# Where Are We Still Lying to Ourselves? | Meinhard Benn, Viktor Tron, Mario Havel, Kyle den Hartog

- Speakers: [Viktor Tron](https://streameth.org/speakers/viktor-tron), [Mario Havel](https://streameth.org/speakers/mario-havel)
- Channel: [Ethereum Cypherpunk Congress](https://streameth.org/ethereum-cypherpunk-congress)
- Date: 2026-07-09
- Duration: 33:00
- Topics: web3, privacy, now, crypto, cryptography, blockchain, data, security, human right, rights, tech, technology, internet, open source, free, freedom, ethereum, hackers, ethics, cypherpunk, dev, developer, dapp, decentralization, bitcoin, computer, surveillance, cyber, peer2peer, p2p, love, solidity, zk, zero knowledge, education, academy, w3pn, neo, summit, berlin, neocypherpunk
- Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt-ZxVBpBCSc8k
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxVBpBCSc8k

## Description

The Decentralization Stack: Where Are We Still Lying to Ourselves? Meinhard Benn, Viktor Tron, Mario Havel, Kyle den Hartog
Moderated by: Migle Rakitaite

A cross-stack panel asking the question most decks tiptoe around: what actually breaks if a single company disappears? Infrastructure builders from storage, compute, identity, and frontend sat down for an honest conversation about which parts of the stack are genuinely decentralized — and which parts everyone hopes nobody looks at too closely. No roadmaps. No token plugs.

Panelists: Viktor Tron, Mario Havel, Kyle den Hartog, Meinhard Benn
Moderator: Migle Rakitaite

Speakers

Viktor Tron — Swarm
https://www.ethswarm.org/
X: https://x.com/zeligf
Mario Havel — Ethereum Foundation
X: https://x.com/TMIYChao
Kyle den Hartog
X: https://x.com/PryvitKyle
Meinhard Benn — Freedom Browser

Moderated by

Migle Rakitaite — Web3Privacy Now
X: https://x.com/rakymnft

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🎤 Neocypherpunk Summit: https://s26ber.web3privacy.info/

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## Transcript

[applause] >> So, I know that a lot of you are tired of the panels, and I wanted to introduce a little game that I am giving to the panelists. So, as each of you are bringing your uh chairs, I'm going to give this flower to each of the panelists. And this is their wand of rejection that they can use once. So, if they raise this plant, they can immediately interrupt and disagree with whoever is answering the question. Okay? Rudely lift it up, and the other person needs to stop talking and pass it on to the person that is holding the flower up. If you disagree wholeheartedly with someone else's saying in a mid-sentence, that's what you do. You lift up the plant. If the question is too controversial and you don't want to answer, you can also use the plant. But, remember, you can only do that once in this talk. So, Victor Tron is the true OG that built a decentralized storage. He's the founder of Swarm. I give you the plant. I take you to the stage right there. We're doing it the prom the fast way. >> [applause] >> This is Kyle, and Kyle's working for Brave browser. I don't think I need to say even more of what he will introduce himself. Kyle, on stage. Mario and his fried chicken is working for Ethereum Foundation. >> Thank you. >> He might need a flower to reject some of the controversial questions. And this is Meinhard, and Meinhard is building Freedom browser. So, you see what we have on this panel? Two people that are representing two different browsers, but their ethical goal is the same. So, how can we make sure that they collaborate together? One of my favorite quotes is from Albert Einstein. And he says, "If you can't explain your theory, or whatever you're working on, to a 5-year-old, you actually don't understand it yourself." So, in the context of privacy and this audience and what you are building, tell me in a sentence to a 5-year-old. Sorry, guys. You're all now very smart 5-year-olds. What are you building and why are you building? Meinhart. >> So, I'm building a computer program that allows you to be free and without anyone watching you and expressing yourself, saying whatever you want. And I do that because it's a fundamental human right. Every human on Earth should be able to do that without fear. >> Does it pass the check? Did the 5-year-olds understand it? Okay. So, sort of. Okay, Mario, what are you working on? But remember, 5-year-olds. >> 5-year-olds, right? >> What the Ethereum Foundation does. >> Um let me not speak on behalf of EF, maybe more of a subjectively, right? But uh 5-year-olds >> using the flower? >> No, good. I'm good. Um just like, yeah. So, you know the monster under your bed? It's real. And it's run by very, very bad people all over the world. And I'm building, we are building uh a community and technologies that let you uh keep it under the bed and uh just feel safe. Yeah. And anybody can feel safe with these uh tools and anybody can use them. Yeah. >> I like that. Kyle. >> Uh we build a browser that helps bring web 3 technologies to the web 2 world is probably the best way to describe it. >> Okay, I don't think five-year-olds understand what is browser or what is web 2. >> We build software that makes it easier to access all the cool things that you guys build. >> Yeah, we we give it a pass. Okay. Victor. >> I'm Victor and it's what we're building is going to decentralize the internet, the entire [ __ ] thing. Maybe it's not five-year-old compatible, but in the way it's a >> Oof, okay. Um, decentralize. How do we explain to a five-year-old what truly decentralized is? >> So, we're building everything that's these folks in the browser using basically under the hood, yeah. >> Okay, so would you agree that if they're in a classroom, we had a big jar of candy instead of the teacher having all of the candy and distributing the candy, all of the kids have the candy, and if you're being good, we're all have the right to distribute it. Does that work? >> Kind of, yeah. >> Kind of, okay. And and the jar is the storage, so you're building the jar of the storage, but decentralized to all of the different kids. >> Yeah. >> All right. >> It just doesn't mean it's broken all the pieces. >> Okay. So, in your tech stack, because you're building a lot of the different things in layers, um, what is something that you think, um, you're compromising when it comes to decentralization, because right now we don't have the solution. So, you're making the compromise, but it's at the stake of the usability of the people. What is something that you have to give up on it? Kyle. >> Uh, well, I think you could say 99% of what we do is, uh, a compromise because we're going the opposite way. We're starting from where the users are and building the bridge to where we want to be rather than building an island and hoping people swim over. >> Okay, I like that. Main heart. >> Yeah, I'd like to link in there because we both build browsers. So we come from the other side. We built the tunnel from the other side actually. And our compromise would be very specifically and this is where we leave the five-year-old, you know, understandability. The ENS, the name resolution is we try to do it as decentralized as possible, but it's not fully decentralized yet. So the compromise there is that we trust like a group of people and not fully decentralized system. >> Mhm. Maria. >> Well, you asked the same question in Prague and I'm worried I still have the same answer similar to Kyle that like most of it that we do has compromises. Speaking on about Ethereum, from the moment you are downloading a wallet which you download from some trusted source, you don't verify the signatures mostly, right? Uh kudos to exceptions there. Then you connect to a centralized third-party RPC that spies on your transaction. Then you connect to a dapp that has bunch of third-parties that spy on you. You connect through a wallet connect which is like a a rather third-party server that like just gets your data and then you sign send a transaction to a contract that's completely public on chain and everybody can see your uh your stuff. So I think there is some compromise in like every part of the the stack. And uh yeah, uh like it's the for a long time, I like the name of the panel. I think for a long time we've been lying to ourselves about this. Like, oh, it's so cool. It's all decentralized, right? And for many people when they come to this and they get the wallet and use the chain like it might look like that like oh it's just like it runs. But then you know the tornado moment happens or something really realize how many how many compromises there are. So I think that like right now we are actually in a point where we have this discussion and we had these cases like tornado where we learned how to work in in more in environment where we really need to really need to strive for the privacy decentralization. Yeah. >> Guys, you see nothing happened. We admitted that we're all pretending that we're all acting 99% of the things are not really decentralized and everything is fine. Now let's continue that thread of brutal honesty and let's invite our competitors to help each other out so that we can build more resilient technology, right? But Victor, what is your take on this question as well? Like where in your tech stack you think you're compromising the most when it comes to decentralized storage? >> Well, thanks. I would love to convince everyone that we're not making compromises but actually the the the very foundation of it is all brittle because after it's it's it's through adoption and and and through numbers that things get really working. It's like just think of a Tinder where only Kyle and me are on it. It doesn't doesn't really work and with all the fake profiles. So I just So after all after all we we have to we have to somehow build the stack and and and build through through the a lot of kind of economic economic issues that that lead to adoption and and kind of reach a stage where the adoption can can actually make it resilient for >> So from your tech stack you saw my presentation that I showed two different theaters. One theater as beautiful as this and another theater built out of the cardboard box. In your tech stack, in your work, what is one piece of technology or software that is the cardboard box? Kyle? >> Uh, I mean, speaking in the Web3 space, the wallet. Uh, we have a built-in wallet uh for this. Um, and I don't think many people realize this, but the wallets are going to be the thing that gets captured. Um, they are the thing that represents the user, but they are also the thing that economically is most incentivized to build um and to expose the capabilities of Web3 to the user and to hide all of the capabilities underneath it. Um, and so if you look at where sanctions compliance is occurring, it's going to be happening in the wallet. If you look at who's actually had sanctions compliance enforced against them, it's been wallets. You look at Exodus. They faced the $3 million fine from OFAC because of this. Um, and so that's really the question is like, we can build all the under stuff in a decentralized way, but the reality is the user's not going to use it if it's not easy and that's what the wallet is doing, but then the wallet so also is a uh centralization point. >> Right. Mario? >> Um, can you repeat the question, please? >> Yes. What is a piece of cardboard box that theater built out of the cardboard box that is currently in your software, in your tech stack? >> Ha- hard box? >> Cardboard box. >> Cardboard box. >> how I showed two theaters? One is built out of this material and the other one is out of a paper. What is built out of the paper at >> Yeah, so just a feedback. Um, yeah, the cardboard box. Oh my god. Um, damn. >> Pick one. >> Yeah, I mean, I was I talking about I was talking about the stack here, right? And actually like despite like the maybe privacy problems like bunch of the parts are solid. Like what I'm worried the most lately about is just like the security of DeFi where it's like, you know, even contracts that's been running for a while are being exploited now. So maybe just like the the security of the on-chain applications, not just their privacy, but even the security is something that we can question now and like it looked like it it seemed like for us like, oh, this is solid. It's been going on for years, but now it turns out it's more of a cardboard box, maybe something that can get wet when it starts raining and we see more and more exploits. So like the security of the dApps, but also like, you know, this goes further to like the user interactions. Like we saw even safe being exploited like the multi-sig. We see people getting the supply chain attack to make them lose their keys, right? So I guess the security is uh uh yeah, uh sort of a cardboard box that we've built uh around and now it's just a lot of work to harden it again, yeah. >> Main hard, with the Freedom Browser, what is something thus far that is cardboard box? >> Um so we have the claim not to just read from the DWeb, but also to write to the DWeb, but actually the write user interface. I mean the technology underneath is is solid, but the user interface and how it's set up and how you activate that feature actually within Freedom Browser is a bit shaky, I would say. And that's something we want to work on because we really want to show the power of not just consuming, but also being part of the network. And uh yeah, it has a bit a few rough edges. The UI was essentially done in a very short time for that. And that's something we we want to push much further to also make it more inviting for non-technical people to to build a dWeb website. >> Kyle, you guys have done so much work and research at Brave browser also on UX and UI. Right? Is there any way that Brave browser, any of team of your members, or maybe there is even any public documentation that could help Freedom browser with the UX UI? Is there some sort of a bridge there? >> To degree yes, but there's a sea of trade-offs here. Like as you were describing that, I'm just sitting here going, wait until somebody doesn't publish content or their content's not online because, you know, they their computer got turned off or they decided to go on vacation. Um what happens when, you know, they read content, they start pinning it, and then all of a sudden they publish it, and now you're leaking the browser history. So, like this is one of the things that we found with IPFS and it's the reason we couldn't default it on was because we realized there's a lot of privacy trade-offs and and a part of our brand uh value is privacy by default. We're going to have it batteries included, so we aren't going to do it in a dangerous way, and then because of that, it makes a inherent economic trade-off to all the sites of like, "Hey, we can't publish in this sort of way because we don't know if the user's even on Brave browser, let alone Brave browser." It doesn't make it as easy to be able to to use uh decentralized app. >> Mhm. Victor, with a decentralized storage, what is something that is made out of cardboard box thus far? >> To be honest, the both both of these people like talk about talk about the same thing, basically, the UX UX of uploading things. But, um yeah, so let let let's take the um the positive part of it, like uh the So, if if if you imagine this candy this candy is a distributed to go in the classroom. So, if you if you want to you want to kind of a black candy, just imagine that you have to pick all the colors, but it doesn't matter whether you pick it from a particular person. Like you can just pick pick the yellow one from from Bob, you can pick the red one from Alice, etc. etc. And it doesn't matter whether you you know, you shut down or whether like if if the half of the classroom is there, basically you're going to have you're going to have your stuff there. >> So, >> Yeah, there we go. >> In some sense, um I agree with everything what you all said, and I kind of formulated the question a little bit This is me stealing and disagreeing with all of these far far guys. Um I think when I was explaining as well that there's a lot of technical people and then you have the pure communicators, I think we need more people in that middle ground that will be the collaborators in between ourselves. I think a lot of the foundations especially uh are trying to focus, and that's the point all of you folks have like your projects have the arm of the either open source or collaboration, you know, from Brave to EF to Swarm Foundation to Freedom Browser, uh but my point here is as well is that we need more physical spaces where people can truly showcase why decentralization matters as well. So, collectives like this as well. Um so, I think taking even a step backwards from the UX, to me it's how we communicate and what emotions we evoke into the people. Um I deliberately try to bring more color into our industry. Like around us there's a lot of darkness as well. Um and I truly think that the idea of the hacker in the basement is kind of back in the days, you know, like it's not there anymore. Like the original Cypherpunk Manifesto said that the Cypherpunks need to write code, and I would argue, you know, that's also out of the window as well. Um The next question I have I would love if anyone in the audience would love to just stand up and shout your answer as well because I think this is a very sensitive question. But I again, I want to create an atmosphere that this is a safe space and we're all here truly for the ethical reasons. So we all think the same and share uh the same hardships. But my question is that um what is something that publicly on our websites, maybe even our your own Twitter accounts, you shared it that super great, it works. Look at this software, technology, website, organization, meetup, whatever it is. It works, it's amazing, it's cool. But then in reality, it's not really cool, it doesn't work, it's chaos, it's really hard to use, and it's kind of crappy and kind of not usable. What is something in the context of what you're also obviously working on. So who wants to start? >> I I can start off with one. Um Crops isn't self-sustaining. There's like we talk about Cypherpunks have to write code, but also like I want a paycheck. Like last time I checked open source doesn't pay me. So like until you figure out the balance between those two, and like that's the hard problem that we've had is that like the number of people who come and complain to me about Brave building in bloatware of AI and crypto without realizing that we're doing it as an option so that we can fund and produce better software. Like that's the real challenge here. If you look at how Google grew to the size that they did, they built an ad network and then they gave you free search, a free browser, a free operating system, and went and funded Mozilla, and gave Apple some money as well. Like, economics matters. >> I love that. See how easy it was? It feels much better. I like that. Again, anyone in the audience, if you feel that something we're pretending that is cool and it works, but in reality it doesn't. For example, from my end, I've participated and been behind the scenes of a lot of these conferences, and it is so much hard work to pull these up together, and we're saying how cool and we all share these pretty images, but the amount of sheer work and hours that it takes in the backstage to make sure that all of the speakers are here and the amount of funds that go into this, you know, like some of you started like I mean, I remember the days where all of the merch was free and all of the food was free, and now we're starting complaining, "Oh my god, you need to pay for your lunch." You know, so to me, even in crypto conferences, I think we kind of like lost the plot, like, you know, bring your own picnic and then share the food with others. So, >> Your chair. Anyone wants some chicken? >> Here you go. Mario's starting. If anyone wants some chicken. >> You go. >> What is the Web3 stack that, again, we said that kind of works in a public space, but it doesn't really exist or work? Main heart. >> No, I thought of something. Uh So, I would say the DWeb doesn't exist. And why am I saying that? Uh in comparison to the clear web to to the normal web, the Web2 or whatever you want to call it, uh it's a rounding error. The amount of websites, uh the amount of storage being used, uh the actual users of it, the publishers, it's a rounding error. It's It's It's just too small. And uh we can pretend otherwise, but, you know, I've seen the numbers. I crawled ENS names for working uh websites. It's not many. It's not It's It's It's a handful. And uh yeah, I'm not saying it's it's a, you know, it's an unsolvable problem. So, we have a very big chicken and egg problem here, and I think that's what was was also part of the reason why Brave discontinued uh uh uh shipping notes with the Brave browser shipping peer-to-peer notes. But yeah, we we were here to kind of make that open again open that window now with the changed field around us where there's more hacks and where there's more censorship where there's other threats now re-emerging that we have been lucky enough to be free almost free from for quite some time, but I think now is the time to really kick off the DWeb. >> Just to add to that yeah, so the data that we had with IPFS was that 99.9% of users did not engage with a web 3 dapp. Like we have privacy preserving telemetry and we had data that looked at what was your setting because we couldn't default it on. We had ask enable disabled. 99.9% of people still had it under ask which means that they never showed up on a site and never had to use it in the first place. >> Victor, do you think Swarm has figured out a bit closer solution to that? >> What exactly? >> So IPFS most of the users they're not really using the system in a decentralized way right? Like on the front end it seems decentralized but actually when you look down into the tech stack it's very much centralized. So do you think the Swarm Foundation tech stack of the decentralized storage is somewhat closer to actual decentralization? >> I mean certainly it's closer in the sense that like IPFS is not really storage model in the sense that like you basically share your share your hard drive share your hard drive to the others and in Swarm it's actually the little pieces are kind of you know travel travel to their to their location. So basically you're you You allow people to upload something. So it's like act as a act as a cloud service in that sense. Uh which is kind of So, you actually don't need your own node for for for using that in this centralized way. It's a major difference, I think. >> Mhm. I don't believe that there's not one person in the audience that does not want to take a chance to complain here. Oh, wait. Can we mic this one? Yes. >> Can I just shout? >> I I don't know. Yeah. >> Yes, I have a lot of opinions about open source hardware. I'm from Taiwan, and we know that all the semiconductor chip makers are from Taiwan. And to have an open source silicon that is also quality with high performance computing power silicon is really hard to do. And so far, all the crypto hardware wallet that have their chip claiming to be open source or other hardware that claiming to be open source, nobody has actually open source their silicon. Uh my company does open source silicon, uh but it took us 16 years, 200 million dollars to just make that really high powerful chip that's open source. We have not made a single dollar. And look at all the other wallet. Trezor wallet said they are open source. They are so not. The chip is not open source. It's not open source silicon. It's only open source on the circuit board. >> Uh wait, but what about Trezor cold? >> It's also not open source silicon. You cannot say they are open source silicon. They don't even know what's on their silicon because they buy off-the-shelf chip from another maker. >> is fully custom. >> level as your toaster. >> But Trezor cold 01 is a custom design. >> toaster. It is not as powerful as us. And it is open source like they they use the like secure element with like open source API but proprietary hardware. Yeah, they just had a laser hack. Yeah, by Ledger Lab. I saw it. It was great. Yeah. >> I started something bigger than I predicted. Thank you so much for being brave. >> [applause] >> But this is what I mean, right? I will give you Kyle a Go ahead. >> So, what I find interesting there is something that you'll see in every debate of any sort of like zealous community is that like what's your threat model? Like last time I checked like unless Mossad's out here trying to kill me like I don't really care. Like >> Yeah. >> If if my threat model is like I'm a Syrian refugee, it's a different model than if I'm living in America or if I'm living in New Zealand. And so like the question really comes down to like what are those properties getting me? What is the privacy properties that I want? Half of what Brave is doing with our privacy properties is we're just trying to cancel surveillance capitalism. We're trying to cut it at its knees at the economic layer by blocking the ads in the first place. So like this is like a very pragmatic just really basic thing of like how do we stop economic surveillance? >> And by the way, when there's tension in the room, it's a good thing. I want us to contradict each other and challenge each other and answer it because that's how we're going to get closer to collaborating rather than staying in those bubbles, right? So I don't see this This is not a conflict. And by the way, all of these guys are just trying to answer it well and I hope you guys also continue the conversation outside of the door. But that's my point that we need more of these safe spaces to be brave souls and stand up and just stop lying to ourselves that everything is solved, right? So, if there's any other soul in here that wants to get something off their chest, this is your last chance. Otherwise, I'm going to go to my final question. Yes, one more person. Oh my god, I don't know what I'm getting myself into with this one. Okay, let's see. Okay. >> No, really? Um so, what I find interesting is that decentralized community building is supposed to be resilient and of course, lots of potential there. One of the things and why I got into the space is also to help with nature conservation, which has lots of centralization issues and lots of human dynamics issues as everywhere. Um one of the words over the last 10 years in the crypto space that's connected to that is the regen word. Um which is promising a more fair and more sustainable future without doing one of the two. Um so, my thing is like also a lot of lying to ourselves and it's nice if we don't do that. Um but like >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Basically, let's not lie to ourselves. Okay, that's a good conclusion as well. So, I want to continue doing this as a series as well, just getting us in the room and being very brutally honest. We have two last left and I want to leave on a little bit more positive note and you guys are someone that are very approachable people. All of you can just walk up and ask questions or start collaborating. From your end, how can we stop lying to ourselves from your spectrum, right? From what you are working on. How can people today after this panel come up to you and collaborate, do, ask, research? Maybe there's a channel, maybe there is a program, maybe there is a website, there's event, anything that comes to your mind, how do we stop lying to ourselves? Who wants to start? Kyle. >> Uh I think first we have to stop lying to ourselves and recognize that decentralization is mathematically not what's most common. Um there's a concept called scale-free networks um such that if a network is designed where a node has preferential attachment, this is a concept of network theory that the network will naturally centralize. And as a perfect example of this, capital within any sort of economic system is highly scale-free. It is going to naturally preferentially attach to whoever has money is going to gain more money. And so you're going to get uh preferential attachment and you're going to get that centralization. This is how Google was able to create all of the open-source software that they contribute to today. So like the better question and this is why I brought this up previously is like what property are we actually trying to solve with decentralization? Let's Let's go to the deeper root of like what do we want to achieve with it? Not just It's not a means to an end in and of itself. It's It's for some other purpose. >> So we have just 30 seconds left of the panel. Let's quickly go through. Main hard, you're next. Victor, you're next. Main hard, go. >> Uh sharing stats, sharing facts. Just like okay, you can say your stuff is working or it's being downloaded or people use it, but show us the numbers or we can show numbers and you will see if that's the truth or not. Just, you know, let's facts speak. >> Speak facts and show the proof. I love that advice. Victor. >> I'm like, I mean maybe if if you if you stop being honest, then actually you don't you don't need to. So So the maybe the lies is is because because we don't have any interest and and maybe if you start being honest about things, then then interest will come just right away. >> Great. So, start from within yourself. Be honest first to yourself, whether what you're doing is actually decentralized. Mario. >> I on this note, take your ideas to their logical consequences, even if it means taking the hard path. We get bunch of cypherpunks here who love to post about how much they are cypherpunk on Twitter from their MacBooks. So, just try to get better, right? Like I mean, you can Oh, I I I use signal, I'm cypherpunk now, right? But I met I met this crazy dude with Librebooted ThinkPad running Gen 2 says I'm aspiring cypherpunk. I'm I'm I'm going to get there one day, right? So, like don't let's not abuse these words like crops and cypherpunk and whatever too much. Let's actually think about their meaning and think it to the logical consequences. Quick follow-up. In after this, I'm going to be Librebooting this ThinkPad in a room next to DOD. Come join me. It's a follow-up on my workshop. I'm sorry about the chicken. I just finished one workshop, went to the food, came here, and I'm going to continue. If you want to see how I flash Libreboot directly to the chip, just you know, crazy thing. It's not fully open hardware, but at least for open firmware. Something we can strive for, try to try to live what we preach. >> So, from my perspective, guys, thank you so much for being honest. This is what I want to say, how to stop lying to ourselves is by being honest with each other and opening more of these spaces when that brutal honesty, you go through that uncomfortable feeling that some of you might have felt, but then it opens up really beautiful conversations and bridges. And again, all of these guys are very approachable. So, from decentralized storage to Brave Freedom Browser, Ethereum Foundation, or independent Mario, all of these guys are very approachable. So, don't look at your neighbors as the competitors. We're all here for the same goal and the same reason. So, hug your neighbor and enjoy the rest of the day and stay here for the live coding session after the 6:00 p.m. Thank you so much, guys. >> Thank you.