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Introducing Self Protocol I Marek Olszewski at Pragma Denver 2025

Thu, Oct 2, 2025, 12:00 AM

Join Marek Olszewski at Pragma Denver 2025 as he unveils Self Protocol, a new identity and verification solution leveraging machine-readable biometric passports, zero-knowledge proofs, and Celo’s emerging Layer-2 architecture. Learn how Self Protocol addresses critical crypto challenges—like Sybil resistance, verifying you’re not on an OFAC list, and even confirming you’re human—without exposing private data. Marek demonstrates the mobile onboarding experience, explains the trusted execution environment (TEE) for secure proofs, and shows how developers can integrate Self Protocol’s SDK for dApps requiring age checks, region blocks, or other identity-based logic. If you’re searching for privacy-preserving identity solutions in Web3, this talk has you covered. 00:00 Introduction & What Is Self Protocol 00:49 Launch Day & Interactive “Guess the Country” Game 01:21 Key Unsolved Crypto Problems: Identity & Privacy 02:41 Addressing Sybil Resistance & Bad Actors 03:17 Rise of AI Agents: “Are You Even Human?” 04:21 Vision for Self Protocol & ZK-Based Verification 05:01 Biometric Passports & Machine-Readable Chips 07:04 Zero-Knowledge Proofs: No Counterparty Needed 09:04 Demonstrating the Mobile App Onboarding 10:30 Passport Scanning & Proof Generation Flow 11:04 Example Use Cases: Age Check, OFAC Check, More 12:27 Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) Explained 13:35 Deployment on Celo & Gas-Free Submissions 14:47 Self Protocol SDK for Builders & Custom Use Cases 15:22 Fun Implementations & Closing Remarks _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 🇺🇸 *Pragma Denver* Pragma Denver 2025 was held on February 25th at ReelWorks in Denver, Colorado and was an in-person summit for builders and leaders in the web3 ecosystem. Watch the full Pragma Denver YouTube Playlist here: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXzKMXK2aHh6mvMfVn2gIK2uhRiTHjIg9&si=Xyozrbw0ZvUW_65a ETHGlobal's Pragma series takes place in cities around the world, and is designed to be a different kind of event. Pragma is a one-stage conference with founders-only on stage, bringing together a small group of curated attendees and speakers to discuss the future of web3 and reflect on the past. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ✅ *Follow Marek Olszewski* X: https://x.com/marek_ ✅ *Follow Celo* X: https://x.com/Celo ✅ *Follow ETHGlobal* X: https://x.com/ETHGlobal​ Warpcast: https://warpcast.com/ethglobal Website: https://ethglobal.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/ETHGlobal _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _Are you interested in Ethereum development and entrepreneurship?_ 👉 Sign up for the next ETHGlobal event: https://ethglobal.com/events 🎁 Get exclusive access and perks with ETHGlobal Plus! https://ethglobal.com/plus 📣 Want us to throw an event in your city? Tell us where! https://ethglobal.com/city _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Speakers

Marek is a co-founder of the Celo Protocol, CEO at cLabs, and President of Valora, an easy-to-use mobile wallet built on Celo. Earlier, he co-founded Locu, a machine learning venture-backed company that was acquired by GoDaddy. He is also an MIT PhD alumni and a former Facebook Fellow and has previously worked at Google, Microsoft Research, and Sun Labs.