<img src="https://crypto.news/app/uploads/2024/01/crypto-news-blockchain-option03.webp” />
In an era where digital innovation intersects with democratic processes, Rarimo's latest development, the “Freedom Tool”, aims to revolutionize the landscape of electoral systems.
Rarimo introduced a digital identity protocol designed to revolutionize the way we think about voting and personal privacy. This zero-knowledge voting platform enables the creation of secure, tamper-proof voting systems where people can freely express their opinions without fear of invasion of privacy or authoritarian repercussions.
Unlike traditional voting mechanisms, Freedom Tool leverages blockchain technology and identity management to ensure every vote is anonymous and verifiable.
Rarimo co-founder Lasha Antadze spoke to crypto.news about the origins of Freedom Tool, how it combats election fraud, and the importance of defending democracy and personal freedom.
Freedom Tool seems to be an innovative application for anonymous elections and polls. How did the idea come about and what motivated the Rarimo community to develop this solution?
Antadze: Identity is fundamental to the vast majority of online interactions, but Web3 was missing an identity layer, so we wanted to provide it. However, we also wanted to incorporate privacy into this layer. Identity cannot function without it, and ZKPs allowed us to overcome the identity limitations of blockchain, primarily that everything on the chain is visible to everyone. Voting is a great example of where you need to prove your identity but preserve your privacy, but it's just one of many use cases.
With more than 64 elections around the world in 2024, how do you envision the Freedom Tool addressing issues such as voter fraud, voter intimidation, and vote control in multiple countries?
Freedom Tool allows polling and voting that are not only free from surveillance but also managed by citizens. Communities are free to set their own electoral terms, defining which candidates are on the ballot and who can vote. In regions where the opposition is prohibited from running and minority groups are systematically excluded from voting, this ability will return power to the people. Freedom Tool represents a class of technology designed not simply as an improvement or patch for the deficiencies of existing systems. Rather, it is conceived as a parallel solution, fundamentally aimed at guaranteeing the basic human right to freedom of expression.
The first implementation on the ground will be in an Eastern European regime. Can you give us more details about the challenges of implementing the tool in those regions and the possible impact on the opposition and minority groups?
In totalitarian environments, the Tool of Freedom allows the opposition to survive. In the Eastern European country where the first implementation of the Freedom Tool is being launched, it will provide one of the few safe avenues for dissent. This not only gives dissidents a voice, but also allows them to organize and unite. Polling and voting capabilities can be used for anything from electing an opposition leader to defining core issues to focus on. Crucially, the sentiment it reflects and the number of users it attracts will reassure dissidents that they are not alone and encourage them to continue fighting.
How does Freedom Tool align with Satoshi Nakamoto?bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf” data-type=”link” data-id=”https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>The original vision Of empowering individuals and decentralizing power, extending beyond finances to encompass personal identity and freedom?
Freedom Tool is a continuation of Satoshi's goal of putting power in the hands of the people. Blockchain's journey began with the separation of money and the state, and the Freedom Tool aims to extend this principle to identity, which is equally essential for individual freedom in the modern era.
Can you explain the key features of Freedom Tool and how it leverages blockchain technology and zero-knowledge identity management for secure and anonymous voting?
With the Freedom Tool, citizens prove their eligibility by scanning their biometric passports with their phones. The biometric chip data inside the passport is verified and upon confirmation of authenticity, an anonymous voting pass is issued. The citizen then uses this pass to cast his or her vote. Zero-knowledge cryptography is used to sever any link between the voting pass and the passport data, so that the two cannot be paired. When the DNI and the voting pass cannot be matched, neither can the citizen and his vote.
Passport data never leaves the mobile device used for scanning. This means that the data never passes through a server and there are no points where it can be intercepted. In addition to protecting citizens from surveillance, Freedom Tool uses blockchain to protect votes from manipulation. All votes are posted directly to the blockchain, where they are tamper-proof and publicly auditable.
Ballots run as smart contracts on the blockchain where criteria for who can vote and on what issue can be predefined. Anyone can send ballots to a network, but they require a support threshold to activate. You can find a more detailed technical description in our White paper.
The integration of the Tool of Freedom into an Eastern European regime implies direct participation in political processes. How does the Rarimo community deal with possible challenges or opposition from governments when implementing such tools?
A 'freedom tool' is a piece of technology with an open source base, allowing anyone around the world to use and modify it for various purposes, from political to commercial. There is no mechanism for its contributors or others in the ecosystem to control or stop its evolution.
Incentives for implementation at the ground level are driven by the actors who discover the tool and, ideally, align with the original vision behind its creation. It is crucial to understand that the developers of this tool do not pursue any political agenda through their technological contributions. Their core belief centers on individual empowerment and belief in freedom of expression.
RariMe, MetaMask Snap brought to you by Rarimo, focuses on digital identity management. How does this integration align with Rarimo's broader vision of a decentralized, privacy-focused Internet?
The macro vision is to ensure that users are in control of their digital identities. Freedom Tool is just one of many identity solutions built with Rarimo that put the privacy and ownership of identity back in the hands of the individual.
The MetaMask Snap is another. It integrates sovereign identity into the broader web3 ecosystem, allowing users to store their own credentials and maintain control over how they are used, generating ZKP for them on demand. This is in contrast to the current web2 identity model, which forces us to rely on centralized identity providers.
Considering the rapidly evolving landscape of blockchain technology and digital identity, what future developments or improvements does Rarimo have in the pipeline to further revolutionize the space?
The main innovation at the heart of the Freedom Tool was ZKPs for biometric passports. This introduces a layer of privacy to one of the most universal forms of identity: passports.
Voting is just one of many cases where you may want to prove your age or citizenship and know that there is no chance of your personal information being accessed or leaked. There are a variety of use cases for this technology that the Rarimo community plans to develop.
More generally, Rarimo is a layer for universal access and verification of digital identities. The protocol provides a structured method for third-party applications to connect and verify information from a variety of issuers. We plan to continue providing interoperability to the decentralized identity space so that users can seamlessly transfer their identities over web3.
The Rarimo ecosystem is built on the principles of self-sovereignty and self-managed identities, using blockchain, decentralized identifiers (DID), zero-knowledge technology, and various decentralized identity standards to ensure that users have control over their online presence.
Its development is highly horizontal and collaborative. This approach personally excites me because I see innovative non-Defi applications emerging by combining decentralized identity with blockchain technology.
