Configurable Asset Privacy and Proof-Carrying Disclosures

Configurable Asset Privacy for Ethereum (CAPE) is a smart-contract application that enables wrapping of Ethereum assets, as well as creation of new assets, with flexible privacy policies. Ben Fisch (Yale and Espresso Systems) explains the basics of CAPE and shows how creators of digital assets may configure a viewing policy, designating auditors that can decrypt select information about transactions under certain conditions. An extension to CAPE, based on decentralized private computation, supports arbitrary user-defined policies. Lastly, Ben presents an application of proof-carrying data (PCD) to disclosing information about the provenance of assets in shielded pools. In theory, PCDs can be used to achieve the same level of sanction enforcement without blocking the usage of shielded pools and/or eroding their overall functionality.

About the speaker

Ben is co-founder of Espresso Systems and an assistant professor of computer science at Yale University. He completed his PhD in applied cryptography at Stanford University under Dan Boneh. More: https://sites.google.com/site/benafis…

About a16z crypto research

a16z crypto research is a multidisciplinary lab that works closely with our portfolio companies and others toward solving the important problems in the space, and toward advancing the science and technology of the next generation of the internet. More about us: a16z.com/2022/04/21/announcing-a16z-crypto-research