The Many Sins of Web3: Bitcoin is NOT Encrypted

OWASP New Zealand Day 2023 Conference Talk

This may shock you, but...did you know that many of the assertions made by blockchain advocates weren't entirely accurate?!? Let us cherry-pick the worst security offenses from a retired cryptocurrency early adopter.

Whether it is the future of finance or a technological Wolpertinger, blockchain and its dependencies sure made a splash in the last few years. Amongst the many promises were how secure the technology was, but what is "security" in the context of cryptocurrencies, and what can we learn from the sector as developers and security practitioners in fiat-land? If this thing is so secure, then why is my bridge wiped, and all my apes gone? This talk will explore both the obvious (self-custody, immutability, pseudo-anonymity) and less obvious (UX, programming language design) issues with blockchain broadly from a technological angle, without all the societal posturing and misappropriation of client funds.

Bitcoin & blockchain in general isn't what people are making it out to be. The digital transformation is based upon deploying digital ID & wallets to secure personal data. We are moving into the time of tokenization, meaning everything will be digitized. You'll need a way of authenticating yourself & a way of signing the transaction of each interaction, since all data will be on an immutable ledger.

That's all of this is about, the system is just upgrading to become more efficient. That's it. The whole system is becoming more complicated for a reason. There will be a handful of protocols that will be adopted, while the rest get regulated out of exsistance.

Everything is based off of standards & regulations.