“Privacy has become a taboo,” says crypto-anarchist project DarkFi

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon introduced one of the first critiques of centralized authority in 1848, a few years after publishing his now classic book What is property? and calls for the abolition of property and the state. According to Proudhon’s view, any political change would be limited without economic change.

His work is at the core of anarchism, “a political theory skeptical of the justification of authority and power,” according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Nearly two centuries later, Proudhon’s thoughts on economics and power still echo in society, with encryption tools paving the way for parts of the ideal society envisioned by his theory.

Crypto may be far from its original political principles, but projects that revive cypherpunk values ​​are still thriving. One such project is DarkFi, a multi-chain layer-1 protocol for anonymous applications and smart contracts powered by zero-knowledge proofs.

DarkFi “is not a corporate startup. It is a democratic economic experiment, an operating system for society,” the manifesto states. Cryptoanarchy, according to DarkFi, “is the tactic of using cryptography to create a space of freedom that cannot be penetrated by force – and capital monopolies with coercive power.”

DarkFi’s manifesto also states that:

“The old technology model is anti-political because it takes ownership away from people and puts it in the hands of monopolies. The old model encourages passivity and indifference by design, reducing people to consumers.”

Behind the project is a team of anarchist coders, including Amir Taak, an early Bitcoin developer who led the Dark Wallet project before it went dark in 2015 when he disappeared from the crypto scene to fight in Syria against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) while trying to introduce the local community to Bitcoin.

A group of pseudonymous DarkFi developers spoke to Cointelegraph in an interview about the project’s testnet and how the crypto industry is evolving amid privacy challenges, bad actors, government oversight and politics. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Cointelegraph (CT): What is DarkFi and what problems does it solve in the crypto space?

DarkFi (DF): DarkFi is a community and movement that seeks to create user-empowering systems, which enable individuals to preserve basic human rights, such as the right to privacy, freedom of expression, and the right to interact with each other without intermediaries. Some of these systems are a layer-1 blockchain with privacy by default, a peer-to-peer IRC messaging system with encrypted groups and DMs, and even decentralized collaboration tools for organization, task management, etc.

The crypto space has lost its original cypherpunk values, succumbing to government pressure by enforcing sanctions and/or implementing backdoors, allowing projects to survive. Privacy has become a taboo, which in today’s conditions often results in the violent termination of development in the name of transparency and prevention of illegal activities. Crypto will split into two – RegFi, useless and bolted down, and DarkFi, a truly free, decentralized and uncensored paradigm. That is what we are trying to address, push back, if you will, to keep the power of the minute man, not serve individuals on a gold plate in states and mega-corporations for fiat profit.

CT: What came first when DarkFi developed, the anarchist crypto vision, or the need for base layer solutions for multi-chain applications?

DF: With DarkFi, we want to build anonymous and secure crypto. As Monero and Zcash are to money, DarkFi is to apps/smart contracts. We felt there is a large market and need to be able to develop decentralized and anonymous financial applications. This has not been possible until now.

“Cryptospace has lost its original cypherpunk values, succumbing to government pressure by enforcing sanctions and/or implementing backdoors so projects can survive. Privacy has become taboo.”

We believe that with privacy as standard and maximum anonymity, we will make it possible for people to organize and act in much safer spaces and ecosystems. We are also very inspired by Richard Stallman and the free software movement, which is also why (unlike most other crypto things) DarkFi is fully licensed with the GNU AGPL license and we follow the free software philosophy.

CT: How can encryption technologies contribute to a balanced environment between personal freedom and government oversight, avoiding bad actors at the same time?

DF: The purpose of encryption technologies is to enable users to “hide things in plain sight.” Supervision, government or otherwise, contradicts this, as it allows third parties to “sniff” what’s inside. Individuals should not give up control of their freedom, especially to a government, which is supposed to work for the individual, not the other way around. By using these technologies, users can protect themselves from bad actors trying to track them to exploit them.

CT: What role does Web3 play in society’s future privacy and policy?

DF: What is currently called “Web3” is just becoming a surveillance tool that is being abused by opponents and officials more and more. If this continues, society’s “future privacy” will be close to non-existent, and politics will be dictatorships where every user and citizen must stay closely aligned so as not to be considered undesirable by their oppressors.

CT: How can crypto stay aligned with its core principles as it becomes mainstream and therefore more political?

DF: It feels like the whole cypherpunk grassroots movement from the early Bitcoin days has slowly been lost. It is becoming increasingly capitalist and may not be “more political.” In fact, with most projects, it seems they will do everything in their power to be less political and more “diverse and inclusive.” They have no bite and simply succumb to the numb agenda. There are too few projects in the crypto space that are political and caught my eye.

CT: Does crypto have a future without politics?

DF: Crypto is not a flamboyant technology. Ciphers started as a parallel language between generals and kings to deter enemies. They are only visible to senders and recipients. Ciphers were used in antiquity, the Middle Ages, and cutting ciphers drove the development of computers in the last century. They have always been necessary.

In this era, communication, work and transactions are the fundamentals of any society that happen behind screens. At the other end of the channel is surveillance and monitoring.

“What is currently called ‘Web3’ is just becoming a surveillance tool that is being abused by adversaries and officials more and more.

The crypto enemy before computers was in foreign territories. Now the enemy is near; crypto creates a parallel and secure space beyond state regulation, sanctions and politics. Crypto is not against politics; it is used to deter your enemy. The enemies of the individual crypto is concerned with are monitoring and surveillance, and crypto principles do not compromise on ensuring freedom.

CT: What are the next steps in DarkFi’s roadmap?

DF: We’ve just released our first testnet, so we’re letting the community try out the UX and find bugs that we’ve written so we can iterate and improve. As for the future plans, we are branching out in several directions when it comes to the blockchain. We hope we will also be able to educate people about the importance of free software and its philosophy. Just open source doesn’t cut it. Developers and founders must stop submitting to Big Tech and use crypto mechanisms to capture value in their projects and remain sovereign.