Citadel Dispatch Episode CD193: FIPS – FIXING THE INTERNET

Host: Matt Odell (ODELL)
Guest: Arjun (FIPS Contributor)
Date: March 6, 2026

Overview

In this episode, Odell sits down with Arjun, lead contributor to the newly announced FIPS project (Free Internet Working Peering System). Their discussion dives into how FIPS aims to build a censorship-resistant, peer-to-peer networking protocol (built on Nostr) that lets individuals and communities communicate and share internet access with minimal reliance on centralized infrastructure. The conversation covers the technical, philosophical, and practical aspects of decentralized internet networking—a timely topic for Bitcoiners and freedom tech enthusiasts.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. What is FIPS? (00:47–03:37)

• Arjun: "FIPS is an attempt to do networking in a way that doesn't require any authority to be involved." (02:52)
  • Originates from the experience with Tollgate, allowing users to pay SATs for WiFi.
  • Problem: switching providers changes your IP (your internet 'identity'), which complicates hosting and stable access.

2. Peer-to-Peer Mesh Networking (03:43–07:12)

• Mesh allows internet access to be resold and shared person-to-person, forming networks without ISP middlemen.
• “With FIPS, everyone has a Nostr public/private key pair as their network identity. You connect peer-to-peer using those, regardless of medium—WiFi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, even satellite.” – Odell (04:55)
• FIPS separates the physical transport layer (e.g., WiFi, Bluetooth) from the routing/encryption layer. The protocol is agnostic to how data is physically transported. (05:53)

3. Discovery & Routing Across the Mesh (06:50–11:02)

• Discovery: Nodes can broadcast presence over the supported medium; connection initiated via Nostr pubkeys.
• Local Communication: Each node advertises its key, negotiates encrypted connections directly with nearby peers.
• Routing: Each node maintains a Bloom filter—a compressed list of peers it can reach (e.g., 10,000 NPUBs in 1KB). This greatly reduces lookup costs and enables scalable mesh routing. (09:05)
• Global Routing: Possible future step—nodes (akin to DNS servers) facilitate global communication, but in a decentralized and permissionless manner.

4. Real-World Use Cases: Censorship Resistance (12:15-14:05)

• Referenced examples like Iran’s internet shutdowns: users could still communicate internally, but broadcasting outside was hard.
• Arjun: “You can introduce a tunnel to the rest of the world from anywhere and it will be automatically discovered by the network. If you smuggle in a Starlink, the whole mesh regains global access.” (13:41)

5. Social & Technical Context (15:08–17:44)

• Nostr Conference & Sovereign Engineering: Origin of the idea to use NPUB-based addressing instead of IPs.
• noDNS: Precursor project, using signed Nostr messages as DNS records for flexible, rapid identity changes over the network.
• FIPS builds on this for seamless, stateless addressing.

6. Economic Incentives & Threats (17:44–19:35)

• Arjun: “Payment is a very important part… you want to be able to steer traffic based on economic incentives as well.” (17:10)
• Anti-DDoS: Nodes limit new connections; routing info does not include NPUBs, only node IDs derived from them—reducing attack surface.
• Odell: “The current internet just solved [DDoS] with centralization… lots of honeypots and central points of failure.” (19:10)

7. Bootstrapping, Backward Compatibility, and App Integration (21:52–26:57)

• Odell: “The core problem is bootstrapping—how do you get enough neighbors running it for it to be useful?” (21:52)
• FIPS can work over existing internet, easing adoption; no need to rewrite apps.
  • Integrates via a custom DNS server: existing apps query for NPUB.FIPS, get deterministic IPv6 address, and are transparently routed over FIPS.
  • Arjun: “It has to work with everything we already have.” (26:14)
• This design enables gradual rollout, especially in urban areas or high-density events (e.g., festivals).

8. Nostr, Key Management, and Privacy Considerations (40:29–43:57)

• Question of static vs. rotating identities: best practice is frequent rotation (like ephemeral MAC/IP addresses), except for persistent services.
• Key compromise: For critical hosting (e.g., community mint), combine with noDNS; use cold keys to publish which hot key is current (see 46:06–47:23).
• Arjun: "It's not meant to be tied to your Nostr social identity… should be rotated by default; only static for hosted services." (41:05)

9. Hardware/Protocol Limitations & Future Directions (32:20–35:55)

• WiFi/Ethernet are robust; lower-bandwidth protocols (like LoRa) may not fit current FIPS packet sizes.
• Hardware advances (e.g., WiFi on LoRa frequencies or Halo) may enable low-power long-range mesh in future.
• FIPS is designed to be simple and extensible—hardware experts can adapt it for new transports.

10. Trade-Offs, Pain Points, and the Skeptic’s Perspective (36:03–39:05)

• Odell shares mesh network skepticism, noting history of overhyped, failed attempts.
• Arjun: “It’s a very big aim… [but] we have new primitives now: Nostr, Blossom, Ecash. These have never been combined like this.” (37:36)
• Jonathan (co-contributor) described as an OG cypherpunk and cryptography expert—his endorsement gives the project credibility.

11. Privacy, Latency, and Censorship (48:09–50:39)

• FIPS is not an onion-routing network like Tor; privacy is hop-to-hop and end-to-end.
• Reduces reliance on singular ISPs—local communities can self-organize access and monitoring is more distributed, not focused in single points.
• Downsides: legal/moral debates on hosting access that could be misused, similar to Tor exit node dilemma. (51:00–53:12)
• Arjun: “Best way is to make everything open and free… let people solve abuse in the old-fashioned way, not by preemptively policing everything.” (52:14)

12. Getting Involved: Testing & Feedback (53:36–54:45)

• The repo includes manuals, test cases, Docker meshes, soon package builds for OpenWRT.
• Arjun: “Test it, give feedback, break it.” (56:40)

Memorable Quotes

• Odell, on FIPS’ potential:
  "If this works, it seems like it's kind of the holy grail that you stumbled on here, sir." (27:08)
• Arjun:
  "FIPS doesn't have to replace the Internet… if it already works local with say half a million people, you don't even need the traditional Internet." (27:49)
• Odell, summarizing the vision:
  "The Internet was supposed to be a network of peers. Somewhere along the way it became a network of subjects. FIPS is trying to make it a network of peers again." (56:31, via Opus bot)
• Arjun, on project philosophy:
  "Privacy and freedom of communication should be enforced by mathematics, not by policy." (Steelman quote, 55:10)

Timestamps of Key Segments

• About FIPS & Problem Statement: 02:52–04:13
• Peer Discovery, Mesh Structure: 06:50–11:02
• Censorship & Real-world Use Case: 12:15–14:05
• noDNS / Sovereign Engineering Backstory: 15:21–16:23
• Economic Incentives, Routing Attacks: 17:10–19:10
• Backward Compatibility & Practical Bootstrapping: 24:37–26:57
• Limits and Trade-Offs (Physical Layer): 32:20–35:55
• Key Management / Identity Risks: 40:29–43:57
• Community/Legal Questions (Tollgate analogy): 51:00–53:12
• How to Test/Contribute: 53:47–54:45
• Mic Drop Moment (Vision): 27:08

How To Participate

• Check out the [FIPS repository](link in show notes)
• Follow the guides for compiling, running local test meshes, or Docker deployments
• Test, break, and give feedback!
• Packaging for routers (OpenWRT) coming soon.

Final Thoughts

The FIPS project is early, ambitious, and potentially transformative for how communities and individuals access and share the internet under adversarial or censored conditions. By leveraging Nostr infrastructure, backward compatibility, and economic incentives, FIPS aims to be a modular, resilient, and pragmatic solution—not a utopian overhaul. The team is seeking testers, devs, and critical feedback.

Relevant Links:

• [FIPS GitHub Repo]
• [Sovereign Engineering]
• [Tollgate Project]
• [Arjun's Nostr npub (in show notes)]
• [Citadel Dispatch Feedback (primal.net/citadel)]

“Stay humble. Stack sats. Peace.” — Odell (57:44)