A crypto-focused venture capital firm, Paradigm, has purchased the answers to the legendary Kryptos sculpture's unsolved codes for nearly $1 million, taking over the baton from artist Jim Sanborn to vet future solutions.
The Kryptos sculpture, a fixture outside CIA headquarters since 1990, features four encrypted panels. While three were cracked decades ago, the 97-character fourth panel, K4, remained a persistent mystery. Artist Jim Sanborn, tired of fielding incorrect guesses and seeking a financial boost, decided to auction off the solutions to K4 and an unrevealed fifth panel (K5) in 2025.
Paradigm, co-founded by a Coinbase co-founder, acquired the answers in a November auction, paying $936,000 for the lot, which included a mini-sculpture model and other related items. Sanborn reportedly took home $770,000 from the sale.
The auction itself had drama, with two researchers claiming to have discovered the plaintext for K4 just weeks prior. However, they honored a promise not to release it, allowing the auction to proceed. Paradigm, which also backs AI and robotics ventures, sees owning the Kryptos secrets as a unique way to attract top talent, with partner Dan Robinson, a lifelong cryptography enthusiast, leading the charge.
Paradigm plans to encourage new attempts by charging a nominal $1 per submission and hosting contests with cash prizes for cracking smaller puzzles. The ultimate prize for solving K4 is not money, but the glory and exclusive access to a pre-recorded video message from Sanborn. While the researchers who found K4’s solution have reiterated their commitment to secrecy, the mystery of K5, which Sanborn suggests will become solvable once K4 is cracked, remains.
Even though Sanborn has passed on the official stewardship of his secrets, he remains somewhat involved, expecting people to still reach out. He even muses about embedding hints for K5 within future public art projects. The Kryptos sculpture continues to stand at CIA headquarters, a testament to enduring mystery and the evolving landscape of codebreaking, now with a crypto-savvy custodian.
