Embedding human rights within cryptocurrency systems is no longer optional but a fundamental necessity. Central principles such as self-custody, privacy as a default setting, and censorship-resistant identities must guide the design of all blockchain technologies to ensure lasting digital freedom.
Shady El Damaty, co-founder of Human.Tech, shares his expert opinion on the rising concerns in emerging technologies beyond techno-enthusiast circles. A growing crisis of confidence stems from issues like government surveillance, deceptive centralization, and misuse of tools intended to empower rather than control.
Cryptocurrency and decentralized identity innovations hold tremendous promise for redistributing power and empowering individuals. Yet, alarm bells ring among many developers and users who witness technologies becoming vehicles for surveillance and control, contradicting their original emancipatory visions.
Real-world challenges include deepfake scams, AI impersonation, and state-backed biometric ID initiatives alongside regulatory frameworks like the EU AI Act that shape digital rights often without public engagement. This urgency compels the crypto industry to embed human rights swiftly and structurally into its protocols.
The problem is less about the technology itself and more about the embedded values guiding its implementation. Ensuring crypto’s future legitimacy requires prioritizing human rights as core components of its architecture, not as mere add-ons.
Prioritizing Human-Centered Self-Custody Solutions
Failing to incorporate ethical design principles risks replicating the centralized power imbalances that Web3 aimed to eliminate. Self-custody has always been a foundational idea in cryptocurrency, but challenges like major exchange collapses and difficult wallet interfaces reveal that current solutions mainly serve power users rather than the broader public.
Next-generation custody must provide complete user control while being simple and accessible. Overcoming issues like lost keys and confusing backups is vital to true empowerment, requiring a balanced approach integrating security, ease of use, and sovereign control.
Universal Personhood: A Key to Digital Trust
As automated bots and AI-generated content become increasingly sophisticated, reliably proving human identity online is critical yet complex. Solutions must protect individual privacy and autonomy without dependence on state or corporate credentialing.
Decentralized, censorship-resistant identity systems enabling universal personhood are essential to fostering trust, integrity, and inclusiveness in digital environments.
Making Privacy the Default, Not an Afterthought
The surveillance-heavy legacy of Web2 demands a new paradigm where privacy is baked into system design rather than patched on later. Privacy-by-default means minimal data collection, encryption by design, and allowing individuals full autonomy over their information.
Every technology should assume that user protection is an intrinsic feature, not an optional toggle, to break free from invasive data practices and restore digital freedom.
Managing Risks While Upholding Responsibility
Some caution that embedding human rights into technology can be misused or politically co-opted. While these risks are real, they are not reasons for paralysis. Transparent governance, open design processes, and diverse alignment mechanisms can safeguard protocols, ensuring accountability primarily to users.
Web3 provides unique tools that, if responsibly developed, can decentralize control, empower communities, and resist abuses of power. Achieving this vision requires conscious integration of rights at the protocol level from the outset, not as retrofits.
We stand at a pivotal moment where human rights must evolve from external constraints to foundational operating principles embedded in digital infrastructure. This shift isn’t just philosophical; it’s a practical imperative.
The opportunity to forge a digital future that truly serves humanity is narrowing. Implementing our shared values into code now is crucial to securing that future.
Opinion by Shady El Damaty, co-founder of Human.Tech.