trust.mit.edu. 1 ... (5) What are MIT's plans for development and release of ChainAnchor? At MIT we have a very ... We a
ChainAnchor FAQ / April 2016
trust.mit.edu
ChainAnchor FAQ / April 2016 (1) What is ChainAnchor? ChainAnchor is an architecture for providing identity-privacy, authorization and access control within a permissioned blockchain system. This can help facilitate Anti Money Laundering (AML) and Know Your Client (KYC) compliance. (2) How does ChainAnchor provide identity-privacy? ChainAnchor uses two cryptographic functions (namely identity blinding and zero-knowledge proofs) to provide transacting parties with the assurance of the validity of the identities used to transact. (3) How does ChainAnchor work on a permissioned blockchain? ChainAnchor views a permissioned blockchain as group-shared infrastructure. Membership of the group translates to authorization to use the blockchain. Entities who are authorized to access the permissioned blockchain have the ability to prove the membership of the group without revealing their true identity. This allows entities who share a permissioned blockchain to preserve their privacy while simultaneously obtaining assurance that all transactions on the blockchain belong to authorized entities only. (4) Can ChainAnchor be used on a permissionless blockchain? A permissionless blockchain by definition allows anyone to use the blockchain without permission or authorization. Similarly, any consensus-node can participate within a permissionless blockchain without authorization. As such, it is very difficult (or almost impossible) to employ ChainAnchor to preserve privacy on a permissionless blockchain while simultaneously providing assurance of the identities of transacting parties. It was not designed to work with permissionless blockchains. (5) But didn’t your original ChainAnchor white paper talk about both permissioned and permissionless blockchains? As a point of reference, the original paper described ChainAnchor in relation to blockchains, and made several mentions of bitcoin in order to provide both comprehensiveness and familiarity to the reader. However, we received feedback that this was confusing, since we hadn’t designed ChainAnchor for bitcoin and it didn’t make sense to use with bitcoin. Accordingly, in the course of several rounds of revisions, we made our point more clear: ChainAnchor is for permissioned blockchains, and is not designed for bitcoin blockchain.
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ChainAnchor FAQ / April 2016
trust.mit.edu
(5) What are MIT’s plans for development and release of ChainAnchor? At MIT we have a very long history of supporting open source software, starting with the MIT Kerberos software developed at MIT beginning in the mid 1980s. Our plans are to develop ChainAnchor software and to release it to the public under the MIT License for open source software. We therefore seeks to establish a development community around ChainAnchor and to standardize relevant APIs and functions within ChainAnchor so that it can fully interoperate with existing infrastructure for identity management and authorization. (6) But Peter Todd says that ChainAnchor is part of a vast conspiracy by MIT to destroy bitcoin! Isn’t that true? No, it’s not true. MIT has a substantial effort to support bitcoin and the bitcoin community, in fact, in the form of: • Investing in bitcoin research (which ChainAnchor is not). • Building capabilities among Bitcoin programmers - who are then free to do whatever they want with that knowledge. • Convening different points of views about a host of issues, including AML & KYC, to help foster a vibrant, dynamic Bitcoin community. • Providing students with mentorship and guidance to launch fintech businesses. (7) But Peter Todd said that it’s true. He is making stuff up. (8) But I believe him. To quote one public statement made by a member of the bitcoin community, this is not the first time “he has published incomplete half-truths with dubious conclusions” (9) Aren’t there NDA’s in place preventing the real truth about your plans from ChainAnchor coming out? That’s what I read on Peter’s website. This is also made up. The whole notion of an “NDA muzzle” was one of several outright fabrications. ChainAnchor has been visibly developed on a public, freely available website (previously www.mit-trust.org, now trust.mit.edu). We don’t have NDA’s preventing people from talking about ChainAnchor, nor about them working with us on ChainAnchor. Furthermore, MIT policy prohibits any research of this nature being done at MIT from not being published. We literally aren’t allowed to “keep it secret”.
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ChainAnchor FAQ / April 2016
trust.mit.edu
(10) Aren’t all forms of AML/KYC compliance evil and designed to subjugate society? Without getting into a broader debate of the merits of AML/KYC compliance, it is the law of the land (common practice among both OECD and non-OECD countries). Ergo, it behooves us to figure out intelligent ways to make this apply to cryptocurrency. (11) But my favorite blogger said ChainAnchor secretly designed to undermine bitcoin by introducing AML/KYC! Isn’t that your real agenda? (a) ChainAnchor is for permissioned blockchains, not bitcoin. (b) We have no desire to undermine bitcoin. We separately helped develop the Windhover Principles, for AML/KYC compliance in bitcoin, which have been adopted by over 20 of the leading bitcoin companies. We aren’t somehow trying to revisit work we’ve already done (Windhover), and certainly aren’t trying to harm bitcoin. MIT has made a major commitment to research and training around bitcoin. We also study other blockchains. (12) Given that ChainAnchor is designed for non-bitcoin blockchains, specifically permissioned blockchains, aren’t you trying to destroy bitcoin by supporting those other blockchains? We’re not trying to destroy bitcoin. We do believe that various flavors of distributed ledgers need to be studied and understood, including the bitcoin blockchain, but not limited to it. We don’t think that it is intrinsically harmful to bitcoin for MIT to conduct research on blockchain. No one is forcing you to study or use Ethereum or Ripple or other popular/well-known nonbitcoin blockchains. At the same time, MIT engaging in serious academic study, training, and practice around these technologies doesn’t eliminate the serious academic study, training and practice we engage with around bitcoin blockchain. (13) But aren’t you making secret deals and all sorts of money off of working on blockchain? No, we aren’t making secret deals. We are a nonprofit academic research university, so we don’t “make money” off of this technology. Our work is supported by gifts and grants from private individuals and corporate donations, and by MIT’s endowment. When specific research is supported by a company, for example, and we publish on it, we typically disclose our financial relationships. We also have industry consortia programs, in which case we typically disclose the consortia members. Imagine if a consultant, say for example a prominent consultant who works on bitcoin, published his client list on a regular basis. That is the kind of standard we are held to.
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ChainAnchor FAQ / April 2016
trust.mit.edu
(14) Doesn’t that mean you are beholden to corporate interests and are a tool of “the man”? Actually, no. Unlike some, who make money consulting to companies and individuals about bitcoin, we don’t make money. We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Profiteering would abrogate our mission. Hence, we are seeking to release ChainAnchor under open source. Our mission is to try to solve global problems like financial inclusion, bringing the 2+ billion people in the world who don’t have access to bank accounts into the benefits that come from having access to banking services. Cryptocurrency is a promising tool in this fight. * * * * Constructive feedback about ChainAnchor is welcome at:
[email protected] More information on our research at: http://trust.mit.edu
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