The crypto industry needs to step up and take action to improve its reputation

The recent resurgence of news around bankrupt crypto exchange Mt. Gox preparing to reunite customers with (just 15%) of their lost Bitcoin

Recent news about bankrupt crypto exchange Mt. Gox preparing to reunite customers with just 15% of their lost Bitcoin has served as a stark reminder of the ongoing battle between cryptocurrency and scams within the industry.

The crypto industry has a reputation problem, and with increasing numbers of investors and users entering the space, it's time to step up and take action.

Paul Quickenden, blockchain futurist and Chief Commercial Officer at Easy Crypto, weighs in on what the industry needs to do to improve its reputation through two key focuses.

Both sides of the same coin…

In the rapidly evolving world of crypto, trust must be continually earned by institutions, providers and innovators as they design and build out the functionality and user experience to engender the trust that the next wave of adopters needs and expects.

At its core, ‘digital trust’ is two sides of the same coin - 'operational' trust ensures that technology is reliable and less prone to scams and attacks, while ‘relational’ trust focuses on empowering, educating and protecting users. For the industry to grow sustainably, both types of trust must be in place to ensure decentralised finance is as inclusive and fair as possible to its diverse range of users.

Operational trust

Investors and potential users all want (and deserve) a safe, secure investment environment. While blockchain technology inherently offers security, crypto innovators can enhance this by integrating security and clever UX into the design, development and deployment stages of crypto offerings (such as exchanges).

Importantly, crypto exchanges that take custody of investor funds are essentially replacing centralised control with another form of centralised control in which users cede access to their money to someone else. Non-custodial exchange models in which users manage their own crypto via their own personal wallets, underscore user autonomy and security.

Ensuring users can do so safely and with minimal friction is important, including innovating around how users ensure they safeguard their access. Many wallet innovators believe self-custody doesn’t necessarily have to mean using a complex (and in many cases, easy-to-forget) seed phrase. Technologies like Multi-Party Computation (MPC) use ‘key shards’ rather than entire seed phrases to authorise transactions, providing users effective control over their assets with options like Two-Factor Authentication (2FA). Easy Crypto is also pioneering new ways of offering users wallet ‘back-up’, including password-free approaches and ‘Social recovery’ which involves designating trusted individuals to help you in the recovery process; and cloud backup. (In short, we are trying to make it human.)

Relational trust

Investors and newcomers want more than just a secure platform; they want to be valued as a customer and receive support in their crypto journey. While robust security is crucial, the industry must foster a culture of trust and transparency that goes beyond technical safeguards to create a user-centred environment that empowers, educates, and protects users.

This relies on both regulation and empowerment.

Industry-wide regulation

Proper regulation is needed to give consumers confidence and ensure the same standards expected from their other financial service providers. This will require coordinated, cross-industry collaboration globally. Encouragingly, initiatives like the Digital Trust Working Group formed in 2023 to advise the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, which includes 21 member economies, are already underway with key representation from the blockchain industry.

Empowerment

Adopting a user-centred approach to simplifying all aspects of the crypto experience will help accelerate adoption by a great number of users.

This needs to include:

There’s work to do to change the narrative completely; but through a focus on both operational and relational trust, the crypto industry will be able to answer “YES!” in good conscience to the question: “Is it safe to invest in crypto?”