In what we've come to see as the modern internet a.k.a Web 2.0 we see features like ECMAscript, HTTP2.0 and other standardized feature sets used to build the basis of every application on the internet. While most of these standards allow for amazing things to be done on the internet, on the basis they are built on top of a mindless framework of connectivity. The covalent smart policy platform looks to change that, implementing a data policy framework that secures not just access but the usage of the overall data access.
Imagine for a moment being able to issue an immutable smart contract that allows a web service to use your credit card once for 1 charge of a certain amount, but then loses access completely to the information like it was never transferred to them. This ability to issue immutable data with fixed policies attached to them is something that HTTP never was designed to handle. Covalent takes what the web is and add's the blockchain technology to turn it into what the web should be. A web where a users data is still their data regardless of how they decide to use it with various web services.
In this day and age with phishing and data leaks more prevalent by the day with even credit agencies, most of the world thought should be secure causing data leaks of an unimagined scale. When you start imaging an internet where specific websites aren't the ones that determine how secure your data is, but the underlying protocol handles security and the user handles how widely and openly your data is used the internet becomes a much better place. Taking into account just how widely used the internet has become in modern society, this kind of modern framework would impact not just website data usage, but the larger scale of modern social interactions.
Data Policy from both the user and service side of the internet could be allowed to evolve into something not only secure but genuinely improved. Imagine sending text messages regardless of platform or software that are restricted not only to who they are sent but for how long they can be viewed. When policy for data is at the protocol level users are no longer beholden to trusting a third party website to keep their data safe. Taking back control, and taking back our privacy is something many have wished for but to date theirs no easy way to see it accomplished.
With covalent's take on what the Web3.0 could be data is ours, data is a commodity that can be sent, used, exchanged and expired dependant on immutable rules. Websites won't be able to use your data for nefarious reasons just because they update their site policy on a webpage. Social networks won't be able to endlessly resell your data, imagine a world where Facebook can't sell your data because it doesn't know about your data. Imagine a social media world, where you share your data with your friends, but ONLY your friends, not with the company hosting the website. Social data policies are something the existing Web 2.0 is just not capable of enforcing in any meaningful way. Hopefully with a strong determined leadership Covalent will be able to truly define what the Web 3.0 can truly become.
It's not often we see projects especially from the blockchain arena attempt to punch way above their weight class, but Cova (covalent.ai) seems to be attempting to do just that. Not just trying to improve a small niche subset of the internet, but to truly reshape what we think is possible on the internet. Solving not some small minor inconvenience but solving a foundational issue that exists on the internet as we know it. Theirs no doubt that they have an uphill battle to fight, but the team seems determined to turn 16+ Zettabytes of dumb-data on the internet into a smart policy controlled machine enforceable ecosystem of data.
To read more about the Covalent.ai project check out the team's website, and their whitepaper to really get a better understanding. They have a subreddit that the team also posts to often to try to get more community support behind improving the internet and what it can be not just what it has always been. If you've got questions they even have a very active telegram where the team is open to questions and really building a community surrounding what Web 3.0 can be.