Picture the recipe for the perfect Internet-age thriller: Computer code. Sensitive data. Some business brains. Some hackers. Governments out to stop them.
Tiny island nations. Ties to a history of conflict, even armed combat, dating back to WWII. And a master plan to ensure world freedom.
Mix them all together, and you get Neal Stephenson's 1999 novel, Cryptonomicon.
You might also have the magic formula for an Internet media darling. A new startup, called HavenCo, aims to find out — by using the color of fiction to market a real-world business.
Stephenson's novel detailed a scheme to create a "data haven" on a fictitious South Pacific island nation, backed by a treasure trove of Nazi war gold.
A data haven, the author explains, is a place where individuals and organizations can store computer information safely — secure both from prying eyes and from the changing whims of government legislation. A true data haven guarantees that information stored within it will never be tampered with, stolen or subpoenaed.
Such a thing is tricky to set up, however. Stephenson's fictional characters took over 900 pages and 50 years to build their data haven. By a Saturday afternoon in early June, 32-year-old CEO Sean Hastings and his real-life HavenCo cohorts haven't quite made it yet — though not, they'll tell you, for lack of trying.
"We're still looking for a good lawyer," Hastings announces over the speakerphone. The remark elicits a chuckle from a group of a dozen or so journalists, crypto buffs, and online privacy activists gathered for an informal conference call. Not a shark in the bunch, it seems.
Also to be determined is a regular schedule for supply runs to HavenCo's headquarters. "We called out for pizza once," Hastings quips, "but they said we were outside their delivery area."
Not surprising, considering the company's actual location: a small platform in the North Sea, about 6 miles from the coast of England, called Sealand.
Despite HavenCo's much-publicized similarities, Hastings denies taking inspiration from Cryptonomicon. For one thing, the novel hadn't even been published when he and wife Jo started drawing up the plans in 1998.
And in truth, HavenCo has little hope of achieving the novel's ambitious goals. But when discussing the startup, the mild-mannered CEO almost rivals Neal Stephenson's flair for the drolly dramatic.
Calling from on-location via cell phone, he informs the audience that though "platform" might be an accurate description, Sealand is technically a "sea fortress." At other times, he refers to it by a more debatable description. Sealand, the claim goes, is the "smallest sovereign territory in the world."
For explanation, flash back to World War II, when Sealand was known as Roughs Tower. The British Admiralty had erected it and other fortresses like it as maritime gunning platforms, to fend off foreign air attacks.
But, still standing long after the last Luftwaffe bomber had terrorized England's skies, Roughs Tower had outlived its own usefulness. Following the conclusion of the War, Britain withdrew its troops from all such structures, leaving them essentially deserted.
That abandonment left Roughs Tower up for grabs, and in September 1967, a former British major named Paddy Roy Bates did precisely that. Only he didn't just assert property rites.
Via a clause under international law called "dereliction of sovereignty," Bates contended that his newfound territory was no longer a part of Great Britain. It was its own Principality. And Roy Bates — something of a wag — declared himself henceforth Roy of Sealand, the new nation's Prince.
Today, Sealand has its own currency, national anthem, constitution, flag, postage stamps, and much-counterfeited passports. The last 30 years' history has been mostly peaceful, though occasionally punctuated by minor tussles with its European neighbors, including warning shots fired at passing vessels.
The most dramatic episode came in 1978, following a hostile takeover of Sealand that included the kidnapping of Roy's son Michael. Roy and some friends recaptured his fort from the German and Dutch perpetrators in a spectacular armed helicopter assault.
This type of swashbuckling history works wonders for HavenCo, to spice up what otherwise might seem a mundane business plan. Stripped of theatrics, what HavenCo offers is simply colocation — a place to put your servers, equipped with a fat Internet pipe and trained IT personnel.
A number of companies provide similar services Stateside, including Exodus and Digex. But they don't have their own countries — so their customers run the risk of interference from Internet-hostile governments. They don't claim to have their own militaries, either.
"A certain number of Royal Guards are present on the platform," explains Chief Marketing Officer Jo Hastings to HavenCo's conference-call audience. Lending a clandestine touch, she adds, "I can't really disclose the exact number."
However many, those "Royal Guards" are armed. Shotguns, machine guns, and assault rifles are all said to be amongst the armaments available for repelling invasion attempts.
Sean Hastings hastens to add that HavenCo will leave all such physical defense to the government of Sealand. "I personally am not heavily armed," he jokes. "Unlike many of you cypherpunk types, I'm a sword guy."
"Cypherpunk types" are network security activists. They champion causes like free availability of strong cryptography and network access without government regulation. Cypherpunks are naturally attracted to a projects like HavenCo.
Indeed, by some accounts HavenCo was born when Jo and Sean Hastings had a chance encounter with noted cypherpunk Sameer Parekh, founder of the Oakland-based cryptography company C2Net, at a conference in 1998. Parekh is currently Chairman of HavenCo's Board.
Cypherpunks are also the first to buy into HavenCo's claims that it's doing a great service for humankind. Creating a place where anyone can store information and Internet applications, shielded from surveillance or other government interference, brings us one step closer to a truly free world, they say.
Or at least, that's the theory. Whether HavenCo can live up to such a lofty ideal is a different matter.
For the record, the United Kingdom does not recognize the sovereignty of Sealand.
So far, they just haven't paid it much attention. And while HavenCo claims its man-made island is independent, in truth the weakness of any island-bound online business will be its Internet connection; sever that, and the effect would be more profound than any naval blockade.
HavenCo claims it will have redundant connections installed "soon" — but in truth, it will always be at the mercy of the governments of the mainland nations that provide its service and the other businesses that route its traffic.
That's okay, though — so long as HavenCo doesn't make too many waves. To that end, child pornographers won't be welcome at the new data haven, nor will corporate saboteurs or spammers.
In fact, HavenCo's loosely-worded "usage policy" rules out just about anyone likely to bring international heat down on the fledgling operation. So much for universal freedom from regulation.
To its credit, HavenCo offers free colocation to "qualified Human Rights organizations." To date, Tibet Online and CryptoRights are among those to make the grade.
But though admirable, this hardly amounts to changing the world: more like another hedge against legal trouble. "We're hoping our work with Human Rights organizations will make people want to preserve our service," Jo Hastings explains.
Sean Hastings, too, admits that armed resistance isn't likely to get Sealand anywhere. "We'd rather countries recognized us because they believed it was the right thing to do," he says.
So what good is all the tough talk, I wonder, if ultimately HavenCo has to play by the same rules as everyone else? Despite the sensational marketing spin, it is, after all, just another colocation company.
Yet no sooner has the thought crossed my mind, than Sameer Parekh appears, in person, to greet the conference call audience. He's dressed in tan khakis and a striped shirt, sporting a long ponytail.
The article in Wired magazine is out of date, Parekh announces. HavenCo has now secured $3 million in angel funding, up from the printed $1 million.
Fantasy or no, HavenCo's banking it's got the makings of the Net's summer blockbuster.
