When I first got interested and involved in COTI it was not for the reasons we see now and it was out of a need to evolve that has created where COTI is heading. COTI is a private payment network that also mints stable coins for their clients use cases on their own private payment networks. This is what caught my eye initially as they were offering services around payments.
Some thing changed however within the last 2 years forcing COTI to think outside the box and develop a privacy solution that protects the data. Institutions who were interested in the PPN could not use a crypto blockchain in the form we see today mainly down to the entire transaction being transparent. It would actually be illegal if institutions showed a clients entire transaction and why it had to change if blockchains were going to be used. COTI could not expand their payment network unless they found a solution that resolved this.
Selective Disclosure
This is when users or businesses transact using crypto and can select whether the transaction is kept confidential or not yet still reveals the parties involved. This is not anonymity like Monero or XRM due to the fact that regulators can still audit these transactions if they need to. The main take from this is the wallets doing the transactions can decide on how much data is divulged, but the two addresses doing the transaction are always visible.
When we look to the future it is obvious where all this is heading and everything will be online and the last thing we need to be visible is the size of everyone's wallets. If people know how much is in a certain wallet it could quite easily become a target so this is part of keeping your data safe along with privacy.
Data
Another problem today is that every time we sign up using KYC we are divulging so much confidential information which often ends up getting stored by a 3rd party. Over the last few years these 3rd party sites have seen a rise in hackings because data today is sought after and is so valuable. Now can you imagine users or businesses being able to control their own data in a way that the information is given, but never kept and this is what COTI has developed.
The Need
COTI in order to expand the PPN business had to basically place it all on hold and develop a solution that would allow their customers to use crypto and blockchains. This was what was holding back adoption ad it did not matter how good or bad your product was it was still not usable due to the transparency. Thee was nothing available at the time that offered any privacy protection and the reason why COTI developed Garbled Circuits.
One has to just think of DeFi and going forward transactions will be protected along with bots front running trades coming to an end. DeFi is one area we know is massive and lately the TVL has shrunk due to the number of hacks and risk associated with DeFi.
Time Frames
There are currently more than 400 smart contracts being developed and created using the new COTI V2 technology. COTI V2 will go live as an Ethereum Layer Two token in Q4 later this year and we will be able to see hopefully what is changing long before this happens. Q4 is literally a month away so this is just around the corner and not only COTI, but crypto in general is about to become a whole lot safer with the deployment of garbled circuits.
Everyone has been talking about mass adoption for years wondering why it had not already happened and why companies were holding back and confidentiality and privacy were those reasons. The blockchain for all it offered was not fit for purpose unless it offered this privacy solution. This is why I do believe COTI V2 will be the number one Eth L2 token by what it delivers.