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Blockchain has promised us freedom and liberation from centralized authorities such as governments, but in the latest report of the Blockchain Forum (EUBF), technology is starting to look more like 1984 than ever before.
L & # 39; EUBF last report the details for which the blockchain can realize its potential within government institutions must focus on the use of technology to build two things: digital identity systems and digital versions of their national currencies.
"Digital identity is the key component and a key area on which governments can concentrate," the report reads. "Another important element … is having digital versions of the national currency on the blockchain, for example through the digital currencies of the central bank based on blockchain (CBDC).
Digital identity controlled by the government
According to the report, digital identities should be a prerequisite before future institutional blockchains are developed. EUBF believes that blockchain can provide a platform on which everyone has a "trusted" State owned digital identity.
EUBF promotes its arguments for state-owned blockchains by implying that the government would be a better custodian of our online identities than centralized organizations like Google or Facebook, due to data breaches and hacks they witnessed. So choose, who would you like as guardian of your digital identity, government or Facebook?
While the report states that blockchain identity systems should be "controlled by the user" and "self-sovereigns", it does not change the fact that the whole identity would be part of a governmental system that could be used to track your every move online.
In fact, just because a user has control over their data, does not prevent the government to monitor data requests and use them to monitor citizens. If the blockchain were public, anyone could view this information.
Moreover, it does not make it immune to phishing, hacking, scams, fraud or theft. Blockchain is often seen as a panacea for a number of modern problems, but it is not always the ideal solution.
Tokenized fiat currencies
If the digital identities possessed by the government exist alongside the fiat currencies set by the government, it would be very easy to attribute spending habits to an individual identity.
Moreover, state-owned digital currencies would potentially be subject to the same manipulation of conventional cards. Unlike Bitcoin, a state could, in principle, only create more. It goes against the whole point of technology.
Obviously, this is largely a conjecture as the EUBF report is little more than a collection of recommendations for EU governments. It does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the European Commission. But the recommendations are bad; a detailed and detailed discussion on how to implement such systems is clearly needed.
The big brother blockchain
Every time a government starts talking about digital identity blockchain, it starts playing more than 1984 compared to the libertarian utopia that Bitcoin and blockchain originally promised.
Everything seems strangely similar to that of David Chaum of 1985, "Security without identification" in which he predicted the "dossier society". This state of society is achieved as a result of the continuous loading and sharing of personal data online. In the end, it allows you to connect all the corners of our lives effectively and free us from any anonymity or digital sovereignty.
In fact, at the beginning of this year the British government talked about how to use the blockchain to provide a chronological record allowing the reconstruction and the examination of a sequence of events, leading to an event specific. Depending on how it is implemented, a property government could be the beginning of a big digital brother.
Published December 7, 2018 at 13:49 UTC
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