NetWatch: Cyberpunk's Net Police, From NetCops to the Blackwall
The short version
NetWatch is a London-based, worldwide Net-policing organization that grew from a corporate security firm. After the 2022 DataKrash it tried to contain rogue AIs, and in 2077 it works to keep the Blackwall intact and netrunners away from what's behind it.
On this page
What NetWatch is#
NetWatch started as a London private security company hunting hackers and computer criminals for corporate clients. European Community lobbying earned it a tenuous global charter in 2013 under a US and Eurotheater treaty, and it has been the Net's police ever since.
It runs on other people's money. Governments, corporations and other large organizations pay for its equipment and staff, and in exchange NetWatch patrols the Net and goes after cybercrime. Its netrunners work beats that can cover a city, a region or a continent.
How a NetCop works#
The goal is arrest and imprisonment. The method includes Black ICE, programs that kill or maim, which NetWatch has been known to use on opposition. Its netrunners carry very powerful software, and the nicknames tell you the culture: NetCops, Wolves, Weasels and the Icemen.
The motto, Vos Videmus, is Latin for "we see you". For an organization whose job is to watch everyone online, it is at least honest about it. Compare the freelance netrunners who work in the same space and spend their careers dodging it.
After the DataKrash#
In 2022 the RABIDS virus tears the Old Net apart (see the Net). NetWatch cannot reverse the damage or neutralize the AIs, so it changes mission: contain the dangerous AIs and secure what can be saved from the Old Net. In 2025 it declares the Net officially down.
Over the 2030s and 2040s NetWatch oversees corporate CitiNets, local networks in reclaimed cities. In 2044 it contacts surviving AIs to work on bringing the Old Net under control. The project does not exist in official records and is known only as the Black Wall.
It becomes the Blackwall. Rumor says NetWatch could not have done it without help from the rogue AIs, who wanted to be hidden from humans for reasons of their own.
NetWatch in 2077#
By 2077 the Blackwall is still active, and NetWatch works overtime to stop anyone from damaging it. The gang most invested in breaking it is the Voodoo Boys, and a NetWatch employee, Bryce Mosley, is tasked with stopping a breach.
Other powers want in. Everyone wants the wall. NetWatch is the guard.
Spoilers NetWatch spoilers: who else wants the wall
Militech tried to revive Project Cynosure, an early attempt at capturing rogue AIs, to turn the Blackwall into a weapon. The New United States government also showed an unhealthy interest, through its netrunner Songbird in Phantom Liberty.
Fixer's notes#
Opinion: NetWatch is a good villain because its job is to protect the world, and it is wrong in all the ways that count. It built a wall that works as a band-aid, it spies on every user, and it cannot say what the wall really is. A group like that does not need to be evil, just secretive.
At the table, NetWatch is the thing that turns up when a netrunner pokes somewhere they should not. Do not use it as a monster chasing the players. Use it as consequence: a quiet message, a traced connection, and an offer to forget everything.
For the corporations that fund it, see the megacorporations page.
Explore#
- Official