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Kim Vanvaeck, aka Gigabyte

Virus writer Kim Vanvaeck's chosen nickname-Gigabyte-also seems endearingly naive, the sort of word an old person would choose to sound high-tech-or a very young person, like the 16-year-old that she was when she began experimenting with computer viruses. Certainly her peers came to respect the name; other viruses were found that included messages like "HECHO EN ADMIRACION A GIGABYTE" in their payload. Vanvaeck engaged in a war for a while with Sophos Security's Graham Cluley, who she deemed patronizing and sexist, before being arrested at 19 in 2004 and giving up the virus game. Now she's a network security professional and has a homepage looking wistfully back at her past-but she's still Gigabyte on Twitter.

Credit: REUTERS/Andrew Winning

Gary McKinnon, aka SOLO

British hacker Gary McKinnon used his nickname as a calling card, not just for his fellow hackers, but for his targets. McKinnon broke into numerous U.S. government and defense systems, at one point leaving a message on a compromised machine declaring, "US foreign policy is akin to Government-sponsored terrorism these days ... I am SOLO. I will continue to disrupt at the highest levels." Ominous as that sounds, McKinnon later declared himself a "bumbling nerd" and claimed that he was mostly poking around looking for evidence of covered-up UFOs and supposed free energy tech that was being suppressed. He at least managed to avoid getting extradited to the United States.

Credit: flickr/the euskadi 11

George Hotz, aka geohot

Taking on a nickname or pseudonym is a very old tradition and goes across cultures. Walter O'Brien told me that it's common in Ireland where he grew up; after he dished out revenge on a high school bully, he became known as Scorpion, after a creature that's docile until pushed and loyal to its tribe. At 13, when he started hacking ARPANET, he naturally used Scorpion as his login; the name followed him to become the brand for his company and the title of the TV series based on his exploits. Many hackers' handles arise from similar youthful origins.

Credit: REUTERS/Jessica Rinaldi

Jonathan James, aka c0mrade

Jonathan James, who gained access to a NASA computer and downloaded navigation software for the International Space Station while he was still a teenager, considered himself a hactivist, which may explain why he chose the hacker nickname c0mrade. He served six months in federal prison as a juvenile in 2000. But it was another nickname that led to tragedy: in the wake of the 2007 hack of the TJX department store chains, investigators focused on a co-conspirator in the case who went by "J.J." James committed suicide and left a note in which he proclaimed his innocence but also claimed the government would pin the crime on him. James's own father didn't seem so sure.

Credit: flickr/Jarkko Laine

Jonathan Gillette, aka why the lucky stiff

In the '00s the man known as why the lucky stiff, or just plain _why, became a mainstay at Ruby conferences with his quirky presentations and charming publications. He hid in plain sight: appearing in public, but always under assumed names and paying for everything in cash. Then, one day in 2009, a bizarrely vituperative anonymous site revealed that he was a computer programmer and indie rocker from Utah named Jonathan Gillette-and _why vanished in an "infosuicide," removing just about his entire identity from the web, including his open source code. He eventually let it be known through intermediaries that he's fine, but wants to be left alone.

Credit: REUTERS/David McNew

?, aka Satoshi Nakamoto

The only thing bitcoin users know about the cryptocurrency's creator is his name: Satoshi Nakamoto. Most people assumed it was a pseudonym or nickname; many doubted whether it was even a single individual, speculating that the name was just a front for the group who created bitcoin. Last year, though, Newsweek made the audacious claim Satoshi Nakamoto was, in fact, a man named Satoshi Nakamoto, a Japanese-born engineer who lives in southern California and goes by Dorian. Despite a confusing interview in which he appeared to confirm that he was the mysterious Satoshi, Dorian eventually denied involvement, and Satoshi re-emerged online after years of silence to confirm that the two men are different people. The mystery remains.

Credit: flickr/Nick Ares

Reality can be monetized

Scorpion's O'Brien enthusiastically described to me what virtual reality will do for identity: give you the opportunity to change not only what you look like, but what others look like to you. Perhaps it's a yearning for this sort of mutable virtual identity that attracts hackers and programmers to nicknames. "Real" identities are tied to humdrum reality and dull questions like who, exactly, owns source code written under a pseudonym. Many privacy-obsessed techies were wary of Google Plus's real name policy because of the realization that it was to further the monetization of your real identity.

Credit: flickr/Alan Light

Steve Wozniak, aka Rocky Clark

And, after all the armchair psychoanalysis I've done in this article, that's perhaps the biggest motivation to use a nickname or pseudonym: for privacy, so people don't know who you are. And it can work remarkably well. Take tech legend Steve Wozniak, for instance: he took what he thought would be a year off from UC Berkeley to earn some money, and along the way co-founded Apple. A decade later, he returned to get his engineering degree, under the entirely pedestrian name "Rocky Clark." Surprisingly few people noticed. The diploma was issued in Clark's name, but Woz gave the commencement speech the year he finally graduated.