We have entered the era of anonymous encryption

Recently, following a change to Whatsapp's privacy policy, hundreds of thousands of people from all over the world have decided to abandon the app and use other services. Signal, an encrypted messaging service, has seen so many subscriptions that it has temporarily frozen.

Later, a mass exodus from social media took place, as Twitter and Facebook (Facebook shares - ticker FB) were involved in a debate on free speech and censorship. All of this could signal a change in how users value privacy.

The demand for privacy increases

For years, issues such as anonymity, resistance to censorship and decentralization have been the domain of political extremists. Armed with a pessimistic, even paranoid view, the ancestors of cryptocurrencies designed tools, such as Bitcoin, to get out of that world into which civilization had fallen.

But now, pushed by an information crisis and deepening global unrest, privacy has entered popular consciousness. Similar to what happens with popular consumer-facing apps like Signal, the flow of users on the darknet is also increasing.

This growing popularity could lead to an increase in monetary transactions. In December, the Whitehouse darknet market announced that it would no longer accept bitcoin payments, strengthening Monero as the cryptocurrency of choice for the darknet.

In fact, despite being removed from listing by the Shapeshift and Bittrex exchanges, Monero's price has steadily grown 140% over the past year, while its daily transactions have increased by a staggering 290%. Zcash has also increased by almost 70% in price. The fact that there is a growing demand for privacy is evident.

A new dawn

It's not just traditional cryptocurrencies that are undergoing a resurgence. Privacy apps are proliferating on decentralized finance (DeFi) while private smart contract platforms like Secret Network and Aleo are enabling programmable, general-purpose privacy.

All of these advances are made possible by significant improvements in privacy technology, especially zero-knowledge encryption. The internet is currently dominated by data collection and surveillance. In exchange for using a service, user data is collected by companies for purposes such as predicting and controlling behavior.

Offering a new economic vision for technology, the cryptocurrency ecosystem has the potential to challenge this paradigm. However, these new landscapes will not be without challenges.

Over the past year, cryptocurrencies have been inundated with rumors and headlines announcing an impending regulatory crackdown. In an interview that coincided with her statement that the European Central Bank (ECB) will release its own digital currency - the digital euro - within the next five years, ECB President Christine Lagarde called for global regulation on bitcoin. .

Separately, US Treasury Secretary candidate Janet Yellen said cryptocurrencies are a "particular concern" for terrorist financing and said there was a need to "curtail their use." But regulatory pressure can have unintended consequences by making privacy-preserving cryptocurrencies more attractive.