ECB’s Digital Euro Project Taps COTI as Pioneer Partner

Although the general conception of CBDCs has slowed down in recent years, especially since the arrival of US President Trump, who vowed to ban such a product in the US, the European Central Bank continues to make attempts to launch a digital version of the widely used currency within its jurisdiction – the euro.

The latest news on the topic informed that the central bank has picked COTI as a Pioneer Partner in its Digital Euro project.

The press release shared with CryptoPotato indicated that both parties will collaborate with other organizations to develop a solution for a euro-wide central bank digital currency.

The idea behind Europe’s CBDC is to complement cash and facilitate secure, fast, and even private payments across the region’s economy.

“Being invited to work with the ECB on such a consequential project is humbling and a testament to the expertise and hard work of the COTI team. Privacy is a vital component for the future of Web3, ensuring user security and organizational compliance, and the same benefits apply to CBDCs. It’s critical that confidentiality is built into the core of these new systems, rather than merely being added as an afterthought,” commented COTI CEO and co-founder, Shahaf Bar-Geffen.

The role of a Pioneer Partner will allow COTI to use and improve existing ECB infrastructure to “test its privacy solution for conditional payments.” According to the PR, this will help ensure that “asset provenance can be verified without exposing sensitive user information,” which is a key requirement for a CBDC system.

COTI, which introduced its V2 developer network last year, has already worked on similar projects with the Bank of Israel’s Digital Shekel. It developed a proof-of-concept for “confidential, trustless cross-border transactions using garbled circuits.”