Transparency

Artwork ➢ Transparency Artist ➢ Black7even Text ➢ hex6c, Chiara Braidotti, and Black7even

Web3 exists in an unstable and delicate balance between transparency and privacy. On the one hand, all data published on the blockchain are potentially visible to anyone, for example through a blockchain explorer such as Etherscan for Ethereum. This data includes the code of smart contracts, the (fungible and non-fungible) token transactions we make, and the amount of tokens we hold.

This visibility requires users - for reasons of privacy and personal security - to remain anonymous, thus not exposing their identity in person when interacting with the Web3. An account identified by an alphanumeric string (which encodes the account's public key) is used in place of an identity. In truth, each user is free to create from one to many accounts, thus fragmenting his or her digital identity. This, in theory, guarantees anonymity, and thus the person's privacy. More precisely, one should speak of pseudo-anonymity: in some cases, by exploiting network analysis techniques, it is possible to trace the user's nominal identity with reasonable certainty even through his or her anonymous digital identity. Hiding something, even one's own identity, is by no means trivial on the Web3.

Fragmentary, multilayered and almost see-through is also sym ph o n y, a work inspired by transparency in the context of the blockchain system. Developed by deconstructing a photographic image, this digital symphony presents an intricate web of shapes, colors and sounds subject to centrifugal and centripetal forces. In it, amorphous elements appear to be engaged in a cyclical loop of assertion and concealment, creating an almost hypnotic movement.

At the conceptual level, the key elements related to transparency that the artist chose as a starting point are redundancy, immutability, diaphanity, and anonymity/pseudonymity. Through a process of indexing the source image, each layer in the work was generated by extracting individual colors from the image palette and animated following the idea of redundancy. In a seamless loop, a harmonious series of abstract appearances seems to flow like a kaleidoscopic river of data through an ethereal background.

The luminous shapes featured in sym ph o n y symbolically represent the blocks: almost transparent to evoke the clarity and accessibility of the immutable data recorded in the blockchain; of various colors to allude to the variety of information and transactions that are shared and authenticated through it. Their dynamic movements recall the diversity of actors involved in the ecosystem and, in some cases, lead them to dissolve. This fragmentariness alludes directly to the multifaceted nature of digital identity.

As for anonymity in Web3, Artificial Intelligence is further complicating the issue. An anonymous human agent may be indistinguishable from an artificial agent (a bot). In many situations it is important to know that we are interacting with people and not artificial agents. This has led to the search for proof-of-personhood techniques, i.e., methods for discriminating people from bots.

The dual significance of the principle of transparency, that is, its usefulness and consequent problematic nature, is evident when this axiom is applied to smart contracts, the programs that constitute the decentralized applications of the Web3. A smart contract to be operational must be deposited on the blockchain and therefore its code is public and scrutinizable by all. This is an advantage in that, before interacting with the code, one can analyze its behavior. The longest-lived smart contracts, which have been scrutinized by so many people, are in fact the most secure. On the other hand, this also allows malicious hackers to study the smart contract code and try to find any bugs to exploit to steal users' funds.

So transparency is one of the axioms of Web3 theory. It mandates anonymity, i.e., the extreme difficulty of tracing a user's personal identity, in order to ensure privacy and security. In some situations, such as during a vote for a DAO, we would like to be relatively sure of at least the humanity of the anonymous user. In others, such as in the presence of theft of honest users' funds, we would like to be able to track the thief's movements and ideally trace his or her identity.

The principles on which Web3 is founded are intrinsically linked and compose the many faces of a colorful polyhedron, as vibrant as sym ph o n y.