Opinion of: Casey Ford, PHD, NYM Technologies researcher
Web3 entered the decentralization wave. Decentralized applications (DAPPS) grew by 74% in 2024 and individual wallets in 485%, with total blocked value (TVL) in decentralized finances (defi) closing a maximum almost record of $ 214 billion. However, the industry also addresses a state of capture if it does not wake up.
As Elon Musk mocked placing the treasure of the United States in Blockchain, for bad thought, the tides are turning since the cryptography is deregulated. But when they do, web3 is ready to “protect [user] Data “, while Musk substitutes commit? If not, we are all on the verge of a global data security crisis.
The crisis is reduced to a vulnerability in the heart of the digital world: the surveillance of metadata of all existing networks, including web decentralized. IA technologies are now at the base of surveillance systems and serve as accelerators. Anonymity networks offer an exit to this capture state. But this must begin with metadata protections in all areas.
Metadata are the new surveillance border
Metadata are the raw material overlooked the surveillance of AI. Compared to payload data, metadata are light and, therefore, easy to process. Here, AI Systems Excel Best. Added metadata can reveal much more than encrypted content: behavior patterns, contact networks, personal desires and, ultimately, predictability. And legally, it is not protected in the way it is encrypted from end to end (E2E) Communications are now in some regions.
While metadata are part of all digital assets, metadata that are filtered from encrypted traffic E2E expose us and what we do: IPS, time signatures, package sizes, encryption formats and even wallet specifications. All this is completely readable for adversaries who examine a network. Blockchain transactions are no exception.
From digital waste batteries a gold mine of detailed records of everything we do can arise. Metadata are our digital unconscious, and is at stake for machines that can harvest it for profit.
Blockchain’s limits
Protecting transactions metadata was a late occurrence of blockchain technology. Crypto does not offer anonymity Despite the reactionary association of the industry with illicit trade. Offers pseudonymThe ability to keep tokens in a wallet with a chosen name.
Recent: How to token real world assets in Bitcoin
Harry Halpin and Ania Piotowska have diagnosed the situation:
“[T]The public nature of the Bitcoin Transaction Book […] It means that anyone can observe the flow of coins. [P]The pseudonym addresses do not provide any significant level of anonymity, since anyone can reap the counterpart directions of any transaction given and rebuild the transaction chain. “
Like all chain transactions are public, anyone who runs a complete node can have a panoptic view of the chain activity. In addition, metadata such as IP addresses attached to pseudonym wallets can be used to identify the locations and identities of people if follow -up technologies are sophisticated enough.
This is the central problem of the surveillance of metadata in the Blockchain economy: surveillance systems can effectively discourage our financial traffic by any capable part.
Knowledge is also an insecurity
Knowledge is not just power, as the Adagio says. It is also the basis on which we are exploited and without power. There are at least three general risks of metadata on web3.
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Fraud: Financial insecurity and surveillance are intrinsically linked. The most serious hacks, robberies or scams depend on accumulated knowledge about an objective: their assets, transaction stories and who they are. DAPPRADAR estimates a loss of $ 1.3 billion due to “hacks and exploits” as phishing attacks only in 2024.
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Leaks: wallets that allow access to decentralized tokenomics are based on centralized leaks. DAPPS and wallet studies have demonstrated the prevalence of IP leaks: “The existing wallet infrastructure is not in favor of user privacy. Websites abuse wallets to users of online fingerprints, and DAPPs and wallets filter the address of the user’s wallet to third parties. “The pseudonym makes no sense if the identities and patterns of transactions of people can be easily revealed through metadata.
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Consensus of the chain: The consensus of the chain is a potential attack point. An example is a recent Celestia initiative to add a layer of anonymity to obscure the metadata of validates against particular attacks that seek to interrupt the consensus of the chain in the data availability sampling process (DAS) of Celestia.
Ensure web3 through anonymity
As web3 continues to grow, so does the amount of metadata on the activities of people offered to recently empowered surveillance systems.
Beyond the VPN
Virtual Private Network Technology (VPN) has decades at this time. The lack of progress is shocking, and most VPNs remain in the same centralized and patented infrastructures. Networks like Tor and Dandelion intervened as decentralized solutions. However, they are still vulnerable to surveillance by global adversaries capable of “time analysis” through the control of input and output nodes. Even more advanced tools are needed.
Noise networks
All surveillance looks for patterns in a network full of noise. By even more darkening communication patterns and the elimination of metadata such as IP of the metadata generated by traffic, possible attack vectors can be significantly reduced, and metadata patterns can be pulled from nonsense.
Anonymity networks have emerged to anonymity confidential traffic such as communications or cryptographic transactions through noise: cover trafficking, obfushens and mixing data. In the same spirit, other VPNs as Mullvad have introduced programs such as Daita (defense against traffic analysis by AI), which seeks to add “distortion” to their VPN network.
Running the codes
Whether defending people against murder in tomorrow’s drone wars or ensuring their chain transactions, new anonymity networks are needed to stir the codes of what makes us all objectives: the metadata that our lives online stay in their path.
The capture status is here. Automatic learning is feeding our data. Instead of leaving people’s data, web3 and anonymity systems unprotected can ensure that what ends in AI teeth is effectively garbage.
Opinion of: Casey Ford, PHD, researcher at NYM Technologies.
This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The points of view, the thoughts and opinions expressed here are alone of the author and do not necessarily reflect or represent the opinions and opinions of Cointelegraph.
