Privacy_and_Blockchain.html@robinrenwick.net
Welcome to the "Privacy and Blockchain: a boundary object perspective" information page.
Blockchain technology emerged at the beginning of 21st century; becoming renowned for its role in enabling cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. While the majority view blockchain as revolutionary, their perspective of such revolution differs. These differences become especially meaningful for two reasons. First, each of these groups is actively contributing to the development of blockchain either directly (as is the case for academic researchers, and protocol developers), or indirectly (as is the case for investors and regulators). Thus, each is inevitably trying to direct and influence the evolution and growth of the technology as they see fit. Second, a central feature of blockchain technologies is that it is a ‘distributed ledger’, i.e. a public record of interactions visible to all nodes on the network. This has the potential to create a single, complete historic reservoir of data, the anonymity, fungibility, and transparency of which has significant social and economic implications for individual liberty and/or legal accountability, depending on one’s perspective. The objective of this research is to analyse how different attitudes to privacy are likely to impact the development of blockchain technologies.
A qualitative analysis is proposed, based on semi-structured interviews with practitioners from five key social worlds, namely corporate architects, regulators, users/investors, cryptographic researchers, and protocol developers.
Interviews will be carried out over one of the following communication platforms, depending on interviewee preference: Wire, Telegram, Skype or Telephone. If the participant wishes to remain anonymous, this will be respcted. The interviews are wholly voluntary, and the participant may end the interview at any stage. The participant may also request deletion of any information held regarding their participation. Interviews are expected to take approximately 60 minutes.
n.b: The study is currently in the second round of interviews at the request of the proposed Journal.
Information surrounding the overarching research process:@information_sheet
An outline of the consent you are agreeing to:@consent_sheet
Some related research and my own research profile:@research_gate