Legislation has been introduced in the US Senate that would direct the Treasury Department to implement a pilot digital dollar project (CBDC).
The Electronic Currency and Secure Hardware Act (ECASH) was introduced in the US Senate, which would mandate the launch of a retail CBDC pilot project by representatives of the US Treasury Department. Previously, the Federal Reserve was supposed to be responsible for issuing the digital dollar, but the agency’s functional limitations surfaced during the drafting process. The ECASH Act aims to resolve this situation.
The bill would require the Treasury Department to prepare and test software, hardware, and network infrastructure to launch a peer-to-peer retail digital dollar. The bill is authored by Congressman Stephen Lynch.
Representatives from the agency would prepare and test hardware wallets, a mobile app and a prepaid card. The technology is not planned to be based on a decentralized ledger; moreover, the system will work without a ledger at all. Instead, “secure hardware architectures” are envisioned.
The bill also emphasizes privacy and anonymity. Anti-money laundering methods would be implemented in the same way as in the traditional banking system. The key question remains the level of cybersecurity that such a system can provide without using any ledger.
