MIT ensures that electronic money is far from replacing cash
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology says that digital money has failed to offer freedom and ease of use
According to the analysis by the MIT Technology Review, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the use of electronic money is not an alternative to completely replace cash because, after the experiences put in place, digital money has failed to offer the same combination of freedom and ease of use that characterizes direct payment.
In the article published, MIT ensures that “the bills and coins are the property of the owner. We can use them to make transactions with another person without a third party getting in the way. Companies cannot create advertising profiles or credit ratings from our data and governments cannot track our expenses or our movements.”
In this sense, digital technology has failed to exceed the level of freedom that represents the realization of transactions without intermediaries, which usually happens when some online commercial management is processed, the culmination of it will always depend on banks and financial technology companies.
However, there are state policies in the world that go against this thesis and prefer to invest in initiatives that they believe may be a true alternative for the future. Such is the case of Sweden and China, who have projects underway that would lead to the progressive disappearance of cash.
The article concludes by citing that private companies “have an obvious incentive to monetize our data and seek profits above the public interest. Digital government money can still be used to track us, even by well-intentioned governments, and for the less benign it is a fantastic tool for surveillance ensuring that “cryptocurrency can be useful when freedoms are at risk.”
K.Villarroel
Source: 20minutes
