All right, brilliant. Well, thanks for having me. Yeah, so I'm excited to be here. I'm like you introduced me so nicely. I am cheap innovation officer at OKX. I'm also COO at OKCoin. It's great to be here to talk about this recent announcement that
that we had about our security partnership, but also looking forward to answering some questions from you and the team. I've been at the company for over seven years now, so I've done a lot of stuff within our firm, but also within our space, so happy to talk a little bit more about that.
standard, ordinals on Bitcoin may have heard about that. So we have a blog post up on our resources page just detailing what the BRC20 token standard is, how it works, some differences it has with the ERC20 token standard on Ethereum. A really great introduction and look
a technical look from one of our auditors who worked on the audit of OKX infrastructure. And then OKX Web3 earned about a month ago integrated, Certix Security Score into their platform to give users an adaglance look at the security of different products
calls that offer yield on the platform. So yeah, it's really great to see, okay, taking security seriously and helping make it more accessible. I think that's something that hasn't always been easy to do is bringing security to the end user. So if you have any thoughts on the partnership recently, I'd love to hear them Jason.
Yeah, like you said security is important to us, but also to our users. It's also very important to educate users on why security is important to them also. Maybe if I just take a small step back and break down what OKX does and
You know what we're talking about? I might be helpful for the audience here. So OKX has two main lines of businesses. One is what you may traditionally have heard of as the centralized exchange or centralized trading business.
That is much like any other crypto exchange we offer trading products and people most importantly store their assets on the exchange in order to partake in all the features that the exchange offers. The other side is actually where this
recent partnerships focus on is our Web 3 wallet, what we call the OKX wallet. This is where I spend a little bit more of my time myself. And the key difference is that this is a non-custodial wallet, meaning using
create their wallets and secure them and store them on their own device. Utilizing, either it's an NPC, meaning we can help you back up and split up your keys so you don't have to remember a seed phrase, or you can choose to back up and save your seed
phrase and take security of your assets in your own hands. So the OX wallet offers users, like I said, self-custody, but more importantly, the ability to basically explore and do all the cool stuff in
in the broader Web3 space. So you mentioned urn, which is a feature where users can take the assets that they own and stake them, park them, and use them to earn rewards across the ecosystem. And that's where we partnered with you to make sure that users when they browse
earn options choices they can see you know which one's CERTAQ has done a sort of code review on to see sort of that that relative risk. Beyond that there's NFTs there's there's obviously trade-in
There's just a whole wide bunch of stuff. The second thing you mentioned on the partnership site is our recent support for Bitcoin NFTs, Ordinals, and the whole world of emerging Bitcoin use cases. So we're very excited about that, and it's great to see that we're working
working with you to make sure the users understand that we've done our part in basically building our code and our product correctly. So I'll pause there real quickly. >> You know a lot of great points you raised there. I think you're right about how exciting it is that
on Bitcoin have been a very recent area of exploration. How do you see the comparative innovation between Bitcoin, which may have had a reputation as a bit of an older single trick pony, but in a good kind of way, as a
secure medium of exchange, whereas you've got the innovation happening on other chains of Ethereum and smaller chains as well. Do you think that it's the role of Bitcoin to be an innovator or is it better left alone or how do you see that?
I think there's a lot of debate about this and this is a fantastic point because I first of all I don't think Bitcoin is stagnant. I don't think that's been the case. I think the innovation in Bitcoin has always been around
How do we make sure that Bitcoin is the most decentralized, the most permissionless, and most accessible network out there? We'll see focus around that for use case of
self-safety and ownership of your assets. When you open up the network to new ideas, new use cases, whether it's protocols, tokens, whatever, you're exposing the, you could potentially exposing
the underlying security and framework of the network to new attacks or you guys are very familiar with. A larger surface area for for attacks is you have more to cover right and so I think Bitcoin has been innovating in that sense whereas other chains you mentioned it there
I mean, others, they've been taking a different approach and just I wouldn't say, you know, at the expense, but there are certainly compromises where hey, look, let's try to do a lot of different things and see what works. So it's just different approaches. And so now with what's happened this year with ordinals and this sort of
expansion of the Bitcoin design space and use space use case I think it's just tremendously exciting because a lot of these ideas were sort of They've been in the Bitcoin ecosystem broader Bitcoin ecosystem since you know 2014 2013 right back then
And we had people that really wanted to build these things on Bitcoin, but realized that at the moment it wasn't possible. And not to say that it is possible today, but now people are really experimenting and looking to see how to do it all while preserving those sort of core
principles and values that the Bitcoin community has built up? For sure, I think the original project was only recently enabled with the Bitcoin's taproot upgrade. So yeah, as you were saying, it really just wasn't possible a few years ago. And I think at the end of the day, Bitcoin is a very
decentralized open source project and there's no one to stop people building on it and it should be encouraged. At the end of the day, it makes the protocol better and if it can respond to any new attack vectors that open up, then it becomes stronger and just at the end of the day becomes a better network, a stronger network.
And it's a good thing for the community as a whole I know there has been some debate about the congestion and everything like that that BRC 20 tokens have involved but That's usage that's that's the network being used I mean, yeah, I think just on that note, I mean Bitcoin block speed
usage is a good thing. I don't think people can, big corners can't really debate on that note. I think you want people to be using blog space. And so to see, you know, that happened recently. It's a, it's a healthier security budget. It's a healthier
ecosystem, you want a variety of use cases for the block space, in my opinion. And to say that one use case is better or worse is not for any one of us to make that judgment. As long as the transactions follow the network rules, I think it's all fair game.
which they are. Yeah absolutely absolutely yeah they legitimate Bitcoin transactions and just a different use case than what has been previously done. So what is some other changes you've seen across the industry during your seven years working in crypto obviously
Obviously a lot has changed, a lot has changed. We're in an interesting space right now. So yeah, how do you see like the trends that have emerged throughout your time in the industry where we're at now and maybe what will be happening in the near future? I know that's a big picture question, but it'll be great to get your thoughts on that. I mean, I'll try to answer
And so that, I think one thing that I've learned is that it's not easy to sort of predict, and I've frequently been wrong, if not almost all the time, I've been wrong. But I think one interesting thing is now this sort of concept of this
broader concept of Web 3 is interesting, sort of opening up that whole realm of use cases around digital sovereignty and digital ownership, whether that's around data, tokens, and FT's art, whatever it is, I think that that has been very fascinating. And I think there's a lot of
new use cases and business cases to be built once people understand how powerful it is to have actual digital rights and digital ownership. Still early, but I think that's an interesting area of exploration. The other thing is that
For us, one thing, it is important to have that longer term conviction despite not knowing exactly how it plays out. This is our 10th year now. We've been
building and focusing on building tools and services and really for our users, right? That's our focus and where those use cases arise. We're really ready to really jump on and make sure that we iterate and improve our products for those use cases. So I think being adaptable
being pragmatic and willing to really change quickly when the situation and the market change is a key part of navigating what we call Web 3 in crypto these days. So I think that's broadly my learnings, hard to
predict the future, but also you have to keep in open mind and make sure you build towards what the users are asking for. For sure, no, that's a great take. I think yeah, keep the conviction strong and remember why you're in the industry and then just adapt to the changes
I guess that's the role of a chief innovation officer. Or maybe you could speak about the role of a chief innovation officer. What's your day to day look like? And yeah, what guides your thought process when you're evaluating new innovations, new opportunities? Yeah, I think fortunately
My role is really as a support to our broader team. We're very fortunate to have an amazing team here around the world, all focused on different aspects of our business. For me, it's making sure that I can support them
with whether it's guidance or insight or things like that. And so, you know, it's really hard to say what a day to day looks like in crypto and much less in our space, in our company. But there's just so much to do, so much to digest. It's really trying to make sure that our product
is well understood by our users and making sure that our team is also building and understanding what our users are looking at. And the innovation part probably comes in just to maybe look ahead a couple months. For example, we have
on our roadmap account abstraction that we're trying to build a rollout in July. This is obviously for more EVM or Ethereum type compatible chains, but how do we bring that in a way that it's,
Seamless for the user understandable and actually solve some of their pain points at the end of the day our whole teams are all of our teams are matter what function you're in we're geared towards Building and delivering for our users. So that's just my my small part in that whole effort
I think as you mentioned account abstraction will hopefully solve a lot of those pain points that users feel when it comes to interacting with crypto. It's not a straightforward thing. There is quite a steep learning curve. So what are your users requesting right now? What are their major
needs that you're meeting at OKX. Yeah, we talked about the Bitcoin ordinal support. I think that's where we're getting there. About a month ago, we launched our first support for viewing and then now trading and soon
And so basically providing more and more tools for people to deep dive into the Bitcoin ordinals and BRC 20 ecosystem. We also actually announced a proposal on extending BRC 20 to something we called the BRC 20s, which allows for more fields and more
program ability to allow for things like staking and maybe defy on Bitcoin. So we're definitely committed to the Bitcoin growing that Bitcoin ecosystem. So that's one. And users have been asking for that quite a bit. We've seen quite a lot of interest on that. Number two,
is we've had tremendous feedback on a few months ago now we rolled out our NPC wallet which basically means you can create a wallet that's secure and backed up using various components you know whether you have a Google Cloud account or iCloud
or you have an OKX account, we can help you split up your private key and make sure that you have the ability to recover it without dealing with seed phrases and things like that. Very simple to use and users have been really excited about that. The feedback has been great. So we're iterating on that to make it even more powerful and make it more seamless. We're looking
to enhance and add some more support for different types of ways to back up different parts of the private key. So things like that, right? We're taking feedback from users and building on top of that. I think the most important thing is for us to hear
and get that feedback, whether it's via channels like this or you can tweet at us on our main okay, Xhandles on Twitter, email us. We're always open for feedback to make sure that we are delivering what users want. For sure, and we will most
We have time for a couple audience questions at the end of this. So if anyone has some feedback they want to give, have some questions they want to raise, then definitely raise your hand when the time comes. And yeah, you mentioned MPC wallets, that's multi-party computation. We have an introduction to MPC wallets.
on our blog page, which I recommend anyone who's not super familiar with the concept checks out. I know I wasn't and then the blog gave me a really good introduction. So turning a little more to current events, like the current state of Web3 and crypto, and
As I'm sure you take a very global view and there's a whole lot going on in a whole lot of different places, not always the same sort of approach in different countries. But how do you see the sort of global environment for crypto right now? Is it overall
are there is it in danger? What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, I think one thing that I've learned is that it's important to keep that long-term vision and optimism in mind. We are building for a
long-term future where users will understand why it's so important to self-custody to own your own digital assets and basically be able to do all these things with them without needing or relying on a third party.
I think that that choice will always be there whether you want to offload some of your responsibilities to a third party, but having that option is super important. And so when we look at what we are building for and how we view the current landscape,
Okay, ex wallet is our is our solution for individuals who want to take Self custody into your own hands and explore the world wider world of web 3 it's it's actually you know despite all the You know in some pockets of the world mostly in the US I'd say there's been a bit of more negative
If you look beyond that, there's actually been a lot of general optimism around crypto and Web 3. Specifically, if you look at areas like Hong Kong and the Middle East and Dubai, even in Europe with some recent legislation that has been passed,
I think we're getting to a place where the regulatory and global understanding of why users may be using this technology and how to protect users, consumer protections, are I think there's increased
increasing clarity around that. And that if we get there, I think there's that just lifts a lot of the, I'd say, black clouds on the horizon or uncertainty that that builders and businesses in the in our space currently face. So, you know, I can see that, you know, in three years,
whatever five years will all be focused back on the use cases as opposed to some of the risks and bad actors that have occurred over the past 12, 18 months. So it is tremendously exciting. I think we always have that optimistic outlook and we're always building for the long term.
Absolutely, that's a, I appreciate your optimism and I think it's justified. I think there's a lot of great work being done in the space. Account abstraction you mentioned. I think right now is the time that a lot of the tools that are really going to bring on the next billion to put a number to it.
to bring in the next generation of crypto users are being built and it will be really exciting to see those use cases. And it's great to hear that even as the centralized exchange you're working on, you have a major product that allows users to take custody of their assets, which is really true to the whole idea of crypto in the first
was. Yeah, I think I think in some sense where I don't know if self disrupting is the right word, but we're certainly making sure users have the choice to choose which product they want to use. Self custody is not for everyone and that's fine, but for those
that choose to go down that path, they need to have robust tools and very simple to use products that are on par with what Web2 or centralized businesses can offer. And when we circling back to our partnership and our recent announcements, I think it's just
So important that users understand that today there's still a lot of risk involved in how you do that. Go down that path of self-sarmony and self-custody. And so I think you guys have been around for, I want to say, five years maybe.
Coming up on six. Got it. Yeah, and so I mean look we've worked together multiple times over the years and you know the each part of the Of what we do in the ecosystem has its has its role right we're building up towards something where users don't necessarily need
need to understand what open source code is and they don't need to look at smart contracts because they can rely on tools to do so. But at the same time they can if they want to, right? So it's making sure we have that choice and clarity for users up and down the value stack.
for sure that's a great way to point it. Let's turn to some audience questions now it's your opportunity to ask the experts so Harvey milk as well as you as a speaker and feel free to ask Jason your question. Yeah I have a question for the Merlin Hack you
you announced a $2 million recovery fund for Merland Dex Victims, then you unpin the tweet, it says you're covered like 160K since then. When are you going to actually do something about that? You've been banning people from the telegram.
That is something that's being worked on. I appreciate the question, Harvey. It is a complicated process that we are addressing internally. Let's keep questions related to OKX and board and all anything like that.
Okay, we've got cats. If you want to ask a question to Jason.
Yeah, thanks for having me. I just wanted to ask a question and it can kind of be for kind of both parties is my question more
we slowly start to see all of this integrate because ultimately it's happening whether we like it or not. So how does this all play into both
from a security perspective, but also just the daily functionality of the DeFi space and how to all play it. It's a bit of a wide-reneric question, hopefully.
Take how you feel? Yeah, the intersection of AI with with web 3 in crypto generally Yeah, just as just as a general more broad spectrum obviously the You guys are at the security side, but then you've got them the other side which is just the generic side of contracts and everything else in terms of just the way it functionally works
That's a great question. Do you want me to answer? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's let you as the expert take this one. Jason. Well, first of all, I'm not an expert, certainly not an expert in AI. That's for sure. And I think even in crypto, it's hard to be aware of people that call themselves the expert because there's just so much to learn. So at least from what I know,
on AI and what we're doing with AI. We've added internally, we've been experimenting and adding layers where AI can sort of help improve efficiency, I guess. A lot of it comes down to at least today making sure our
Our centralized systems have the ability to detect and prevent fraud. And I think that helps sort of the broader ecosystem. We're doing also experimenting with things like, you know, we have a chat bot where users can ask questions and go, so simple.
Language stuff where we can maybe help provide answers in a more accessible manner. But looking forward, I think there's a lot of cool stuff that's, I think that intersection of AI and crypto and blockchain leads to
actually a much healthier AI ecosystem is my take. You know, right now there's all this doomsday chatter around how AI can just do a lot of bad things, right? And I think when you pair that with
blockchains and specifically with crypto assets. You allow AI bots to have an element of truth and provenance built in. I think that's something that people, very smart people are already exploring and that's just something that I can see playing out for our sort of humanities benefit.
And then secondly, if AI bots and agents themselves have access to wallets and accounts and crypto digital assets basically, you can now see a world where good AI agents are
rewarded for providing good behavior, right? And so we can basically use economics and economies to help regulate behavior of AI. So I think it's interesting. And I think it's going to be-- we're going to be talking about this for a long time to come.
For sure, it is a super interesting topic. I think it's sort of lucky that we have crypto and blockchain in a world of AI. When you've got the ability to have actual digital scarcity, whether that's with tokens or NFTs, in a world where AI can create web pages, text, images, all the
sorts of things, then having sort of, not restrictions, but rails that that can go on or where you can prove where it comes from is a very important thing. And I think crypto really blockchain enables that in a world where AI is becoming more and more important.
That's nearly coming up on time now. So Jason, are there any other topics you'd like to touch on? Anything you'd like to say about the, just the okay, X is approach to security. Obviously you guys are taking major steps in the space to raise the level of security and transparency, which is something, which is a mission we share here at CERDIC. So yeah, any final thoughts on security before you
wrap this up. Just on security, I think this is a never ending quest, right? We're always trying to improve. And so we have a bug bounty program. We also have multiple channels where you can provide feedback to us. We're also working with you, continue to work with you, Jesse and the team to highlight
and educate users on best practices and surface security data. So look, it's never ending and we're always keen to take feedback on how we can improve. >> That's a very commendable attitude. Thank you, Jason. Thank you for sharing your insights today. Thank you for
listening to your users and building new products that serve them while remaining true to the the ideology of crypto. I think that's a really great thing to see. Thank you for taking the time today and yeah it's been a great discussion. We look forward to working with you in future. All right well thanks for having me. Thanks everyone. Thanks everyone. See you next time.