Some time ago when CEX delisted various privacy tokens, did this have any impact on Aleo? Today we will sort it out for you in the form of an article, hoping to clear up your doubts about this issue.
In order to improve the credibility of the answer, the attitudes and opinions of Aleo’s official executives are the most critical. We can get a glimpse of it from different executives and their different interview contents. Let’s get started~
1. Answer from Joanna Zeng, Vice President of Aleo
Foresight News: Privacy applications such as Tornado Cash face regulatory issues in many countries and regions. If Aleo is built as a privacy public chain, will it also face regulatory concerns or risks?
Joanna Zeng :
1) I think one thing that sets Aleo apart from other privacy chains is that we are committed to compliance from the beginning.
2) Privacy public chains and compliance public chains seem to be contradictory, but we believe that both can be achieved . We are working with a company that provides zero-knowledge proof technology to develop a validator mechanism that allows regulators to view on-chain data if necessary, but this view requires the consent of the project itself.
3) We are also working with many government agencies to help them develop privacy applications. We believe that by working with regulators, Aleo can provide privacy protection for users while also meeting regulatory requirements.
My opinion: Judging from the vice president’s answer, we can know that the Aleo project team has been considering this issue from the beginning (we can all think of it, it is impossible that they did not think of this issue), so their initial steps were Compliance is the first priority, and they believe that there are solutions to achieve both privacy and compliance/supervision; they even help government agencies develop privacy applications (a bit like Tencent’s approach?).
The popular application they recently promoted — zPass, is not a blockchain project in the traditional sense, but more of a down-to-earth Internet project. It is a solution that focuses on current problems that have arisen, but it just happens to use zero knowledge. Proof that blockchain technology is used.
2. Founder/CTO-Howard and Executive Director of Aleo Foundation (former CEO of Aleo parent company)-Alex
Howard and Alex believe that it is important that the protocols on the Internet are inherently neutral. For them, privacy is not about helping bad actors evade sanctions, but about ensuring that the base layer remains neutral. Anything built on top of a protocol is the most natural and efficient venue for regulation, as these applications may be sensitive to geography and local regulation in ways that base layer protocols cannot. This mimics the compliance regime that made the internet successful: regulating the applications, not the base layer, just like my bank might be sanctioned for sending money to Iran, but the internet itself would not be sanctioned.
Additionally, developers on Aleo can build what Tornado Cash lacks: risk mitigation controls that will allow compliance with existing laws (and, optimistically, may even inspire more effective regulations). While the base layer is private, most activity will occur through applications, where on-ramps and off-ramps can serve as important places to ensure compliance, just as they do in the broader crypto ecosystem today (as well as those based on KYC compliance for zk, where applications can confirm things like KYC and sanction consent without compromising user data, would be a privacy improvement over many current KYC options).
The tricky part in this environment is getting regulators to listen and appreciate the potential of this infrastructure, with the internet itself being an important analogy. It seems likely that people will do both wonderful and terrible things on Aleo, just as they do wonderful and terrible things on the Internet. Like developers, Aleo’s biggest regulatory challenge will be education.
The following 3 and 4 are our own thoughts and are for reference only.
3. Executive background overlaps with government compliance
Alex is the CEO of the original parent company of Aleo and the newly appointed executive director of the Aleo Foundation. Why him? But Howard, the founder at the beginning, stepped back behind the scenes and took on the role of technical director?
Of course, the technology of a project is very important, especially for a new public chain from 0 to 1. The CEO position is more of a management-level matter, which may be too cumbersome and affect the progress of technology development. Therefore, It makes sense for Howard to focus on being responsible for technology development.
As for promoting Alex to CEO, his blockchain experience before joining Aleo was also crucial — former @a16zcrypto, @coinbase, @standfordGSB and cuckold @USArmy. Personally, I feel that his rich experience in the US military is something that other candidates do not have. He should be very familiar with government/military rules. Choosing Alex also shows that Aleo, as a privacy-focused public chain, is not incompatible with government compliance/supervision. As Joanna said — “You can have both”, this is an attitude, which has continued until the establishment of the Aleo Foundation. Alex is the primary external figure of the entire privacy public chain.
In addition to Alex, Aleo’s product manager John Reynolds also has a military background. Project compliance ultimately determines whether the product is compliant, so this position cannot be ignored!
John: I graduated from the Air Force Academy, where I studied computer science and philosophy, focusing on the ethics of cyber warfare. I was assigned to the Air Force’s cyber staff. During my service, I focused on correlating satellite data for defense systems and military strategic systems. So it’s a very exciting job and role and I really enjoy serving.
After that, I joined a private startup working on making mortgage applications and bank applications more efficient. I helped them develop some identity KYC AML solutions for some of their strategic partners.
Then, luckily, because of my military background, I had the pleasure of meeting Alex, the CEO of Aleo. He was actually a West Point graduate. So we have something in common to discuss.
I have started exploring some of the blockchain and crypto space. I earned my master’s degree in software engineering while in the military, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to advance this endeavor. I had the pleasure of accepting the Aleo Product Manager position with Alex.
Ashton: Wow! Very cool, military, cyber warfare, especially when it comes to cryptography and digital assets and global assets. I feel like this is going to be an increasingly important topic, and the more you know about it, the better equipped you will be to create great solutions for identity, ZK, and privacy in web3. So I’m excited to tap into your knowledge.
4. As a privacy public chain, Aleo is not completely closed, but has optional privacy protection.
1) As Vice President Joanna Zeng said — “ Regulators are allowed to view on-chain data if necessary, but such viewing requires the consent of the project itself. “
2) Users also have the right to choose the privacy mode of the wallet — public or private
For example, Aleo domain name provider ANS can also choose whether to use Primary Name or convert to Private mode when transferring money.
In other words, Aleo can be completely open and transparent like other non-private public chains; it can also become a public chain with great privacy protection. This function is especially important for large asset management institutions/whale wallet address holders.
Attachment: New link to Aleo DC
We recently updated the official Aleo Discord link to: https://discord.gg/aleo As always, please remember to verify any server invitations against Aleo’s official channels to avoid phishing links.
