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Challenges and Risks

Challenges and Risks​

The "Crime Evidence Economy" that WikiTruth attempts to build is a bold reconstruction of existing social governance models. Redefining the way justice is obtained with code inevitably faces huge challenges from ethics, law, technology, and human nature itself. Facing these risks is the only way for WikiTruth to mature.

1. Ethical Dilemma: Monetization of Justice or Tool for Extortion?​

This is the sharpest social ethical question WikiTruth faces.

  • Challenge: The outside world may question that the platform provides a convenient tool for "extortion"—monetizing criminal evidence and allowing buyers to delay the disclosure of truth by paying confidentiality fees. Does this become an accomplice to evil?
  • Our Response:
    • Lesser of Two Evils: Private extortion often comes with indefinite cover-ups and personal threats to whistleblowers. WikiTruth makes this process "transparent" and "procedural".
    • Inevitability of Truth: The "Incremental Confidentiality Fee" mechanism is the core design. The exponential growth of fees will eventually exceed the criminal's ability to pay, and the truth cannot be covered up forever. We levy a "time tax" on evil and feed the funds back to the defenders of justice.
    • Process as Punishment: The fear of criminals continuing to pay high costs is itself a deterrent.
    • Punishing Evil and Promoting Good: WikiTruth is essentially consistent with police rewards for evidence—rewarding truth providers, punishing bad people, and curbing crime.

2. The "Oracle" Problem: Verification of Evidence Authenticity​

Blockchain can ensure data immutability but cannot guarantee the authenticity of the source of on-chain data (Garbage In, Garbage Out).

  • Challenge: Someone may use AI deepfake technology to generate false evidence for blackmail, or maliciously upload irrelevant information, damaging the platform's credibility.
  • Response Mechanism:
    • Game Cost: Minting a Truth Box requires staking, and the buyer (criminal) is the best verifier. If the evidence is fake, the buyer will not buy it and may report it back.
    • DAO Arbitration and Reputation System: Introduce "blacklist" and "challenge period" mechanisms to adjudicate disputes through community voting and decentralized courts, confiscating the evildoer's staked funds.
    • Technical Assistance: Introduce AI forgery detection models in the future to raise the threshold for counterfeiting.

As a platform involving sensitive data and fund flows, WikiTruth operates in a global legal gray area.

  • Challenge:
    • Data Compliance: Different countries have different legal definitions for data privacy, defamation, and extortion, and government agencies may block it.
    • Jurisdictional Conflict: Decentralization makes traditional territorial jurisdiction ineffective but may also invite stronger technical blockades.
  • Response Mechanism:
    • Full Decentralization: The DAO governance structure means the platform has no single legal entity responsible, and the code is deployed on censorship-resistant blockchain networks, possessing survivability similar to BitTorrent.
    • Privacy Isolation: Leveraging Oasis Sapphire's privacy features, node validators cannot know the specific data content being processed, technically avoiding some legal joint liability.
    • Compliance Exploration: Explore compliance boundaries through legal advisory funds and be prepared for distributed node migration plans in extreme situations.

4. Technical Barriers and Trust Thresholds​

  • Challenge:
    • Security of Privacy Computing: WikiTruth relies heavily on the security of TEE (Trusted Execution Environment). Once underlying hardware vulnerabilities appear, it may lead to confidential data leakage, which is fatal for whistleblowers.
    • User Threshold: For non-Web3 users, managing private keys, buying tokens, and understanding Gas fees are complex operations that hinder the inflow of real evidence.
  • Response Mechanism:
    • Multi-layer Encryption Defense: In addition to TEE, future plans include cooperation with the Oasis team and other privacy technology teams to extend to zero-knowledge proof technology, achieving anti-quantum attack capabilities.
    • Account Abstraction: Integrate technologies like EIP-4337 in the future to support social login and Gas-less interaction, allowing Web2 users to use Web3 infrastructure seamlessly.

5. Dark Forest Effect​

  • Challenge: Criminal forces may locate whistleblowers through traffic analysis, social engineering, etc. Although anonymous on-chain, off-chain metadata (such as IP addresses, operation time habits) may expose identities.
  • Response Mechanism:
    • Mandatory Privacy Routing: The website does not acquire any user-side data and guides users to use decentralized websites.
    • EIP-712 Proxy Interaction: Cut off the direct association between user wallets and contracts, obfuscating the transaction link through relays.
    • Security Education: Provide a detailed "Security Operation Manual" to improve users' counter-reconnaissance awareness.

Conclusion​

WikiTruth is not a perfect utopia, but an experiment walking on the edge of chaos and order. We know the road ahead is full of thorns, but we firmly believe: Pricing the truth is the only way to break the spiral of silence. Even if we face many risks, as long as we can let the sun shine into even one dark corner, all these efforts will be meaningful.