Formulating a Community Defense

While the Web3 industry is filled with promise, the fulfilment of that future depends on adoption, that process whereby the technology becomes integrated into the systems through which society operates. 

Like any activity where money and eagerness abound, blockchain systems attract greed-motivated people pursuing dishonest enrichment by exploiting defects in the systems and the adjacent community. While the attacks on the community come in assorted forms, they can generally be described as forms of theft or fraud. 

Fraud did not emerge with Web3; it is a persistent societal problem that predates the industry.  For example, the email scams of princes asking for help holding bank funds are woven into the history of the internet. As long as it the industry presents value and wealth coupled with minimal punitive consequences, it will attract thieves and con artists to its spaces.  

While some of these hustles are direct attacks on system infrastructure, many are indirect attacks on the community utilizing traditional social media adjacent to industry projects.  For example, scammers target chat channels of video content on YouTube focused on blockchains, coins, DeFi, and related subjects, appealing to the greed, desperation and occasionally language insufficiencies to dupe victims into the scam.

In all cases, prevention of harm is superior to enforcement and mitigation. Because blockchains are essentially global systems, these attacks on the system frequently occur across borders under legal ambiguity in which jurisdiction and reach are significant barriers to legalistic solutions. Consequently, prosecution is even less assured. Prevention and mitigation are essential components of a long term strategy. To that end, identification of offenders and exposure of schemes serves to prevent future victimization even when prosecution is not available.  

While fraud is not a creation of the industry, the industry's innovations could go a long way towards reducing fraud globally. To the extent Web3's value transfer rails can be secured, the industry can make it substantially more difficult for scammers to succeed, increase the likelihood scammers will be exposed prior to victimizing offenders, trace successful scams to their perpetrators, and de.  

In the field of criminal justice, crime is understood to occur at the intersection of offender, victim and location.  Each of these presents different parameters for prevention and mitigation. Offender focused strategies are predominantly enforcement oriented, although some preventative programs exist.  Target hardening works for both victim and location. For example, educating potential victims on warning signs for fraud can prevent victimization.  Likewise, technical solutions can protect systems (e.g. antivirus, spam blockers, alarms).  Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) intervenes at the architectural level (e.g. lighting, visibility) to make locations less conducive to crime.  

While investigation remains a substantial component of modern policing, most police activity is non-enforcement oriented. Modern departments devote substantial effort to mitigation of community hazards and disorder, prevention (including education), and regulation.  

Cardano and the blockchain industry broadly can develop a defensive capacity to prevent crimes being committed against the Community.  The existing values of transparency and peer review increase the opportunity that insecure code and rug-pulls will be exposed prior to victimization.  Likewise, security and financial audits further strengthen projects against hacks and other thefts. Education and hygienic practices, perhaps bolstered by technical solutions, can alert victims to scams before they succeed.  Formal institutions may be formed to perform critical functions, including tracing and investigation of hacks and frauds to identify and expose responsible parties.  Likewise, legal efforts may be necessary to bring pressure on platforms that permits scams to persist and thrive.  Governments may require a sustained information campaign to educate policymakers about necessary policy change.

In order to identify a successful strategy for the Community, a deliberative process must be followed to assure the strategy is built on a foundation of knowledge.  Combining the technical expertise of industry insiders with experts from policing and criminal justice, the project will develop a solid knowledge foundation from which to evaluate potential strategies.  The project will produce a preliminary report (electronic) that will be shared publicly.  Recommendations from the report may produce future proposals for Project Catalyst.  

Roadmap

1.  Workshop preparation, featuring online meetings between team and experts. 30-days from funding, to prepare and inform workshop.  

2. Two-day workshop, face-to-face, for integration and ideation. Funding for 8 travelers. Objective: identify promising strategies and prepare recommendations to the community to build defensive capacity.  Completion within 90 days. 

3. Writing team developing report. Completion within 30 days of workshop.

Success: 

1.  Completion of workshop within 90 days of funding.

2. Completion of preliminary report by 120 days of funding.  

Budget:

Administration and Coordination: $2500

Workshop/ Travel: $20,000

Stipends to Writing Team: $4000 to PFI

The core team are members of the Police Futurists' Futures Working Group. Additional experts from industry and computer science will be recruited as necessary to provide expertise.

Futures Working Group Biographies:

John Jackson is a political scientist (MA/ABD) and futurist (MS) with 27 years in policing in enforcement, investigative and policy development roles.  John is a director of the Society of Police Futurists International and its current president.

Dr. Bernard Levin is a professor emeritus of psychology from Waynesboro Community College and retired officer of the Waynesboro (VA) Police Department.  For 20 years, Dr. Levin was a visiting scholar at hteh FBI Academy and served as its first Futurist in Residence. Dr. Levin serves on the board of the High Tech Crime Consortium.  

Dr. Joseph Schafer is a professor of criminal justice at the University of St. Louis.  Dr. Schafer has previously served as Futurist in Residence at the FBI Academy. Dr. Schafer is a director of the Society of Police Futurists International and is the current Chair of the Futures Working Group.  

Dr. Michael Buerger is a professor of criminal justice at Bowling Green University and a former police officer.  Dr. Buerger has previously served as director of the Minneapolis Crime Control Institute and as a Visiting Fellow with the National Institute of Justice.  Dr. Buerger studies community policing.  

Rick Myers has served as executive director of the Major Cities Chiefs Association.  Chief Myers also served as chief of police in four cities, and has served in leadership with the Police Executive Research Forum and the Commission on Accreditation of Law Enforcement Agencies.

Al Youngs is an attorney and has served recently as a police advisor for the US Department of Justice, USAID and the US Department of State.  Chief Youngs is a retired deputy chief from Lakewood (CO) Police Department.