About Cyberswaraj

Cyberswaraj brings people together around digital privacy and freedom technology. Some arrive with everyday questions. Others want to understand protocols, hardware and infrastructure.

Our first gathering was at Bitspace in January 2025, under the name Unfuck the Internet. We talked about privacy, Nostr and mesh networks. A later event looked at how to tell whether a tool gives its users control over their identity and data.

In the room

The questions come from different places. Someone wants to know what an app collects. Someone else wants to examine the hardware beneath it. Both can be part of the same conversation.

In July 2025, Abhay, Vivek and Basanta took questions about hardware surveillance, phones and self-hosting. That event was recorded and became podcast episode five. The audio lets people outside the room follow the discussion too.

Starting with the phone

In early 2026, a privacy advocate who had attended an event helped design an introduction for everyday people. Privacy 101 grew from the questions he wanted more people to be able to ask.

The beginner events became practical too. In May, a speaker walked through a phone running open-source alternatives, then participants tried changes on their own devices.

Different ways into the subject

Other events have followed the cables, towers and routers underneath the internet, or used a watch party to start a conversation about surveillance. The format changes with the subject.

Recordings of live discussions sit alongside other conversations in the Podcast section. When an event has a recording, we link it from the event history as well.