‘Deleting the Whole Blockchain’ – EU Regulators Say Entire Chain Histories Could be Erased for Personal Data Protection

Regulators within the European Union (EU) have launched new steering on blockchain expertise because it pertains to the processing of private knowledge.

In a brand new report, the European Information Safety Board (EDPB) says that so as to correctly adjust to the EU’s Normal Information Safety Regulation (GDPR), “evaluations” could must be carried out on how blockchains report knowledge.

In accordance with the EDPB, the analysis ought to tackle the next questions:

“Will the information on the blockchain comprise private knowledge?…

ii. In that case, why is a blockchain mandatory for this processing? (What’s the rationale for this selection?
What are the alternate options?)

iii. What kind of blockchain needs to be used? (Is a non-public blockchain adequate? Can a permissioned
blockchain be used? Is a ‘zero-knowledge’ structure attainable?)

iv. What technical and organizational measures are used? (Will private knowledge be saved on or offchain? Are any privacy-enhancing applied sciences getting used – if not, why?)”

The EDPB says that blockchains should not an exception to GDPR legal guidelines, and will take note of how they course of sure knowledge. To adjust to GDPR, the regulator says blockchains could must be utterly deleted if the deletion of GDPR-relevant knowledge isn’t already taken under consideration to the community’s authentic creation.

“Private knowledge have to be erased as soon as the needs of the processing has been achieved and any
regulatory intervals for retention have expired so as to conform to the precept of storage
limitation.

Information deletion on the particular person stage in a blockchain might be difficult and requires ad-hoc
engineered architectures. When deletion has not been taken under consideration by design, this will likely require
deleting the entire blockchain.”

In a submit on LinkedIn, James Smith, particular initiatives lead on the Ethereum Basis, said the EU’s new tips could threaten the existence of public blockchains.

“What this implies for Ethereum and Web3:

The very structure of public blockchains like Ethereum is being challenged.

With out important pushback, we’re going through a regulatory framework that basically misunderstands decentralized expertise.

This isn’t nearly compliance complications – it’s about whether or not public blockchains can legally function in Europe.”