XX Network Partners with Worldcoin to Further Enhance User Privacy

In an announcement as part of an X space on 9th February 2024 from the Worldcoin project, and a subsequent announcement from the XX Network, several grants (1, 2, 3) have been issued by Worldcoin to development teams of the XX Network to introduce unique privacy technology for use within the Worldcoin ecosystem. Worldcoin’s Wave0 grants programme attracted more than 1,000 applicants with 28 successful projects in this wave, meaning over 10% of them were awarded to XX related ventures.

Aaron from the XX Foundation describes how XX will add value to Worldcoin with this work, in a clip from the X space:

Over three million people have already enrolled in the Worldcoin network which involves a physical interaction with a piece of hardware known as an ‘orb’. This orb scans peoples’ eyes and produces special “iris codes” which are derived from the texture of the iris itself.

The transmission, storage and usage of these iris codes, whilst not directly tied to a human identity, is still a contentious issue because of the conception of a company handling and potentially mishandling the data, or indeed adversaries tracking such interactions over the network.

XX Network’s work will include the introduction of cMixx+ from the point of registration (the orb transmitting the iris code) to the users authenticating (from within their “World App”), in a way where nobody, not even Worldcoin, will know when a new user has registered, nor who is authenticating or potentially updating any information against that record.

Much of the crypto world was sceptical when Worldcoin announced its original project plans but it has sought to explain in meticulous detail the extreme lengths it is going to in regards to privacy, to prevent misuse of the data they capture. It is a natural shoe-in that the XX Network (with its pedigree of cryptographers including its founder David Chaum) should be the ones leading the charge to further enhance user privacy for Worldcoin.

Founded by Sam Altman (who runs OpenAI of ChatGPT fame), the premise of the Worldcoin project comes from the fact he foresees, perhaps unsurprisingly, a time in the not-so-distant future where we will need to distinguish ourselves as actual human beings in a world of hyper intelligent AI and impersonation fraud. So Worldcoin gives individuals a chance to prove their humanness to systems, and therefore partake in an open ecosystem of trade and governance.

cMixx, to be employed by Worldcoin in this development, is a decentralised metadata-shredding mix network designed over several decades by David Chaum and developed, implemented and enhanced by his team in the XX Network from 2016 to the present day. It is run by several hundred independent node operators of the XX Network over 5 continents and 150+ countries who also run an independent Layer1 blockchain with its own governance and its native XX Coin.

cMixx(+) has had several other projects being developed with it, including echoexx (a completely private direct messaging and payment platform using Ethereum identities), Project Tourbillon (a privacy centric CBDC pilot for the Swiss National Bank), Better Than Money (David Chaum’s ‘commodities as money’ futuristic app in progress), Haven (group messaging) and the original XX Messenger to name a few.

The XX Foundation has its own development grants, for which further announcements are expected, and many of the awarded projects are expected to be involving cMixx(+).

Mário Yaksetig, one of the developers with XX spoke of the announcement in Telegram shortly after:

“Very exciting times! We’ll be exploring 3 projects with the Worldcoin foundation.

Votexx (for Worldcoin governance), cMixx+ for privacy in their DB, and actually covering their network traffic from the Orbs.

I think it’s a great fit for us and very aligned with the requests we’ve gotten from the community.”

I interviewed Mário a few days later where he fleshed out the details of the grants a little further. See this page to listen to/read that.

Worldcoin was founded in 2019 and originally raised $125.5m investment from Andreessen Horowitz, Variant, Khosla Ventures, Coinbase and Tiger Global.

XX Network went live to mainnet in November 2021 after many years in stealth development and did not take VC investment, to have more control over its direction. Instead it raised seed capital from Roger Ver and Chris Larsen and conducted and a series of coin sales between 2020-2021.