Could we be just a few years from solving all security-related complications of cash systems today? Daryl de Jori, Head of New Technologies at EDAQS, a German-Austrian technology company, says which could very well function as case.
De Jori, a small business analyst and finance critic by background and renowned Hamburg based economy scientist, Reimund Homann,plus a small team of scientists, technicians, and developers, have spent the last few years perfecting and testing the cash security system DICE, its first hybrid product that unifies artificial intelligence and the lifestyle, which they believe could prevent cash crimes, in addition to solving all security-related complications of cash systems today, including passports and terrorism.
The innovation offers the chance of global change which will solve countless conventional issues with one single system and would allow central and national banks to supervise and analyze all cash circulation without interfering with the privacy of the citizen. It not only produces anti-counterfeit bills but offers the first time in the history of cash an insurmountable protection. Categorized as a semi-governmental project for the public benefit and classified as a “Governmental Reformation Venture” (since an effective implementation could only be performed through official ways sufficient reason for the support from governments), the technology is currently subject to negotiations with governments and national banks for a worldwide implementation of the system.
The development of the DICE (acronym: Dynamic Intelligent Currency Encryption) emerged from the unquestionable need for a financial system that protects money while upholding the best degree of security and privacy. Contingent identifiable banknotes, preferably with a custom-frequency and secure RFID or machine readable codes like Datamatrix, the DICE integrates reliable and innovative technologies that combine their benefits to incorporate them into an optimized security. Starting from the identifiable banknote that connects to a digital security system to verify the banknote’s validity, an integral feature is also the opportunity to devaluate banknotes that may have already been stolen from a DICE user or which are illegally circulating.
It is the goal of EDAQS that the whole banking and retail sector in addition to all entities with regular cash circulation will participate in the DICE system.Up to now, EDAQS has concentrated most of its resources on preventing cash crimes and forgery, but additionally to save lots of cash from vanishing as it is happening in Scandinavian countries. But because of the recent series of external appraisals, the DICE has been estimated at an averaged valuation of $5.6 billion and has plans to skip a scheduled seeding process to immediately raise capital in a Series A financing, after undisclosed leading capital investors and EDAQS lobbyists showed interest to jointly take over the global implementation of the innovative and futuristic banknote system. Within the planned spin-off, the new company will generate two strong market leaders with distinct brands, partners, operating characteristics and industry dynamics.
DICE combines several technologies and intelligent techniques to solve almost all problems that governments claim to be the reason for the planned abolition of cash. DICE protects the citizen, the retailers and also the banks. And it gives cash a new and indisputable reason to call home on.
Among a range of new development models there are several advantages of DICE. Firstly, counterfeiting of banknotes will be a thing of the past and with the counterfeited value being higher than the production costs, counterfeiters would naturally have to undergo immeasurable efforts. Second, robberies will become less attractive and also with a limited usage of DICE, the chance of a worthless robbery will be higher than the best gain. DICE also combats crime and for that reason general cash-related crime will undoubtedly be reduced by almost 25 % based on the official crime statistics for Germany released by the authorities (5.96 million offenses in 2013). The incidental registration of the banknotes would also ensure it is easier for banks and companies to manage cash because the complications of handling illicit money result in higher tax revenues.
Besides mapping out the prevention of cash crimes and forgery, EDAQS hopes to fight drug cartels and terror financing on a totally different level. The remote deactivation of banknotes opens up new effective tools in the fight the financing of terrorism. From drug cartels to Mafia organizations, the ever-present possibility of the amount of money being devalued later and the potential of determining the last retailer scanned position makes cash uninteresting and risky. With a profound change for legal tenders and other securities where its use would make sense, DICE provides passive protection mechanisms which have a preventive effect on the users’ security without impairing their privacy and gathers valuable geographical data of cash circulation along the way. Such data could be used to investigate the financial stability of a country.
If current government trends continue, a cashless economy does seem increasing. And while there are certainly positive outcomes which can be obtained by going cashless not all is rosy however. The darker aspect of a cashless society, is the one that few are debating or discussing, but is actually the most pivotal regarding social engineering and transforming communities and societies. There are understandably concerns about privacy, especially when payments are made through social networks and above all there is an incalculable cost to your humanity. We’d lose our freedom to make decisions. You can easily imagine a totalitarian regime using these tools to great harm. In the digital age, cash is directly faced with technological progress with crypto-currencies like Bitcoin and contact-less payment methods like Apple Pay, Google Wallet or QuickPay. However such technologies can be subject to monitoring and can be regulated in ways which could limit as well as end its utility.
In his book “THE FINISH of Money”, Wired contributing editor David Wolman, explored the twilight of cash and its replacement with a panoply of better means of exchange. To begin with, Wolman notes, that national identity is strongly linked with having a physical currency. Then there’s the best advantage of cash – its ability to enable off-the-books transactions. In a culture as paranoid about surveillance as our very own, imagine the outcry if we were to go to means of exchange that were always traceable? The problem with all of the arguments for a cashless society is that they are rational, and our attachment to cash is not. A cashless society is also a society where there is no longer any anonymity.
Philosopher and economist Adam Smith observed that people are all economic beings in the sense our essence as humans stems from our capability to make fair trades for the labor or our products. We make these transactions in the current presence of the usually benevolent “invisible hand,” as Smith called it in his book “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.” The invisible hand optimizes our total production, and, by and large, fosters our freedom. A “visible hand” monitoring each and every transaction we make could possibly be one of the biggest – and least expected – threats to freedom we have ever encountered in history.
In Bitcoin Era Site of the dystopian outcomes in the evolution in the creation of a cashless society, DICE is billed at breaking the mold when it comes to the protection of cash, since it not only improves cash circulation, but also the quality of people’s life. The advantages of the DICE system can only be positive.Although it would obviously apply to the economy as a whole and to any place where money plays a significant role, however a lot would also change for private individuals. The technology is so far without any competition and in the long term, the best point of arrival, of course, is that it’s unavoidable that banknotes become digital hybrids. That is definitely a better substitute for a state-controlled digital cash system.
Ambitious as which may be, it is really just the end of the iceberg. Of course, society has been through times of innovation in monetary technology before. And while cash has been fighting the digital tide for some time now with the need to get beyond cash having been recognized in a number of countries, there’s no escaping the fact that we will will have a dependence on cash. Cash continues to be king and will stay in circulation for generations ahead – for consumers and businesses. Hence, it’s never too late for businesses to protect themselves by safeguarding cash as a target. Additionally, de Jori thinks that DICE may also revolutionize the planet of finance through an effective long-term protection strategy that maintains confidence in global currencies.