Introducing the Commissioner for digital money: safeguarding privacy and rights in the age of programmable money

Written by Barry James chairman of Frontiers Technology Association

On Wednesday, 19^th April 2023, in the US, the House Subcommittee on Digital Assets, Fintech and Inclusion held a hearing on stablecoins, whilst in the UK and around the world attempts to shoe-horn digital money from central and private banks (CBDCs and stablecoins) into existing regulatory and legal frameworks are proving to be a struggle as regards finding the right balance and the right formula - given the difficult hand dealt to them. Because this is the advent of endemic, digital and programmable money, perhaps (and needless to say) we can’t afford to get it wrong; not least because we are playing not only with our national money, but with a new and unprecedented power to survey and control people - whether suppressed and nascent, or not. Given that the programmability of national money is unprecedented, we may well also face unforeseen problems and consequences that will need to be identified and remedied quickly.

A little over ten years ago, having concluded that the UK financial…