Animoca-linked Moca Chain plots Q4 mainnet launch
Moca brings digital identities onchain as a privacy-forward alternative to existing single sign-on tools
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Moca Foundation — the group behind the MOCA token affiliated with Animoca Brands’ Moca ID and Mocaverse — is launching Moca Chain.
The namesake L1 blockchain is focused on being a cross-chain identity layer and verification system. The MOCA token will be the chain’s native token.
In an X Space Wednesday morning, Animoca Brands cofounder and Chair Yat Siu explained that for crypto users, Moca Chain can be an alternative to giving your personal data — and therefore identity — to big tech firms like Google and Meta.
For businesses, it can be a way to reach target audiences without needing to see or store all of their personal data.
“Our digital identity is all over the place right now,” Siu said, adding that he sees Moca Chain as a way for crypto users to own and control their own digital data. In the future, he expects more “walled gardens” or closed tech/data ecosystems, like those belonging to Apple or Meta, to be forced to open up.
The blockchain’s testnet is expected to launch this year in Q3, with a mainnet launch near the end of this year in Q4. Moca Foundation describes the blockchain as both EVM-compatible and chain-agnostic, as well as modular.
Moca Chain will also offer decentralized data storage, a feature we’ve seen recently with the launches of protocols like Walrus. On the tech side, the Moca blockchain is also planning to use ZK proofs, zkTLS and an oracle for user identities.
These adds aim to keep user data private. Third-party Moca Chain issuers will be the verifiers of user identities, earning as they provide that service.
To me, Moca’s plans here sound like a crypto-powered alternative to Google’s single sign-on (SSO) offering that’s spread across the industry lately. For crypto firms like Immutable and Abstract, SSO has been an answer to the clunky legacy wallet onboarding processes of the past.
But not everyone necessarily wants to tie all their Google Search history, cloud storage and email account to a crypto wallet.
While we won’t be able to claw our data back from the big tech giants without substantial US regulation (similar to what the EU has done), I’d say an easy-to-use, decentralized digital-identity option that puts privacy first is always welcome.
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