While the world looks to label Bitcoin for all of the things it isn’t–as a major financial mechanism of terrorism, or a smart way to perform money laundering–let’s take a look at one of the paths it does take. The charitable donation, for example. The charity industry has had their own public relations issues over the last several years for many fly-by-night organizations turning out to be full-on scams, like some alleged “Bitcoin exchanges” of days gone by. Bitcoin’s digital currency and its blockchain public ledger are seen as a way to improve not just the efficiency of corporate banking interests, but also smaller operations like charities. Charities can grow quite large, too. Two of the largest, the United Way and Greenpeace, have been accepting Bitcoin for some time now. The attraction to Bitcoin by more and more charity organizations becomes clear when you consider the inherent advantages of Bitcoin over legacy economic models like debit cards. Transparency is one that is readily apparent.
“ Charities always face issues in terms of managing the trust, ” said Rhodri Davies, head of the Giving Thought policy program at CAF. “ With blockchain, you will be able to see where the money goes and track your donation as it goes through the charity. ”
Identity theft is virtually eliminated, maintaining a level of trust in the charity. For those who don’t want to reveal their donations publicly, personally-identifiable information is not tied to these transactions, directly. Also, there is no limit on the amount of the transaction, often brought on by a merchant processor. You could deliver $0.50 USD or $1 Million USD with the same amount of ease. If you want to donate $1 million USD via traditional channels, however, it immediately becomes both public, time-consuming, and subject to potential theft through […]
