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Widely recognized as the inventor of digital cash, David is currently leading xx network, a completely private, quantum-secure decentralized messaging and payment platform. He is also known for other fundamental innovations in cryptography, including privacy technologies such as mix nets and secure voting systems. With a PhD in Computer Science from UC Berkeley, he has taught at NYU Graduate School of Business and the University of California. David is the founder of the International Association for Cryptologic Research, the Cryptography Group at the Center for Mathematics and Computer Science in Amsterdam, and DigiCash. Among his breakthrough projects are digital blind signatures, multiparty computation, and random sample voting.
Projects
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Led creation of high-speed privacy-protected blockchain with quantum-resistant consensus and currency with metadata shredding via mixing.
Messaging and payments are all encrypted and metadata is shredded, giving users full control over their own personal information.
XX NETWORK
Founded IACR by launching one of the first cryptography conferences when NSA was bullying scientific societies to halt all events on crypto.
IACR remains the scientific society of the academic field, sponsoring 3 flagship conferences yearly, plus workshops and a scholarly journal.
I.A.C.R.
Invented mix networks, which use public-key cryptography to hide senders and receivers of messages and thereby “shred” the metadata.
Messages are multiply-encrypted and passed from node to node, each node changing the message order and removing a layer of encryption.
MIXING
Invented and as CEO saw through to global deployment the first digital bearer instrument and first privacy-protected electronic payments.
eCash was launched online as its own CyberBucks currency and also issued under license by banks around the world in national currencies.
ECASH
Proved CBDC can be private and better than quantum-secure against counterfeiting as well as fully scaleable.
Built, tested and demonstrated using smartphone payments by the Bank for International Settlement’s Tourbillon project.
ECASH 2.0
Invented a new medium of exchange where users each have their own portfolio of assets from which value can be sent or received.
Value is always invested and trades can be combined with payments, giving scaleability privacy, instant finality, and interfungible assets.
BETTER THAN MONEY
Invented key privacy protection technologies–untraceable communications, digital cash, and unlinkable but unforgeable credentials.
Explained concepts to a wide audience also in scientific journals by invitation, as well as predicted metadata as a key issue.
ACHIEVING ELECTRONIC PRIVACY
Named the solution; led effort that proved fundamental theorems in 3 main models and unilaterally in a combined model.
…by synthesizing a universally trustworthy entity. Named the research area, led effort that proved fundamental theorems in 3 main models and unilaterally in a combined model.
MULTIPARTY COMPUTATION
Invented new approach to elections and led a technical project allowing more issues to be voted on yet each voter to dig deeper.
The technology was implemented, including anti-vote buying decoy ballots, and deployed for a binding election at the Council of Europe.
RANDOM SAMPLE VOTING
Invented “Guerrilla Democracy”—a way for anyone to prove that there is majority support for a statement among a population.
Requires only a mailing list, postage for 1,000 letters, the internet, and simple materials like envelopes, stickers, and cardboard boxes.
7TH ESTATE
Invented Scantegrity technology, including chemistry and fabrication, and led deployment to run two full municipal elections by invitation.
Voters use special pens to reveal codes they can later verify online, maintaining ballot secrecy while ensuring votes are recorded correctly.
TAKOMA PARK MARYLAND 2009 & 2011
Invented and led project aimed at solving vote-buying and voter coercion without polling places in a fully decentralized system.
Inalienable registration separated from vote-casting lets voters flip votes via “hedgehogs,” which buyers/coercers can neither detect or prevent.
VOTEXX
Invented a cryptographic technology that allows direct peer-to-peer trading of cryptocurrencies as well as financial instruments generally.
No trusted intermediaries or smart contracts, minimizing systemic risk while giving access to global pricing and liquidity.
LIQUIFINITY
Proposed an optical architecture in the form factor of typical prescription eyeglasses, matching the capabilities of the human eyes.
Multiple facets, with adaptive foviation and focus. exceed perception of the eye over the full field of view through the eyeglass lens.
PERSPECTIVA
Proposed the AstroCool project to reverse global warming utilizing shade from moon dust placed in space by near-term technologies.
AstroCool is a four-phased project to reset global temperatures that is democratized through competition and a secure global referendum.