MIT Technology Review Discusses Central Bank Panel from MIT Bitcoin Expo, which included DCI's Rob Ali
For central bankers, the game changed last summer when Facebook unveiled its proposal for Libra. Many have responded by seriously exploring whether and how they should issue their own digital money.
A Working Group's Paper: 'A Model for Genetic Data Exchange and Sovereignty' by the BCG Healthcare Applications Working Group (2018-2019)
Member Company: Boston Consulting Group (BCG)
Project Group: Healthcare Applications
Executive Summary
Over the past decade, significant breakthroughs in DNA sequencing have accelerated our capacity for genetic research and created new disciplines of precision medicine, promising a generation of novel therapies for previously incurable ailments. However, with an influx of vast amounts of genetic data, another challenge arose: the problem of data stewardship and governance. As of today, an individual who has their DNA analyzed through consumer-focused products like 23andMe or Ancestry.com, or through their personal healthcare provider has no promise of knowing where the genetic data goes or how it will be used. This historical lack of transparency has had cascading consequences across the industry- from disincentivizing participation in programs that would benefit from sharing genetic or health data, to driving a profound lack of genetic diversity in clinical trials. We believe that a blockchain tool, leveraging non-fungible tokens, can enable a degree of transparency and traceability to allow individuals to become informed stewards of their own genetic data. By doing so, we strive to build guardrails for privacy and security around the exchange of genetic data, thereby regaining the trust of participants, and encouraging our community to drive a thriving genetic data marketplace for the greater good of society.
DCI's Neha Narula Discusses CBDC in WSJ's 'Does the U.S. Need a National Digital Currency?'
Proponents say payments with a digital dollar would be faster and easier. Opponents say it would be costly and inefficient.
The nature of money is changing, and central banks around the world are debating whether they need to change with it.
TokenSpace: A Conceptual Framework for Cryptographic Asset Taxonomies by DCI's Dr. Wassim Z. Alsindi
Abstract
This work addresses the ongoing lack of legal clarity and inconsistent pronouncements regard- ing the regulatory status of cryptographic assets by introducing a novel series of classification approaches employing non-binary scoring systems. Novel taxonomies have been constructed based upon multi-level categorical and numerical discrimination methods following design science of information systems best practices. The aim is to provide greater explanatory insight with respect to the nuanced and complex ensemble of attributes which may be exhibited within this sui generis type of objects. The notions of Secu- rityness (S), Moneyness (M) and Commodityness (C) are proposed as candidate meta-characteristics for “TokenSpace”: a three-dimensional visual construction of subjective classification approaches towards a co- herent and customisable conceptual framework. TokenSpace can be used to make reasoned qualitative and / or quantitative comparisons of asset properties. TokenSpace has more in common with successful prior classification frameworks in other domains and greater development potential using axiomatic, empirical and qualitative approaches than the sorting, clustering, intuitive or na ̈ıve categorisation approaches pre- viously employed for cryptographic assets. TokenSpace provides a basis upon which real-time information feeds and predictive analytical tools may be developed in future.
Forbes's "Bitcoin Rival Suffers Devastating Attack" reviews DCI's James Lovejoy's discovery of a '51% Attack'
“Bitcoin gold, a relatively minor cryptocurrency that split off from the original bitcoin blockchain in late 2017, has suffered a so-called 51% attack resulting in over $72,000 worth of bitcoin gold tokens being double spent.
'MIT researchers identify security vulnerabilities in voting app' by MIT News discusses research by DCI's Neha Narula, Sunoo Park and DCI Advisor Ron Rivest
“In recent years, there has been a growing interest in using internet and mobile technology to increase access to the voting process. At the same time, computer security experts caution that paper ballots are the only secure means of voting.
Now, MIT researchers are raising another concern: They say they have uncovered security vulnerabilities in a mobile voting application that was used during the 2018 midterm elections in West Virginia. Their security analysis of the application, called Voatz, pinpoints a number of weaknesses, including the opportunity for hackers to alter, stop, or expose how an individual user has voted. Additionally, the researchers found that Voatz’s use of a third-party vendor for voter identification and verification poses potential privacy issues for users.”
'Aurora: Transparent Succinct Arguments for R1CS' by DCI's Madars Virza et al.
Abstract:
We design, implement, and evaluate a zero knowledge succinct non-interactive argument (SNARG) for Rank-1 Constraint Satisfaction (R1CS), a widely-deployed NP language undergoing standardization. Our SNARG has a transparent setup, is plausibly post-quantum secure, and uses lightweight cryptography. A proof attesting to the satisfiability of n constraints has size 𝑂(log2𝑛)O(log2n); it can be produced with 𝑂(𝑛log𝑛)O(nlogn) field operations and verified with O(n). At 128 bits of security, proofs are less than 250kB250kB even for several million constraints, more than 10×10× shorter than prior SNARGs with similar features.
'Blockchain and Money' course taught by DCI Advisor Gary Gensler is now available on MIT Open Courseware
“This course is for students wishing to explore blockchain technology's potential use—by entrepreneurs and incumbents—to change the world of money and finance. The course begins with a review of Bitcoin and an understanding of the commercial, technical, and public policy fundamentals of blockchain technology, distributed ledgers, and smart contracts. The class then continues on to current and potential blockchain applications in the financial sector.”
'Data Structures Meet Cryptography: 3SUM with Preprocessing' by DCI's Sunoo Park et al.
Abstract
This paper shows several connections between data structure problems and cryptography against preprocessing attacks. Our results span data structure upper bounds, cryptographic applications, and data structure lower bounds, as summarized next.
CNBC Interviews DCI's Neha Narula and reports on WEF Davos 2020 'Calls for a US ‘digital dollar’ rise as China powers ahead with a digital yuan’'
DCI’s Neha Narula was interviewed by CNBC whilst she was participating at the World Economic Forum in Davos. The article titled ‘Calls for a US ‘digital dollar’ rise as China powers ahead with a digital yuan’ and was published on Jan 23rd 2020.
'Crypto Thoughts From Davos: Encouraging, But Beware Unintended Consequences' Covers the panel 'Creating a Credible and Trusted Digital Currency' at WEF 2020
DCI’s Neha Narula was part of a panel ‘Creating a Credible and Trusted Digital Currency’, Forbes reporter Robert Anzalone covers the story in ‘Crypto Thoughts From Davos: Encouraging, But Beware Unintended Consequences’
'Privacy-preserving analytics for the securitization market: a zero-knowledge distributed ledger technology application' By DCI Collaborator Sophie Meralli
Abstract
A zero-knowledge proof or protocol is a cryptographic technique for verifying private data without revealing it in its clear form. In this paper, we evaluate the potential for zero-knowledge distributed ledger technology to alleviate asymmetry of information in the asset-backed securitization market. To frame this inquiry, we conducted market data analyses, a review of prior literature, stakeholder interviews with investors, originators and security issuers and collaboration with blockchain engineers and researchers. We introduce a new system which could enable all market participants in the securitization lifecycle (e.g. investors, rating agencies, regulators and security issuers) to interact on a unique decentralized platform while maintaining the privacy of loan-level data, therefore providing the industry with timely analytics and performance data. Our platform is powered by zkLedger (Narula et al. 2018), a zero-knowledge protocol developed by the MIT Media Lab and the first system that enables participants of a distributed ledger to run publicly verifiable analytics on masked data
'Redesigning digital money: What can we learn from a decade of cryptocurrencies?' by Robleh Ali and Neha Narula of the Digital Currency Initiative
Introduction
In a 2019 speech, Bank of England governor Mark Carney said that “Technology has the potential to disrupt the network externalities that prevent the incumbent global reserve currency from being displaced.” Certainly one of the most interesting places where technology is disrupting payments and finance is in cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrencies have emerged from open source development communities in large part because electronic transaction systems are too expensive and they have not evolved fast enough to keep pace with the demand for retail online digital payments and more sophisticated types of financial transactions. The wide variety of experimentation in cryptocurrencies is causing technologists and central bankers to rethink the interface to money and explore a digital form which can be held by users and companies directly. This could lead to a financial system with a simplified institutional structure, capable of serving the public at a much lower cost. Though there has been much discussion about the policy design for central bank-issued digital currency (CBDC), there are important technical points missing from the conversation: CBDC should not be a direct copy of existing cryptocurrencies with exactly the same design and features but there are things we can learn from their emergence - the usefulness of programmability in money and the importance of preserving user privacy.
DCI's Robleh Ali was quoted in MIT Technology Review's 'An elegy for cash: the technology we might never replace'
Cash is gradually dying out. Will we ever have a digital alternative that offers the same mix of convenience and freedom?
by Mike Orcutt
Jan 3, 2020
Think about the last time you used cash. How much did you spend? What did you buy, and from whom? Was it a one-time thing, or was it something you buy regularly?
The New York Times quotes Neha Narula in 'Twitter and Facebook Want to Shift Power to Users. Or Do They?'
A decentralized internet was hailed as a way to dethrone Twitter and Facebook. But to the tech giants, the idea could unload some of their burdens.
By Nathaniel PopperDec. 18, 2019. The New York Times.
SAN FRANCISCO — Not so long ago, the technology behind Bitcoin was seen in Silicon Valley as the best hope for challenging the enormous, centralized power of companies like Twitter and Facebook.
Now, in an unexpected twist, the internet giants think that technology could help them solve their many problems.
Coindesk Article: 'Even if a Thousand Projects Don’t Make It, Blockchain Is Still a Change Catalyst' by DCI Advisor Gary Gensler
This post is part of CoinDesk's 2019 Year in Review, a collection of 100 op-eds, interviews and takes on the state of blockchain and the world. Gary Gensler is a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, Co-Director of MIT’s Fintech@CSAIL and Senior Advisor to the MIT Media Lab Digital Currency Initiative. He was formerly Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Under Secretary of the Treasury, and a partner at Goldman Sachs.
DCI's Neha, Rob and Gary engage in National Crisis Simulation 'Cryptocurrency and national insecurity'. Review by The Harvard Gazette
The year is 2021, and the nation is in crisis. North Korea has just tested a missile that will soon be capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to the continental U.S. The move took Washington by surprise as the project was likely funded via a new Chinese digital currency, which allowed North Korea to bypass the global banking system. In response, the National Security Council House has gathered in the White House Situation Room to formulate short- and long-term responses.
“Digital Currency Wars: A National Security Crisis Simulation” unfolded before a packed audience in Kennedy School Forum on Tuesday night. Hosted by the Economic Diplomacy Initiative and co-sponsored by the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, the exercise brought together administration veterans, career diplomats, and academics to dramatize a very real prospect — the rise of an encrypted digital currency that would upend the U.S. dollar’s dominance and effectively render ineffective economic sanctions, like those currently applied to North Korea.
CES Summit review by Bitcoin Magazine: 'Cryptoeconomic Systems Launched as Open-Source Journal and Conference’
MIT’s Digital Currency Initiative (DCI) has announced the launch of Cryptoeconomic Systems (CES), the name of both a forthcoming conference in March 2020 and a new, open-access journal intended to bring a scholastic level of quality in research and reviews to the world of cryptocurrency, outside of the traditional publication channels.
