Jack Dorsey: building an internet decentralized identity layer & payment infrastructures

Jack Dorsey is the CEO of Block, an ecosystem of businesses empowering many to access payment infrastructures. 

TBD, among other businesses in the Block ecosystem, was defined by Emily Chiu, TBD’s Chief Operating Officer, at the African Bitcoin Conference in Ghana as a project founded with the vision of using the power of decentralized technology to return ownership and control to everyone over their data, finances, and identity. 

Highlighting the building focus of Block, Emily said, “We are rewriting the internet by building open source infrastructure that will make it easy for developers to develop the next wave of incredible applications.” She added that TBD has a team of pragmatists that are trying to solve real problems for real people. 

Block is working on building a decentralized identity layer for the internet and building an open-source self-custody wallet. Additionally, Emily mentioned that part of Block’s portfolio includes lightning infrastructure in the form of a lightning service provider. “We’re thinking about the whole stark technology to connect anyone in the global economy who wishes to participate,” she said. 

With TBD and TBDex, the liquidity protocol that allows people to hold either Bitcoin or Stablecoin using a decentralized identity self-custody wallet, individuals can on-ramp or off-ramp at will. According to Emily, the on-ramp and off-ramp functions are among what TBD’s Web5 is underlining to make possible despite the complexities involved. 

Bitcoin seeks to empower global access to decentralized financial systems, especially for people who are locked out of their traditional finance. Emily affirmed that TBD catalyzes technologies that will provide fundamental tools needed to participate in the economy and allow developers to build. 

She explained that the technologies would enable a world where one can go to the internet with a smartphone (the majority of the unbanked have a smartphone) and download a self-custody wallet, be able to send, and receive Bitcoin, and access global commerce. 

Looking across continents, close to 30% of the GDP comes in the form of personal remittances, Emily emphasized. She mentioned that at Block and TBD, remittances are one of the most compelling and exciting use cases they are building.

She disclosed that the firm had demonstrated the first Proof of Concept in Latin America using USDC and crypto as the payment rails. Also, TBD is looking to replicate the Proof of Concept in other countries. 

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