Edward Snowden: Bitcoin is superior to credit cards, the rise of cryptocurrency is inevitable, Bitcoin is still a work in progress

Former CIA agent Edward Snowden, who gained fame in 2013 for exposing the U.S. mass surveillance program "PRISM," was interviewed on the 22nd, where he shared his views on the future of cryptocurrency and Bitcoin infrastructure.

Although Snowden has been following the cryptocurrency field closely, he rarely speaks out. On March 13 of this year, after the cryptocurrency market crash, he stated that Bitcoin's decline was accompanied by excessive panic and was unreasonably steep. He revisited this "buying the dip" tweet on December 7.

During the interview on the 22nd, Snowden mentioned that cryptocurrency will continue to develop. Even with the launch of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC), CBDCs have no clear advantage. He also expressed his preference for Bitcoin over credit cards but expressed confusion over the slow development progress of Bitcoin.

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The Unstoppable Rise of Cryptocurrency

Snowden points out:

This is an inevitable trend. Countries have realized that digital currencies are the future. They are also trying to create central bank digital currencies to compete with them. However, this is just a digital version of fiat currency, which, apart from making it more efficient for governments to distribute relief funds, is completely unattractive to the public. Most people may not even realize that this is a completely new form of taxation, as the increased issuance of relief funds leads to the overall devaluation of fiat currency.

Bitcoin Still a Work in Progress

He believes that in a broad sense, cryptocurrencies also cannot solve the insidious form of taxation known as inflation. Although Bitcoin has a lower inflation rate, it still faces issues with privacy and transaction throughput.

He explains:

Bitcoin has low transaction throughput and lacks privacy protection. When we talk about Bitcoin Improvement Proposals (BIP), I understand that developers themselves are aware that these features should be implemented in any case. However, it is perplexing that even after several years, they have not been perfected.

Preference for Bitcoin Over Credit Cards

Snowden emphasizes that as the rise of digital currencies becomes an unavoidable reality, he is not intentionally picking winners or losers. He has no qualms or worries about who can win this battle, but he believes that what the world needs is a truly independent means of achieving private transactions. He states:

If Bitcoin prevails, that's great. I am a user. I used it before, and I will continue to use Bitcoin in the future, even though it is still difficult for me to use. In situations where I cannot use a credit card, Bitcoin has already made a huge technological leap. Traditional payment networks cannot even conduct anonymous transactions like Bitcoin.

Snowden concludes that the flaws of cryptocurrency are very obvious, and there is no reason why pain points cannot be resolved. He mentions that many development teams are dedicated to so-called off-chain transactions and cross-chain transactions, and his only question is, "Why is it taking so long?"

In reality, Bitcoin is certainly not a for-profit organization. Some developers even need sponsorship from exchanges to sustain themselves. While other projects receive funding from venture capital firms, apart from the tokens having value, most projects do not have a fixed profit model. They rely more on marketing tactics to attract attention. Therefore, it will take some time for cryptocurrencies to eliminate usage friction and become mainstream.