Tech Experts Urge Regulators to be Sceptical on Digital Currencies Innovation

A group of technology innovators has sent a letter to the United States Congressional Leadership, Committee Chairs, and Ranking Members, urging them to take a critical look at cryptocurrency innovations.

These experts, numbering 26 in total, including Harvard lecturer Bruce Schneier, former Microsoft engineer Miguel de Icaza and principal engineer at Google Cloud, Kelsey Hightower admonished the lawmakers not to listen to stakeholders with a vested interest in the crypto industry who claims the technology is designed for the good of all.

“We write to you urging you to take a critical, sceptical approach toward industry claims that crypto-assets (sometimes called cryptocurrencies, crypto tokens, or web3) are an innovative technology that is unreservedly good,” the letter reads, adding, “We urge you to resist pressure from digital asset industry financiers, lobbyists, and boosters to create a regulatory safe haven for these risky, flawed, and unproven digital financial instruments and to instead take an approach that protects the public interest and ensures technology is deployed in genuine service to the needs of ordinary citizens.”

These experts argued that not everything that can be built should be built and that the history of technology is replete with innovations that started out good but turned out bad in the end. They said the technology is not as novel as the proponents claim they are, adding that the only group of protocols, privacy coins, which offer true anonymity, are a disaster in that they are the right haven for money launderers.

They believe the clamour around blockchain technology is not also worth it in that it promotes only very few real-world use cases. 

Drawing on all these points, experts implored the lawmakers tasked with formulating regulations that bind the crypto ecosystem to “take a truly responsible approach to technological innovation and ensure that individuals in the US and elsewhere are not left vulnerable to predatory finance, fraud, and systemic economic risks in the name of technological potential which does not exist.”

Image source: Shutterstock