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Howard Wu

Howard Wu

Founder of the privacy-focused blockchain Aleo and CEO of Provable; cryptographer and UC Berkeley alum known for zero-knowledge proof research (Zexe, DIZK).

Oct 21, 2026

13:12
Yes
13:12
... your accountant or your auditor to be able to see specific transactions as they're required.
13:16
Additionally, there are also, uh, things like freeze lists so that, you know, if you, uh, if you have sanctioned addresses or if you have specific banned accounts that need to be controlled there, that is also a possibility, that's also allowed.
13:27
Um, and we also have been working on initiatives, uh, more on the experimental side, like ZPass, which basically allow you to prove your identity without revealing your identity.
13:34
So I can prove that I'm over the age of 18 without revealing my birth date.
13:38
Um, there are many capabilities with privacy tech that can be used to enable better compliance and better safety.
13:44
It's something that we're a big advocate for.

8 MINS LATER

22:07
Yeah
1:51
But for the most part, in order to make sure that nobody's doing anything untoward, you have to have this kind of full transparency by default.
1:59
I get the sense that people haven't really thought deeply about the user journey in crypto.
2:03
And because of that, this concept of privacy is fundamentally at odds with the kind of expectations of what people think you use the blockchain for.
2:11
The best example that I like to give is just the simple concept of payments.
2:15
Right now, when I use USDC or USDT on-chain, every sender, receiver, and amount, along with its timestamp, is publicly revealed.
2:24
And because of that, I can track and trace.
2:26
And there's advantages and disadvantages to that.

6 MINS LATER

8:10
Correct.

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