Posts - page 3

Mnemonic

In order for privacy preserving technology to see widespread adoption, it must be accessible.

One of the key problems in making this technology accessible is the question of how to handle identity. In a centralised system, some authority can be in charge of which identifiers are associated with which identities. For example, Google runs Gmail, and keep track of which user owns what username. To create an account you ask them for one, such as arrakis@gmail.com. They will look up their list of previously registered usernames, and tell you that someone else already has it. Finally, you find an unallocated username arrakis1729@gmail.com, which Gmail grants you. From that point forward, if someone wants to contact you they need your username, then send you their message via Google.

In decentralised systems however this poses some challenges. A global table of registered usernames is a complex engineering challenge.