Really? THEKEY.VIP? This is NOT decentralized...

Disclosure... you'll find the same article over on my Medium blog https://medium.com/@angrysalad486/ .

Keys have the power to unlock doors. They also have the power to close them, as in the case of THEKEY, a decentralized identification verification (IDV) tool. That’s right. Big Brother is well and truly on his way.

Companies like SelfKey, and platforms like Agrello, take a truly decentralized approach to digital identity with granular information and no centralized databases on which your valuable personal information is stored. However, reading through THEKEY’s whitepaper, it soon becomes apparent that their approach is anything but decentralized.

One of the first pieces of information that really leaps out is that THEKEY has already collected the “personal identity data of 210 million people in 66 cities, authenticated by the relevant government authorities, [and] are connected on a real-time basis. This constitutes a solid foundation of IDV.”

Doesn’t that information strike you as odd? If not, you need to ask yourself who gave THEKEY permission to access that information? Was it the 210 million individuals? Probably not.

Looking further into THEKEY’s data collection module, you soon find out that the storage of this information is not decentralized at all.

“It is based on ETL technology, which enables data extracted from different data resources, transformed to a uniformed format and upload to a central site.”

If that’s not concerning enough, the list of ‘Validators’ should send you quickly into paroxysms of fear.

In THEKEY ecosystem, there are three types of participant: “There are three parties in THEKEY Ecosystem: (1) Validators who process the IDV request and generate the IDV result, (2) Service Providers who initiate IDV request and (3) Individual Users who are the customer of the service provider and need to give consent to validators to process the IDV request.”

The whitepaper goes on to further explain that the Validators are the backbone of THEKEY ecosystem, and the “Validators may include THEKEY, government entities, financial institutions and utility companies among many others.”

You’re right. That isn’t decentralized at all. You couldn’t make it up.

What makes things even worse for THEKEY and their ‘decentralized’ IDV solution is they claim that “Due to the limit of storage size on Blockchain, an alternative option is to save PII data in the ETL database of the Validator in THEKEY Ecosystem, and save the hash value of the underlying data on Blockchain.”

Nice. So THEKEY, government entities, financial institutions, and utility companies among many others, can hold your personal information inside their own ETL databases.

Laughably, in their confusion over the term ‘decentralization’, THEKEY also claims that “Instead of setting up a centralized database for IDV solution, THEKEY deploys its DMI System within the Information Centers of provincial or municipal governments.”

Governments. You got it. Not decentralized. But here comes the real winner, a true, out-of-nowhere left hook that’ll leave you reeling.

“Automatic Diagnosis and Treatment of Diseases. The intelligent device on your body will detect the detailed data about your body when you feel feverish. Moreover, it can also tell where you are sick; MTS1 will diagnose your disease and recommend the most suitable medicine or diagnosis and treatment scheme according to your health record. It can even recommend the nearest and best doctor to you. The mixed payment from social security funds, self-paying and pooling funds will be completed in one action. Besides, the Blockchain IoT technology will help you get the cheapest medicine as fast as possible, which can be traced back to the source.”

So, to put this in a little context, THEKEY are claiming that you can wear an MTS1 intelligent device that will automatically diagnose your condition and recommend a course of treatment.

Obviously, all this information is submitted to Validators, such as health insurance companies, who can then hold your data in their ETL database. That’s going to get expensive. For you, not them.

All the quotes in this article can be found in THEKEY’s whitepaper, which is laughable in places, yet quite frightening in others. One sentence seemed to offer some hope in which the company claims that “you can sell your own personal data to insurance companies for actuarial purposes, which can decrease the insurance premium you need to pay.”

It’s likely won’t be much, since they already have your personal data stored in their Validator’s ETL database.

Perhaps it would be a good idea, for companies like THEKEY, do their research a little better before making claims of decentralization and freedom. Satoshi Nakamoto’s and Vitalik Buterin’s whitepapers are a good place to start. If they don’t understand what decentralized systems look like and how they operate, perhaps they shouldn’t be playing with people’s money.

Hey, this is my own opinion, but really? There are plenty of ways that THEKEY’s whitepaper makes no sense at all. In fact, I believe that they purely do not understand the truly mind-blowing capabilities that blockchain technology has.

But, maybe they do understand, and maybe they’re subverting notions of decentralization and freedom to exert more control over you. That’s not what blockchain technology is all about. Welcome to Big Brother.