Who's afraid of innovation?
Part 3 of our series on cryptography and our ICO.Link solution focuses on data protection:
In ancient times, those who transported encrypted messages had to contend with enemies, hunger and thirst. Today, those who develop innovative hashing software have to contend with data protection hurdles that resemble a 3,000 km obstacle course after a marathon.
Fancy a chronicle of a data protection odyssey?
- The year is 2020: The idea and technical sketches for a quantum-secure encrypted data comparison platform called ICO.Link are immediately followed by discussions with insurance companies on the subject of data protection.
- In 2021, the first – positive – expert opinion from an independent law firm arrives. The search for pilot participants begins.
- In 2022, we are already fine-tuning contracts when participants suddenly withdraw: data protection concerns! Despite another expert opinion...
- In 2023, a third opinion is issued. And a fourth. The tenor is always the same: ICO.Link is GDPR-compliant and even represents a genuine innovation in data protection. Many are enthusiastic about the technical aspects. But data protection hangs over everything like the sword of Damocles.
- We also carry out the first pilot in 2023. The results are encouraging, but their significance is limited because, for ‘data protection reasons’, we are only allowed to implement a slimmed-down version.
- In 2024, a fifth and sixth expert opinions are issued. We also set up a new pilot project in the legal protection sector. Are their data protection departments more courageous? They are still hesitant to answer this question...
- In 2025, the State Data Protection Commissioner in Thuringia will be consulted. He responds quickly – and he too gives ICO.Link a thoroughly positive assessment.
It is now late summer 2025: after hundreds of thousands of hours of work, tens of thousands of euros spent on expert opinions, hundreds of emails and letters, and epic telephone and video call sessions, all of the external experts tell us:
- ICO.Link is data protection compliant!
- It protects against fraud!
- Solves problems that the industry has been struggling with for decades!
Thanks to complete documentation, nothing can happen to pilot participants in terms of data protection law!
So there are no technical grounds for the concerns. Are they psychological in nature, or rooted in a culture of obstruction? Is there as much hesitation when it comes to data protection and innovation as depicted in Greek myths about Acrisios, Oedipus or Paris? In mythology, fate strikes drastically, punishing those who hesitate. And in reality? Fraudsters who could have been tracked down long ago by ICO.Link continue to rub their thieving hands together.
Let's take a moment to catch our breath. We'll keep running, we promise. But for now, we'd like to know: how can we convince hesitant target groups if
- well-founded, independent expert opinions
- enormous savings potential
- ethical aspects
don't do the trick?
With the horror scenario of billions going to fraudsters?
Photo/image: Prompted by ICO-LUX with Leonardo.ai