Topic: Blockchain, ethics, and human rights (Read 129 times)

Dear community,

I'm a researcher who's been working on big data and ethics - who can access which data, say, in the health context, and who shouldn't; what levels of consent are required, and so on.

It seems to me that blockchain and bitcoin will, can, and should massively change the handling of sensitive data, making it easier to provide privacy for those whom the data pertain to (e.g. the patient) while still allowing for socially beneficial use (research on medical data curated by smart contracts, or even completely carried out by smart contracts, such that no researcher at any point could identify  individual patients, but could still be confident that the data they are using is accurate. I'm not sure whether such a use-case is entirely feasible, and would love to hear your views, especially if you know something about proof-of-ignorance or similar mechanisms.
 
Of course this is just one small example. We have heard about bitcoin for foreign aid, for crowdfunding support for people in oppressive conditions, and to work-around censorship. Bitcoin and the blockchain certainly rely on underlying principles of inclusion, participation, and equality, which are also the fundamental principles of human rights theory and international human rights law.

So, long question short, in your view, do you think the blockchain/bitcoin/altcoins can be used for ethically sound projects? Have you heard of some, and if so, could you link to them or discuss them a little bit? Do you know of any human rights use-cases? And finally, do you know if anyone has written on blockchain ethics, or tried to introduce ethics into the community?

BTW, by ethics I don't mean stale old philosophers' talk, I mean simply: doing the right thing for the right reason.