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# System prepended metadata

title: Letter for Human Rights Foundation
tags: [letters/fundraising]

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title: Letter for Human Rights Foundation
tags: letters/fundraising
robots: noindex, nofollow
---

*STATUS: sent Oct 5th. Response from:	Alex Gladstein <alex@hrf.org>: Thanks for this email. Great stuff. We will be in touch if we can provide support.*

Blockchain Commons is engaged in the development of open blockchain infrastructure. It is focused on developing and supporting open, self-sovereign, decentralized systems that can provide individuals with authority and agency in the digital world.

I believe that this work is a good fit for the Human Rights Foundation because Blockchain Commons has many of the same goals and concerns. Our focus on self-sovereign technologies is about ensuring that each person can engage with the digital world in a safe way that's proof from censorship or oversight. It's about allowing every single person to escape from the surveillance of tyranny.

These priorities have already appeared in some of our work to date.

We use Tor in our Gordian system and in our Spotbit pricing tool. This allows people to protect themselves from correlation and censorship in states that are hostile to cryptocurrency usage. We also [teach Tor in our Learning Bitcoin Course](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/Learning-Bitcoin-from-the-Command-Line/blob/master/14_0_Using_Tor.md), so that people can protect whatever internet services they need to. We've evangelized Tor because we recognize and support the need for privacy: it can literally be the difference between life and death. We believe in personal agency and authority. 

I've also personally been involved in the evolution of Digital identifiers, or DIDs. These self-sovereign identifiers are crucial to the future of digital identity, and thus to Sustainable Development Goal 16.9 from the UN, which requires that we  "provide legal identity to all, including birth registration, by 2030". The DID standard was incubated at my Rebooting the Web of Trust workshops, and I've also seen it through the standards process. It remains a prime area for future development at Blockchain Commons.

I'd love to work with you to support the general work at Blockchain Commons in creating decentralized, open infrastructure, as we believe that focus on open infrastructure is what's needed to create the bedrock of an internet that will be safer for everyone, no matter their conditions or needs. Our sustaining patrons, who support our general work, receive special recognition at Blockchain Commons for their support of an open internet.

However, I also recognize that as a foundation you may wish to focus on specific projects that are tightly related to your goals. If you're not interested in becoming a general patron, I'd like schedule a call to speak with you about ongoing sponsorship of an individual project or technology. This could be an existing project or we could introduce a new project that would advance both of our goals. Some possibilities which you may find of interest include:

* Tutorials or programmatic support for the use of Tor.
* Tutorials or programmatic support for the use of other technologies that support privacy and anonymity such as the BTCpay cryptocurrency payment system.
* Work on self-sovereign identity and identity wallets, expanding my own work with DIDs.

We have a proven track record for bringing projects to completion. Among our biggest successes to date are:

* [**The Gordian system**](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/Gordian), a coordinated self-sovereign Bitcoin system that links an automatically deployed full node and a cutting-edge mobile wallet.
* [**Learning Bitcoin from the Command Line**](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/Learning-Bitcoin-from-the-Command-Line), an educational course intended to help nurture the next generation of Bitcoin developers, now entering its second edition.
* [**LetheKit**](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/bc-lethekit), a DIY project to create an airgapped cryptographic device.
* [**#SmartCustody**](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/SmartCustodyBook), an educational book on how to assess risks in digital-asset custody scenarios, with a second edition in the planning stage.
* [**Spotbit**](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/spotbit), a self-sovereign cryptocurrency price discovery tool.
* A variety of **C-based cryptographic libraries**, covering topics such as [BIP39](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/bc-bip39), [Shamir Secret Sharing](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/bc-shamir), and [SLIP39](https://github.com/BlockchainCommons/bc-slip39).

We both care about secure and safe access to an open, unfettered internet. I hope we can work together in advancing them.

Sincerely, 

Christopher Allen, Founder, Blockchain Commons