On-Chain Privacy VS Radical Transparency

Transcript

So it easy is uh the Ethereum community here which the main aim is to make uh Ethereum event and crypto event like cyber cyber punk again. So this means to promote uh who is really building stuff and who is really have something to say more than I don't know like something like a pay to win of someone who pay to talk or sponsor and stuff and we're also like uh working on uh on different opensource uh projects and things. So we want to make like give voice to cool stuff basically as it was like once upon a time. So um this is the first event.

uh each event uh recordings and uh and uh and everything like also like uh pills, debates they they go on YouTube at it as you can see and also there is the uh text version if you prefer to read which is also go on medium at it and uh so also we uh upload like a lot of bills and stuff from the event. So if you just you know like want to see like something like interesting like this last like five minutes and stuff like you have everything and also uh our main channel for news for things and also to you know like say

stuff is on X and also we are opening like Instagram where we basically like publish a lot of you know like uh shorts and stuff like hot takes from uh from each event and uh obviously the main um the main uh community is on the telegram group at it as usual and the main web page is it.g Okay. And so like today is one of the biggest event actually uh because uh it's not just a talk and a discussion after but we start actually by a discussion which is uh the

Q&A to uh to Saul that he uh uh uh talk at the the last event about ZK about we can say like everything about ZK K basically because it was like a huge talk to understand deeply how ZK works and it was amazing. So I recommend you all of you to go back to YouTube and and watch it. Then we have uh basically we have a very special talk uh because as for example Samuel is a privacy maker we have a a special talk from a privacy breaker.

So, and how it's easy actually to find out who you are from your wallet and u then we have a debate about this talk and then we have a debate with uh a privacy maker versus a privacy breaker. So, uh okay. So, the next event uh it's also will be next Wednesday. Uh it's also will be pretty much interesting because we have Matthew Tambusi from material community fund about this project which is pretty much like uh I can say like try to find the truth basically because you know that now we

have like Wikipedia, Groipedia and all of this you know like more political point of view about what is real, what is not and uh in this research from the community fund they actually try to solve this problem in very difficult way with very difficult incentive. So it would be like a very interesting topic actually and then what we do before Christmas like we still have the event uh 05 and event 07 uh 06 which is like December 10 and December 17. So what we are organizing for the uh 05 it will be like a debate from uh uh like a table uh with some D5 van veterans talking about you know like uh I'm

trying to organize with people who work in D5 actually in in protocols uh people who outit protocols and people who break protocols and try to have a conversation about all the about DeFi basically. >> [laughter] >> And then uh in the 17 we still have to decide. So uh we will see if you have some ideas like after the event like it will be amazing to to have like I don't know we can organize everything and so now we start uh in03 >> let me to start uh with introducing myself. So I I am ion chain and uh I am as leon chain so doing investigation on

exploits um criminal activity and dislike of stuff and uh I have I introduce um actually the main problem of the blockchain. So people thinking um the blockchain give them privacy from the beginning uh like using checks and uh so infl um open a wallet uh folded with with checks and uh so for them that that that it means uh is uh is the normal standard pro process for uh embark on the on the blockchain.

But um from the beginning um the the the blockchain was created with the promise of restoring uh sovereignity, individual through uh radical transparency and uh at the same uh that same transparency uh original future has quite become one of the biggest uh vulnerabilities and um people doesn't understood what uh what it means doing uh a lot of transactions uh interaction with apps minting NFTTS and all type of action you you can do on

on the blockchain source let's start to the uh transparency paradox uh let me slide so um In this presentation uh I will explain what what is the main character will be broke the the the blockchain uh sorry guys what will what will broke the the privacy and the blockchain. So um the the onchain surveillance uh at the moment uh we can do a lot of

things on the blockchain. So we can uh we can do a lot of we can do a lot a lot of type of action and uh people after doing every single uh action they don't think about this uh um all these events will be uh storage and will remain like a digital footprint on the on the blockchain and everyone can uh check that analyze that and do some some research for find some information related to the individual or the entity.

So let's take an example like people they love use ENS name or use NFD like uh as a PFP on on on X or maybe uh use uh the new um new era of web three social platform like forecaster the bank uh and the and etc. uh other things uh like to do uh participating to drop giveaway and so publish them address on on X or maybe just connected to um a list where where where you can view if

you your wallet is eligible to their eyrop um and constantly um using the same DAS and the same protocols and all All all of these type um of interaction they leaving some um so many information and how we can pro it. So we very simple things via oint. So uh I think is the main um is the main weapon uh people can use for track an individual RN just taking just

using um like a trace uh this type of interaction I mentioned before and uh it's very easy you you don't need any type of skills like to be a tech guy uh for like a hacker or something like that but just using um onchain traces and uh you can rebuild the old history um did the individual behind the B. So um most of the time I think uh uh the main things uh I use it I have used it for

truck criminals and exploiter um it was the ENS name. So people they love to use it for everything. So he made someone mint ins name and at the same time using the same name for and personal uh his personal uh social media accounts. It's very easy uh track it with only um using a different combination Google parking.

So um just searching on Google and you can um you can find everything related that guy uh or other things it's very enthusiast about his NFT collection maybe is the I don't know part of community uh of bate or cryptos me so you can use the the p the NFT for truck or the wallet or maybe uh directly with um Google via the search searching page you can find all the suits the same PFP and uh so that's is very

big damage so people literally doxit themselves with living including this type of information uh other very um practice most use it from the user on the blockchain. So it's to share them address publicly on under tweet uh for um participating a giveaway air drop and this like stuff. Uh and the last things I think very damage for people is like using the bank they introduce the part of social media.

So you can share all type of content you want like or like for caster the same things it's very easy uh find the hand behind the wallet because you can share your uh discord account your account with connect connect it with the bank or or other other social media platform most uh so that is the I I already state that so but we can we can talk about other things so from this digital footprint like NFT and social media platform you

can track um the entity behind just using other uh um most use it on the awesome perform like um you can cross the information you have extracted from uh that type of interaction uh using data bridge you can find a lot of type of information so like on on crypto happening so many data breach like um I don't know bit bit it was breached whole of of checks was was breached and Just you using the username you can find the name and

surname and you can just try other combination of hos and via um datab bridge you can cross check the information and match it and for for identify the individual or the entity behind it. So it's very easy. There are many providers actually uh giving the easy access to um take um easy subscription for um check the information in your head.

uh so I think the this is all people thinking are very easy and don't about what they need to manage uh they um them wallets or them action on blockchain. So the obstac is the most important things. Um the people using only one wallet for everything. So let's take an example uh a subject meets domain then starting to do so many transaction uh using the same dots uh

his word everywhere. um and without using multiple wallets for change his routine uh on on blockchain. So uh it's very easy in any type of situation I did like minutes for someone behind that activities uh and the people don't think to use multiple wallets like one of jobs way and it's like one wallet for him things like uh for many collection,

one was for trading on defy uh or maybe using for uh moving funds to defy checks. Uh so people um the things like standard so normal it's uh it's very important to to take high uh the the transaction in gine so that is um I think it's the pillar of privacy because most of the time let's take an example the cases I'm actively I'm managing for truck exploiters

uh it's one of the par parameters I'm using for broke uh the identity of the individual so Uh most of the time the exploiter using the same uh strategy how how they moving the phones like they found uh a wallet with a tornado cashache or a rail gun then they split the uh the phones or um to multiple wallets and uh they start to uh attack the the DS. uh let's take an example uh uh in the case of arc arc digital per text where uh I have finded the

explained just using the timing analysis um where in the in the same days the same transaction um using one vulnerability inside the DS and he did um a collateral uh and this is a pattern people don't think about uh it's I think the the pillar of everything. Uh you can uh you can image um very easy uh just memor memorizing the the timing where he did the transaction and which t use uh and

so from that you can directly um intercept the guy. Uh ZK I think is the the most important things actually is the future for um privacy on chain because there are not um other uh possibility to to take it back um like from the beginning. Um and so Zik uh actually they are using not for privacy uh on chain like I want to be um I I I don't want to uh anyone know who

is behind the behind my wallet but uh actually they are using in in in the bad way. So there is most projects very cool like cash uh tech and um many uh privacy tools uh but they are most of them they are using very badly like tornado cash ray gun. So I think every every every single exploiters uh moves all funds inside tornado cashache and um it was also very bad because uh there are many reason where you can uh track the the

transaction you um using um deposited on tornado cash like just using timing analysis uh and the size of the amount deposited inside. Um the the bad things it's uh people like these exploiters um using this this for stole phones for from people then um take take high they trying to take high uh them privacy. uh but um not not not uh not all of them there are most practice to how

mix them money and uh this is the this sympatic things because um in other one case I got someone uh phon uh his wallet use it for do um for do an exploit uh it was funded uh 24 hours before uh using a checks. So it was like uh broke his hops like uh 10 minutes. Um and that's this is the bad things because there there there are not many good motivation uh from the users using this um these these dubs like tornado or rail gun um

for take privacy because now actually they all of them uh sanctionated by um the off and um uh it's it's it's not the the it's not a good reason why the you need to take your privacy high. So um I think uh project like like Zach um attempt um privacy pools uh they did uh they are doing a good work actually for um taking back uh in a good way um the the

technology zero knowledge. The main uh the main uh important things is to use these protocols in a great way for for for the real reason uh for take care about uh your hopsc uh your privacy and don't uh for take for don't take any type of risk or the anonymize yourself um very easily and uh so I think uh Blockchain is a freedom for everyone and there is not um a good reason for try to uh take him for from someone even if uh

he did something off Frank. And um the the the ethic of the zero knowledge is to to take privacy for uh and take care about yourself um for your information and um don't risk uh any bad situation like um so many KS sharing them PNL or showing them address on X and uh for the hand. I've been so many times uh where they kidnap uh this this type of people showing and doxing themsel on social

media. Uh it's very badly to to see that that this bad this type of stuff. So I think um the use case the main use case is for don't risk this type of situation and um and take care for yourself. So that's it. >> Okay. Hello Mr. Eison on chain. So I have like five questions for you. Allow me to start. So, uh, the first one would be when you're investigating some type of a project, what are the initial things that you look to to check for you to determine if it's like a scam or if

it's a fraudulent project or if the people are legit? What do you look for initially? The first things uh I'm looking if the wallet it's aged if you did some interaction um with the so like everyone so doing swaps bridge this like a stuff and the main characters I'm will start to look it's if um is a contract deployer like if deployed so many contracts if interacted with tornado cache or rail gun uh other stuff maybe if using uh some shady protocols. I'm sorry if I say that but like um

bougie swap or oudini swap for me is a red flag because it's someone trying to hide some something he did. Do you think generally as this technology is progressing is your job as an open-source investigator is it getting easier or is it getting harder? What I mean is that do the crim is the criminal's job getting easier or is it getting harder? >> Uh it will getting depends in which case because uh nobody taking um taking uh what what I can explain it.

No, nobody um taking attention what about what they doing. So uh if someone is very uh expert and so it's not a new beginner on blockchain for sure it will use something of strong project or ds for hide this transaction and uh if it's if it's something of wrong but um the fact is uh if you will use um the the new projects they are in common It will be a little bit hard to for me for for track for for tracking. Yeah.

Depends in which case we talking about because there are many cases where it was um like very uh difficult to to track uh the individual even also using in the same time tornado cash uh it was a little bit uh easy for me for bypass it. uh for um for track the the depositor address but um if it's someone very practiced with um with the blockchain so to be very easy for for him he hide so you can do infinite transaction for for I do but people

doesn't have um I don't know practice or um big intention to to something of complex to to to to hide the transaction. So they they prefer to use the uh as people strategy. So like using a tornado cash or um grave gun or uh two or three layer of depositing inside this type of determ. >> Thank you. uh what is your advice for beginners who want to get into open source intelligence? What should they

use? What type of things that they should practice and how generally what should be their mindset if they want to get into open source intelligence? So uh for sure you you need to be a guy very um enthusiastic uh about uh research because uh you need to be very curious guy um looking uh the source of the information because that's that it was my my that the things uh giving to me very simple to be a open source researcher and onchain analyst Um and so you need to be practice with the Google

darking because it's the main technique I'm using for find info. Um when I got something of interest uh from onchain part then you you need to use so many toolkit you you need to be you need to be skilled with development build something um helping to you um giving to you a easy way for um reducing the time uh about your research.

>> Uh so when you're working you're dealing with a lot of data, transactions, addresses, right? So what are some softwares that you use to first of all to collect this data to visualize this data and to use it to better understand things so to say. uh I'm using toolkit to my toolkit it's like um I'm using like um Arcom chain analysis meta meta layouts uh so they are the main uh onchain platform you can use for um create cluster about wallet activity uh for track every single um information related on the onchain part and about

the offchain part the my my toolkit it's it's a bit long but I can mention like uh Intelix is the biggest data uh data bridge where they have inside like 40 billion data records I think um then big peak um there are only toolkit um um you can use for cross check the information you got from the onchain then try to to match uh about the individual. Um other toolkit very very good uh very useful is OC industries.

>> Well, thank you. Uh I have a final question and that's more of on a moral side, right? So uh through your work you're youxed a lot of people, right? Mostly criminals. However, through that has it happened that whileing the criminals you also to doxed couple of innocent people who were just interested in a project and possibly you ruined their life as well so to say right so how do you reconcile with that how do you think and has it even happened I'm just assuming >> so um in uh on open source intelligence there are not existing uh um a final target So if you starting from

blockchain so you you are you you don't have any type of information who is behind it what what is is is in is is in action but uh what you you need to do you need to um take all information and elaborate it and then you can visualize which is the way uh if you are searching uh um about an individual did the bad things or are simple digent guy want to snipe some coins. So you cannot to know that that fact before. So you need to process with uh so many research uh and

um the cases where I'm using my skills uh the main times is only where people doing uh uh wrong things. So like exploder or like uh I was uh I I I take it a big attention on the the 10 October uh I find it a big information related the guy who opened the big short on I liquid and uh so this is the the cases there is the cases where I'm using my skills uh ethically and personally I'm not Um I I never did something wrong and and I'm a good guy. Uh I believeing only in

transparency and uh karma. So personally I don't I don't take take my I don't use my my skills for track [snorts] uh I info is not relevant at the moment. That became a problem when uh we talk about like uh big wallet leagues like uh binance/3 commas uh who um actually track this money after that leak and uh also find the person who would do this uh and uh that uh zero knowledge systems actually uh take away that opport

opportunity from us as a users uh not only for us uh for the government and uh FBI and know uh nobody can track it, nobody can uh find the person who did it. Uh what do you think about that? uh in terms of uh like uh zero knowledge systems >> uh what I'm thinking about is uh it's to actu to so to introduce so many compliance uh structure to prevent any type of um bad intention from the users. Um so is

to using some limits like uh um like let's take an example. So if they they introduce some many uh layer on inside to tornado people cannot uh moving funds very easily inside into and um so deposit infinite money. So the there are very important to to introduce limits about the the size the sizing of the amount we think and uh a compliance like um the po introduced by privacy pools. So uh you

can um you can prove with the money um inside your wallets they are not uh uh they are not coming from u exploits or criminal activities um and the bad things I think um it's a bit hard to try to to to introduce more of these things I mention. So the I I don't remember the other things you you asked me. Sorry if you can repeat.

>> There was there was a big uh leak from three/b Binance uh for big leak for wallets. Uh many people lose money and u at some point uh uh the companies uh not actually the companies but uh someone uh find that uh person who stole this money actually uh that group of person by the way I don't know uh actually uh what uh how it finished but is it was like uh pointed to uh some group of people uh who are

responsible for this. Uh when we got um uh zero zero knowledge system without uh tracking uh anything like uh who did the uh transaction uh from where it uh the transaction was. Uh it's kind of became impossible to like find people who stole uh users money from their wallets. um in this in this type of case depends about the digital footprints they leave.

So if there is someone already got who did the exploits who stole the money so is uh also criminal let's say these things then um it's not impossible to to find them because um if the money they are actually inside in a wallet these phones they they will need to move. Um let's let's take an example. I can share this info is a clue actually. Um I don't know if you following up the bunny case exploit happens like two months ago.

It's the same is the same things. So people knowing who did it and um the money they are still holding in the wallet. But you need to know that this um these phones they will need to to go out one day and uh what you can do it's it's wait this moment and then uh then try to to track it >> but as I understand uh when you uh when you try to uh take money out there is still no uh if you for example like uh want uh do it from the uh zero knowledge system to uh for example u uh your own

personal wallet uh you should pro should you prove uh the that um where that money from >> sorry sorry I will I will intervene into into the question because I'm one of the biggest user of tornado before it was Like so basically when you when you use tornado, okay, you uh you get like um a note, okay, that only you know and with this note you can uh withdraw the money with another wallet and so the connection between your initial wallet and the other wallet is uh is anonymous in theory. Okay. So um what he's he's

saying is that from uh even if uh like uh someone steal like for example from uh this this protocol okay and they send maybe like uh x amount of transaction to tornado uh you can still uh in some way like coming back even if you don't have like 100% secure because uh uh you can see for example that the the wallet who stole money is send like 0.5 ET on tornado and another transaction is sent like for example one. Okay. And if you know pretty much like what is going on with uh other tornado uh like uh money that are coming in and out you can

basically not having like 100% secure but you can say in a percentage of possibility that probably this money came out to to this wallet and so and bas on on the future transaction you can say ah probably this no because it's from this person this no because it's another person. So you you can still like uh going back actually like full anonymity is still like not not not that thing like on this case like you still have the the the the human layer like after >> okay then what >> same things I say before you can use the timing analysis and the sides amount then you can track it through

>> ZK protocol can be actually effective in identifying the authenticity of the original news sources. You know, in other words, like can it be effective to combat fake news? And by fake news, I'm not talking about the kind of fake news that we're seeing these days, but like like AI level fake news, you know, and that's what I would like to Yeah. >> Okay. So, um I [clears throat] think the answer is actually very simple. Yeah. >> Um, blockchains are permanent store of information or data which means uh there's something in Zika called attestations.

So if you commit a proof or let's say I don't want to use technical terms. So if you if you um upload a particular piece of information and then you generate a proof that you uploaded that piece of information and it has um attestations of time, dates, our source or all of this information attached to it, >> it means this is the actual source of information. So I don't think it would be able to um say this is a valid information or true information. I just think it's so it's not it doesn't um it doesn't show proof of I broke this

laptop. Okay, [laughter] >> it doesn't it doesn't give you this proof. if only did somebody made a video and uh this was attested online and then okay I think another thing we could look into is um >> was actually interesting um succinct lab is a zk protocol you're working on like you know proven systems verifying systems um so they started working on something someone invented a camera that has um zk properties so you could take uh pictures of things and you could prove that These are real pictures that were taken, not AI edited pictures >> or images or videos. And you could, you know, you could have manifestations on

the blockchain and you could verify that, you know, we're in a very very crazy age where this >> um current panel could definitely be AI generated. So, >> so yeah, they basically help you verify what is true and what's false, but based on the metadata, based on the attestations. So I don't know if that answers your question directly but basically it's can't it's maths so it's doesn't have human bias it still relies on data that's been uploaded but probably factual data that's been uploaded or invalid data that's been uploaded I think that's like still left to human to comprehend but in terms of um things that can be computably u

verifiable >> you could you know help with Like in a sense I get it somewhat. Yeah. But I'm still in the learning process and I think I have to check with the YouTube video later, you know. >> Yeah. I think uh if you if you want uh if you want to uh like uh to to understand it's like oracles like uh so [laughter] >> it's like oracles. So basically uh you can trust an oracle. Okay. But the problem is the oracle source. So with ZK you can basically verify that uh uh this uh is uh what the oracle said okay but [clears throat] you need also always to trust the oracle the initial oracle so is is the same problem that you have

like also in without zk >> like that you can trust an oracle but if the oracle is right or wrong or this kind of thing this is what I understood so I don't know if I'm totally wrong okay >> so um [clears throat] I think since we'll go into um Wikipedia and the old stuff later next week. Um >> okay >> just like Wikipedia >> um you because it's open source you could know when a particular piece of information has been edited >> or when it was um falsified or stuff like that and like all the changes are verifiable not verifiable but like you know are tested on >> on their websites. So um ZK makes it because if Wikipedia decides I mean

they're open source so I'm not going to but we can use Wikipedia they are going to be the scape goats for today. So uh if they decide to alter a particular piece of information they're centralized organization so there is no way to verify that this piece of information was altered or the source of this piece of information has not been changed or stuff like that during a period of time. But if Growtopedia for example was hosted on the blockchain >> and they use um ZK's to show proof >> of um information and whenever someone makes an edit it get attested on chain.

I think even with the blockchain you could do this without CK. So it just helps probably in like maybe uh proving that you're an author on Gipedia proving that you published this particular article without actually doxing yourself. >> [clears throat] >> I think these are like the nitty-gritty that it could help with. You know, you're you're a journalist, for example, you write blogs. You want to get um paid or you want to get paid, but you don't want to dox yourself and show your name or stuff. You don't want to dox your ID.

You could actually show proofs that you actually wrote this article >> without actually doxing your personal information. >> So, ZK could help with that type of use case. Do you understand? >> Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Like um like uh to level up the question here though if we still have time. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. >> Like uh journalists are basing the report on external sources, right? It can be like an image or spreadsheet, financial like analysis report anything that can be all like manipulated right on that source level. Do you think that ZK can stand and like track and >> Okay. Yeah. So um there is like I said there's something called attestations or

I'll give you I don't really know about data that is not on the blockchain >> that is like based on human beings imputes >> because transactions on the blockchain can be verifiable >> or you can see them on the blockchain basically. >> So thereby you can always like go back to when it a particular token was minted. You can go back to when the token was created. You can check the date and time of when a particular transaction was made. So all this information are on chain. Okay. >> And uh not to forget where I was going before. Um so basically you would be able to still uh show attestations of this particular informations and prove of this

particular information but I don't think it would help with >> uh showing validity of if it's a fake news because the same because it's it's decentralized it's open so the same way a great h actor will be able to like upload >> right information or force art to like you know also upload uh false statements. >> Yeah. >> Does that help? >> Yeah, I think so. I'm exploring like uh what kind of like options right it's an uncharted territory and obviously like uh like ZK caught my attention last few weeks when I was actually like attending these events and uh >> I know it's a very difficult topic. I I appreciate your helping with some

inputs. >> Yeah. And just hard in case you're building a platform, um if you want or to provide anonymity for your journalist, Zik could help with that. If you want to be able to accept payments privately or tips privately, so they don't track who published this journal. I mean, you're docs now, so you're cooked. But [laughter] >> uh if you want to be able to do all of this primitives, Zika could help you with it. >> Yeah, >> that's a good start. >> Yeah. Thank you so much. >> You said something that I got I found very curious and I didn't understand it very well. So along the lines of uh you said if wallet uses perhaps unis swap then it cannot be fully secure because

it has what why why does it have that's the question and additionally I didn't understand what you mean because let's say wallet uses unis swap to offer you exchange services is it already not secure or you if you don't use the unis swap services and you just use the wallet to store your coins then can it be secure that's >> okay so I didn't mean secure I meant private >> so uh I was talking about view keys and I was talking about um the fact that zk basically protects or gives privacies to values particular set of values and it doesn't give privacy to um things like

that has to do with the network So if I send you funds right now privately using a shielded primitive doesn't have to be Zcash can be anything. I could shield uh this is the shielding frameworks. I could shield a trans Ethereum right now and send it to you directly to your address. There is no way that could be broken basically. But if I want to do like DeFi activities and I want to maybe add liquidity to unis swap or I want to send or the app that I installed was using unis swap to process transactions at the moment when I'm sending you money not directly to your address but because the app I'm using uses unis swap there

would be leaks of metadata the timing and a lot of informations that security researchers can use to basically dox you regardless. So that's what I was talking about. I wasn't talking about them not being secure. It's it's a trillion dollar up to a trillion but almost a trillion dollar protocol. So yeah, I'm not I wasn't talking about the security. I was talking about the privacy. So if so if you want to build applications that could use uh defy privately there are a lot of more factors aides a lot of more primitives aside zk we need to do like um meool um encrypted me encrypted intent there a lot of primitives you

need to you could use mixnet some people use t some mpcs a lot of more are like primitives or implementations you have to do to be able to like you know do the secure end to end transaction questions. >> Well, thank you for the answers. They're welcome. >> Great. >> Thank you. >> Also, actually, I think the the RCB is a problem on this case because you can you can track IPs like stuff like this like for example having lights clients. It will be important like at some point. >> Exactly. >> To actually have real privacy stuff. >> So, basically it's just about the our metadata of information me if you're not protecting mess. not perfect 10 are there's so much information that can

that could get leaked if you're using like external layers and I mean that's the same problem that happened with Zcash itself when they started implementing near but is also like working on improving that aspect to make sure uh such stuff doesn't happen >> right I'm going to take a moment uh to get a little political just to make everyone uncomfortable that's what I do >> um when we think about these technologies we can talk about the technicals which is very important why they work but we also have to think about how they're used as well as the world of tomorrow right and a lot of what people are worried about and one of the reasons that people embrace Ethereum they embrace Bitcoin is the control you

have over your money that you don't have with centralized currencies but you also have the fears about censorship the fears about the surveillance state that's being developed in different places Without me being specific, >> but what's important when we consider about all of these things is how these various technologies, zero knowledge proofs and the entities that create them and manage them, uh what their ethics are, how they are compliant while also staying true to the communities that use them. So my question is kind of hypothetical. comes around to a use case I can think of for zero knowledge proofs and let's say we have this world of

tomorrow could be the whole world it could be a certain state it could be whatever but we have an individual could be Edward Snowden right and he wants to give a talk to speak on the subject of government surveillance information being released so on and so forth and he has to prove to someone who is going to interview him that he is who he is >> but at the same time protecting ing himself without revealing his location, without revealing certain factors about himself that would incriminate or you know put him in danger. Right? So take Zcash, take any entity that might in the future create certain technologies to protect such an individual in such a

situation. How do they balance a mission that protects the ethics of someone like that or creates a use case for someone like that who we as a community might identify with because they're trying to do something good, you know, but at the same time trying to be compliant with people who make the rules who might be doing something bad inherently. That's my question. >> Okay. Well, I I don't get the the framing. I got I got I got the snow warrant which is like talking about your use case but you started off with the political side. So do you have like a direct question there? So I could like >> that that's basically it. Like honestly like this subject a lot of people get really wrapped up in it because it becomes political right because to

support someone like Snowden are you inherently against the government that might have its own interests right and you know it could be any political parties or whatever but they support the state. It becomes kind of a question of that when you're really saying like this person should be free to share this information. This technology should be able to be used to um create some kind of situation where this person can create value for others. Um in the same way that you have something like tornado cash. It has a dual use. You have people who are literally just trying to be private with their transactions. You have people who are literally stealing money from people.

>> Yeah. So um on the political side I think every technology will be used by the both sides. Let's call them both sides. uh transparency is being used maliciously or nobody is calling the people who you know annotate everything that you've done on chain to be able to sell this data or to be able to like you know compute this data and sell it or profit from it or is it to track you or is it to like you know alienate you from certain services because they notice that you made a donation to a certain course that doesn't like and automatically blacklist your wallet or something like that. So nobody's chasing after these guys and based on the

definition of uh the other guys, they're also bad guys. So I think every tech would be used by um the two sides effectively. [laughter] But one of the most important part of ZK is that you could do something called selective disclosure. So you don't necessarily have to be fully private or handon. I think it just gives you the the right to be able to disclose to be able to make the decision to disclose what you want to disclose.

Not just to say for example now going into the use case um Exodian or any other person wants to prove that they are who they are. There are so many means aides um I don't want to go into government because it might not be related across all cases. It could be voice or they could annotate their voice on chain, create a PGP key for their voice. It could be based on the sound spectrums and all of that. And um it could be their iris like word ID. It could be it could be anything. So the point is to be able to uh I think but the most general one is like your passport or your IDs.

And I think even if we want to use passports if it's applicable in this case there's ZK passport for example you could uh take your phone install the app just tap your passport to the back put some particular information that you want to share and uh they get to see only the information you share. They don't get to see the color of your passport. They don't get to see your picture in the passport if you don't want them to see it. They don't get to see your date of birth if only what you want to show them is your ISSR or R >> or maybe your location when you submit the >> G.

So they don't get to be able to you only choose what but they know there's an attestation on the passport that means it's valid. So um and that's one there's your IRS if you use the um world ID hub. I have personal beef with them but that doesn't matter. It's a great tech. If you use that to scan your iris, you do proof of personhood and it is encrypted on chain and there's a ash key that shows that this is you. And anywhere you put this ash key, they can't they can only verify this is you. They can't actually see your eyes color or [laughter] or your whatever. Do you understand?

They only get to see that particular set of information. So I think selective selective disclosure is also so if you don't want to be and then there [clears throat] are a lot of products there's privacy pools they have um they they are the good guys of tornado cash so they have compliance privacy compliance features not directly linking to the government just based on your wallet transactions with particular addresses that's been indexed and if you want to use them good if you want to literally our tornado cash right now. Create an instance by yourself and send a transaction to somebody. Good for you. So like I think that's also the beauty of the blockchain and beauty of privacy. Everyone gets to decide how

they want to use it. Everyone gets to decide which product they want to use. Um I wouldn't support using a product that is not open source because that's when they could be, you know, they could claim things on their website and they're doing opposite. So far it's open source. So far I don't even care about the founders most of the times. I have opposite beliefs with the founders most of the times but I can see their code. I can audit their code. I can see the product itself. I know it does what I want it to do for me then I'm fine with it. So yeah I think so going back to the political side people would use everything for people could use microphone to harm someone could use it to speak. People could wear shirts to protect themselves. People could yeah you could.

>> So there's always going to be two sides of it. It just uh I think one of the most important parts which is giving our the decisions for this for your personal data privacy is a right like it's not just a property it's not a future a feature rather and um you know you having the decision you having the ability to be able to decide who gets to see this data or who doesn't get to see it it's a very very important part and that's the role ZK is playing. I appreciate that answer and also bringing it back to what you said as well about you know you may not know who someone is right like we we had that period of DeFi some even myself I was like anonymous you know but it's like the code speaks

for itself there's merit behind the code and if you don't understand the code there's plenty of people you can trust who are also looking through this people who audit it so on and so forth and there's always so many ways even if like you don't like the ethos of someone behind a particular project or something whether it's forking the code or just realizing We're decentralized. We're bigger than our founders, right? If our founders are so egotistical that they have such a controlling interest in their communities, they're probably not the projects that they are anyway, like Zcash, which is clearly like bigger than just one founder. Exactly. >> Um Yeah. And and also just to kind of clarify what you said too, um it sounds essentially like what projects like Zcash and others, you're really collecting the most minimal amount of

information to prove something. So you don't even have to be in that ballpark when it comes to dealing with a a compliance issue where you have to choose between protecting the privacy of your user or or giving information to be compliant. It sounds like you gather the least amount of information and put the user in control of what they need to verify. >> Exactly. And I think one of the um one of the magic part of ZK is the fact that I could um prove ownership of a particular property, but the person I'm actually sending this data to doesn't even have access to it. It's not on their database. Do you understand? It is encrypted.

>> They can't even decrypt it. But using >> prop um Z MPCs or stuffs like that, they could do computations on the encrypted data. >> I think that's like super beautiful. It means that you don't have to rely on the founder just waking up the next day and being like, you know what, I'm sending all your data to this particular organization or this particular organization or anything like this set of informations are literally encrypted. you won't have the problem that happened with Coinbase for example where customer support leaked the data of like you know millions of people and it has been on until nobody knew that you stand on the dark where people are selling it so >> and uh yeah I think that's one of the

you know the most important part or very very vital part also >> yeah I love it that's why I don't support centralized entities so >> yeah [laughter] >> all right awesome thank you >> you're welcome