-founded with Manta, Secret, Orchid, ECC, Status, Oasis, Aztec, Aleo, MobileCoin, Anoma, and Railgun
- First Nym Shipyard Academy with 6k participants
- First round of Shipyard grants
- Nym Innovation Fund launched
2023: Becoming a global community
2023: Becoming a global community
Nym tooling
- Rust and typescript SDKs released
- Zk-nyms announced at SXSW
- Mixfetch launched
- Nym SDK released
- NymVPN Litepaper published
- NymVPN presented at Chaos Communication Congress
- Nymvpn.com launched
The Nym Network
- Ecosystem in Latin America established, growing to 30+ nodes in the region
- Nym Shipyard Academy with 2000+ registrations
- Nymja ambassador program launched
- Nym mixnet integrations with Blockstream green, Monero, Alephium wallets
- Chainsafe partnership for shielded Ethereum consensus clients
- Partnerships with Side protocol, Aztec, Near, and Woleet
- London and Paris offices opened
- First community censorship tests
- Delegations Program (30M NYM) launched to support decentralization and Nym node operator growth
2024: Launching NymVPN
2024: Launching NymVPN
- NymVPN blog launched
- NymVPN Alpha launched for private testing
- NymVPN Help Center and Customer Support launched
- NymVPN Beta launched for free, public testing
- Android, Linux, and Windows localizations in 10+ languages
- NymVPN Fast Mode integrated with WireGuard protocol
- Censorship resistance research project started
- Launch of Nym Trust Center
- Launch of zk-nyms for unlinkability
- Major network leaks on DNS and IPv6 plugged
- Nym rebrand and new consolidated Nym web presence on nym.com
- Early bird access to NymVPN and first paying customers
2024: Growing the Nym Network & Community
2024: Growing the Nym Network & Community
- Nym Squad League launched
- “Project Smoosh” enables operators to run both mix node and gateway mode
- New rewards scheme for Nym nodes with gateway rewarding
- First public security audit of the Nym network
- Nym Delegations Program scaled up with rolling registrations, community-built applicant management system, and an increased budget of 40m NYM
- New Nym node operator tooling
- Nym Operators and Validators Terms & Conditions
- Scaled to 30+ entry and exit gateways
2025: New NymVPN features
2025: New NymVPN features
- Censorship resistance
- Killswitch and lockdown mode
- Autoconnect
- Split tunneling
- Ad blocker
- Post-quantum security
- Secure key management and optimization
2025: Improving the Nym network
2025: Improving the Nym network
- Scale NymVPN to 100k users
- Scale to 50+ entry and exit gateways
- Censorship resistant gateways and extended gateway use cases
- Extend mixnet support to blockchains
- Partner with reliable privacy apps like Signal messenger and Brave browser
Nym Supporters
