[source] Yonhap News 08.01.2023 5:05 am article
[CES Interview] "Technology to solve current problems"... Startup 'zkrypto' that CTA paid attention to
[Original article] https://n.news.naver.com/article/001/0013687370?sid=101
"Technology to protect the principle of secret elections by encrypting voter information during ballot counting... Expecting a transparent society"
zkrypto Booth in Eureka Park
[Cinema Oh Kyu-jin]
(Las Vegas = Yonhap News) Reporter Kyu-Jin Oh = There is one domestic company that attracted attention at 'CES 2023', where the world's leading companies show off their new technologies.
It is a domestic startup zkrypto, and the blockchain online voting system 'zkvoting' developed by this company received a 'thumbs up' from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), which hosts CES.
CTA Senior Vice President Kinsey Fabrizio praised the system, introducing zkvoting as "one of the three technologies that will solve the problems facing mankind" at the 'CTA Industry Status Briefing' held on the 5th (local time).
Oh Hyeon-ok, the CEO of the company and a professor of information systems at Hanyang University, met with Yonhap News at the CES startup exhibition hall 'Eureka Park' on the 6th and said, "I didn't know it was selected. I only found out about it after foreign reporters told me about it."
zkrypto is a blockchain startup co-founded by CEO Oh and Professor Kim Ji-hye of the Department of Electronic Engineering at Kookmin University, and operates zKVoting and digital asset trading application 'Azeroth'.
Among them, GK Voting, which won the CES Best Innovation Award and Innovation Award, helps voters vote without disclosing their identity and voting details based on 'Zero Knowledge Proof' technology.
zkrypto received CES 2023 Best Innovation Award and Innovation Award
[Cinema Oh Kyu-jin]
Zero-knowledge proof is a technology that can prove that one has the information without providing any information to the other party in the blockchain environment. The verifier receives the data, but does not know who the data producer is.
Representative Oh explained this technology, saying, "Assuming that 100 voters voted, the fact that 100 voters voted can be confirmed, but during the counting process, it was encrypted so that who voted where could not be confirmed."
As a result, the process of registering voters and voting can all be handled within the application, so you can cast a vote at home by pressing a button without having to go to a polling place.
Representative Oh explained that zkVoting is the technology that can most faithfully keep the 'principle of secret elections' stipulated in Article 67 of the Constitution.
In order to prevent fraudulent voting, he added a 'fake key' that prevents processing even if data is passed to the verifier. "If you use a fake key, you can vote equally, but the data generated at this time is not added when counting votes." did.
Kim Hyung-joon, director of zkypto, who watched the conversation from the sidelines, helped by saying, "This technology seems to be paying more attention to the United States because of the issue of former President Donald Trump's disapproval of the presidential election."
Representative Oh said that with a blockchain infrastructure, the cost of elections can be drastically reduced through the zkvoting system using zero-knowledge proof.
CEO Oh said, “Even if you use a commercial block chain, it costs about 1 or 2 won per person,” and “If you use the solution, you can hold a referendum with 100 million won.”
zkrypto is currently conducting an open beta test of GK Voting on the Google Play Store and Apple App Store, and will officially introduce this system in March.
However, considering people's reluctance to vote using the app, the system will be introduced first at referendums or shareholders' meetings, and then the service will be developed as a substitute for absentee voting or postal voting.
Representative Oh expected that GK Voting would become a 'technology that expands suffrage' in the future.
CEO Oh expected that "as the cost of elections goes down, voting will be activated and a 'transparent' society will be created where the will of the people can be reflected more actively."
acdc@yna.co.kr
Hyeon-Ok Oh, Professor of Information Systems at Hanyang University,
who founded zkrypto
[Photo Oh Kyu-jin]
Gyujin Oh (acdc@yna.co.kr)