Across discussions with policymakers, financial institutions, technology leaders and regulators, one message became increasingly clear:
Europe has entered the next phase of blockchain development.

This phase is no longer about defining the potential of the technology.
It is about operationalising it.

From Regulation to Implementation

With the full application of the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) in December 2024, Europe has established the world’s first comprehensive regulatory framework for digital assets. Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA)

This represents a significant achievement in providing legal certainty, investor protection and a harmonised market environment across Member States.

However, as discussions at Paris Blockchain Week highlighted, regulation alone does not create competitiveness.

The next challenge for Europe lies in translating regulatory clarity into operational capability — across custody, settlement infrastructure, cross-border execution and institutional adoption.

A New Strategic Layer: Infrastructure and Sovereignty

A second key theme emerging from Paris is the growing importance of blockchain as a strategic infrastructure layer, rather than a standalone innovation domain.

This is particularly evident in the debate around:

• euro-denominated stablecoins
• tokenised deposits
• and the future of digital settlement systems

These developments reflect a broader shift:
blockchain is increasingly understood as part of Europe’s financial and digital sovereignty architecture.

At the same time, the long-standing tension between decentralised systems and European data protection frameworks is beginning to evolve. Recent regulatory developments, including new guidelines on GDPR application to blockchain-based systems, signal a more technically grounded and forward-looking approach.

From Pilots to Production

Another structural insight from Paris Blockchain Week is the transition of tokenisation from pilot use cases to production-ready infrastructure.

Tokenised real-world assets, interoperable identity systems and privacy-preserving architectures are no longer conceptual discussions. They are increasingly becoming prerequisites for institutional-scale deployment.

This transition introduces a new set of requirements:

• interoperability standards
• common data models
• trusted infrastructure frameworks
• and scalable governance mechanisms

Without alignment in these areas, Europe risks fragmentation across jurisdictions, sectors and technical implementations.

Coordinating Europe’s Blockchain Ecosystem

Europe’s strength has always been its ability to define regulatory frameworks grounded in values such as transparency, accountability and fundamental rights.

Its challenge, however, remains coordination.

The European Blockchain Association (EBA) has consistently emphasised the importance of aligning stakeholders across industries, regions and governance levels. In a landscape that is inherently decentralised, fragmentation is not only a technical risk — it is a strategic one.

As blockchain ecosystems mature, the need for neutral platforms that facilitate coordination, standardisation and dialogue becomes increasingly critical.

Actions for Europe

In response to the insights emerging from Paris Blockchain Week, the European Blockchain Association has developed a strategic action framework outlining seven priority areas for Europe’s next phase of blockchain development:

• Moving from rulemaking to operability
• Building euro-denominated digital settlement infrastructure
• Standardising tokenisation frameworks
• Advancing privacy-preserving identity systems
• Establishing trusted infrastructure standards
• Strengthening education and board-level literacy
• Coordinating Europe’s ecosystem across sectors and borders

These actions are intended not as abstract recommendations, but as a practical foundation for policymakers, institutions and industry leaders working to translate Europe’s regulatory leadership into global competitiveness.

From Insight to Impact

Europe has taken a leading role in shaping the regulatory foundations of the blockchain economy.

The opportunity now lies in building on this foundation — by developing the infrastructure, coordination mechanisms and institutional capabilities required for large-scale adoption.

To support this process, the European Blockchain Association has published a comprehensive infographic:

“Actions for Europe — Learning from the Paris Blockchain Week”

The infographic provides a structured overview of key insights and priority actions and is designed to support internal discussions, strategic planning and policy dialogue across Europe’s blockchain ecosystem.

Download

The full infographic is available for download

We invite policymakers, institutions, and ecosystem stakeholders to use, share and build upon this framework as part of a collective effort to strengthen Europe’s position in the global blockchain landscape.

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For years, the EBA has advocated for a modernised, technically grounded approach to GDPR enforcement that reflects the operational realities of public blockchains like Ethereum. With the publication of Guidelines 02/2025, the EDPB takes a crucial step forward—acknowledging the unique legal-technical challenges posed by decentralised infrastructures.

🔍 Key Takeaways from the EDPB Draft

• Decentralisation is not deregulation. The EDPB confirms that GDPR applies fully to permissionless blockchains, with nuanced role assignments for node operators, validators, and smart contract developers.
• The concept of ‘controller’ must evolve. Traditional interpretations of data controllership struggle to fit the modular architectures of modern blockchain systems. The guidelines call for deeper analysis of actors across execution, consensus, and data availability layers.
• Erasure in immutable systems is possible—by design. The EDPB highlights metadata erasure and off-chain storage as viable solutions to honour the right to be forgotten, even when on-chain data remains permanent.
• Privacy-by-default must be built in. From zero-knowledge proofs to enshrined proposer-builder separation (ePBS), the guidance underscores the importance of privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs) in meeting GDPR obligations.

📄 EBA’s Full Technical-Legal Response

In response to the consultation, the EBA submitted a detailed analysis grounded in real-world blockchain architectures, particularly Ethereum. Our reply includes:

• A taxonomy of actors and responsibilities under modular network designs.
• Legal and technical interpretations of execution-layer, consensus-layer, and data availability-layer roles.
• A harmonised GDPR compliance framework tailored for decentralised systems.
• Policy recommendations for avoiding controller ambiguity and ensuring practical implementation of privacy rights.

Through protocol innovations such as zk-SNARKs, PeerDAS, and fully homomorphic encryption, we demonstrate that decentralisation and data protection are not mutually exclusive—but must co-evolve through coordinated effort.

🤝 Call for Ongoing Collaboration

As Europe prepares to implement the AI Act and expand its Digital Decade agenda, this dialogue between regulators and decentralised system developers is more vital than ever. Legal certainty must not come at the cost of technological progress—or vice versa.

The EBA remains committed to supporting regulatory bodies, privacy advocates, and blockchain communities in crafting a compliance-first, innovation-forward future for Europe.

➡️ [Read the Full EBA Response Here (PDF)]
➡️ Access the EDPB’s Draft Guidelines 02/2025

Tags: #Blockchain #GDPR #EDPB #Web3 #PrivacyTech #DigitalSovereignty #Ethereum #CryptoPolicy #DataProtection #Decentralisation #EBA

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Helping to create a transparent cryptocurrency market 

With a team of 43 specialists operating from four different locations (Kyiv, London, Gothenburg, and HongKong) the company offers services that help safeguard interactions in the crypto market, protect businesses and users from scammers, stolen coins and damage to their reputation, and conducts blockchain investigations in cases of discovered theft. The experts check crypto addresses and transactions for signs of dangerous affiliations and suspicious sources in accordance with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). For businesses the company offers additional services like API integration, consulting, and automated KYC. 

A tool for everyone to protect assets and reputations 

“The promise of cryptocurrencies is a more trusted and transparent financial ecosystem. We want to help fulfil this promise and make the cryptocurrency market a safe space for everyone, thus creating an input in the digital assets’ mass adoption”, says Niko Demchuck, Legal & AML Specialist at AMLBot. “We are thrilled to be working with the EBA community on making web3 a secure and trustworthy infrastructure and contribute our knowledge to the EBA’s working groups.” 

“Trust is the foundation for the prosperity of any web3 business. Unfortunately, the importance of services that strengthen trust and transparency in the crypto space is growing. After our recent announcement of the Verified Staking Provider Program, I am ecstatic that AMLBot has joined our community, bringing additional expertise in securing community trust and transparency. We are eagerly anticipating the collaboration!”, says EBA chairman Dr. Michael Gebert. 

👉 If you want to learn more about next steps for AMLBot and the top3 tipps for a safe crypto experience, read our interview with Legal & AML Specialist Niko Demchuck.

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The Position Paper’s goal is to achieve a level of regulation that incentivises blockchain infrastructure providers to choose the EU over competing jurisdictions, as in particular China, Russia, or the USA. This will allow the EU to shape the development of globally relevant blockchain networks according to its federal values. As all EBA Working Groups, the EUPoS Working Group is open for all aspiring participants, willing to comply with the general EBA Governance and respective working group requirements.

Empowering The European Blockchain Ecosystem
The European Blockchain Association aims to become a partner of choice for organisations, corporations, institutions, and policymakers working in the field of blockchain and DLT in the European Union. We combine, synchronize, and leverage blockchain-related activities of European corporations, startups, venture capitalists, and scientific institutes. We serve as a superior, neutral body to aggregate and coordinate blockchain activities throughout Europe and to provide Non-European parties access into the European blockchain ecosystem. By building bridges, s.a. by creating the EUPos Position Paper, the EBA lowers hurdles and reduces obstacles that stand in the way of innovation in the field of decentralisation.

The New EBA Website
Besides the publication of the EUPoS Position Paper, EBA has launched its new website. Great EBA features, s.a. EBA Engagements, EBAx, or EBA Tenders, have achieved higher visibility and better access for interested visitors. The EBA team really enjoys the fresh look& feel, and we would love to hear your feedback on our new website!

Join us!
The EBA isn’t a centralised body – it is a decentralised organisation that depends on the engagement and activities of its members. If you work in the field of blockchain and you are based in an EU member state, don’t hesitate to contact us and explore the possibilities of your active participation! We are awaiting you!

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If you missed the meetup and want a better understanding behind how the European Blockchain Association governance works take a look at the video above. In the video you’ll get a high level overview of the motivations behind governance as it stands as well as diving into the wider implications of decentralized governance of sociotechnical systems.

If you want to dig a little deeper into the EBA governance you should take a look at the our governance summary. If you’re interested in a deep dive into the actual documentation download the EBA governance and read it for yourself.

EBA members are entitled to actually contribute to the governance procedures by making pull requests to the EBA github and actually modifying the code. The goal of decentralized governance is solve problems that the architects of the governance and its technical implementation didn’t anticipate. In that spirit, member contributions to the code are most welcome!

A huge thanks goes out to the meetup organizers, participants and speakers!

The post Meetup Recap: Governance in the Digital Age & the Role of Blockchain appeared first on European Blockchain Association.

The European Blockchain Association governance framework has been getting a fair amount of attention in legal and industry circles lately. We’ve been working hard on operationalizing the governance in practice and outlining the practical steps everyday people need to take officially become EBA members and even contribute to our governance.

After the signing of the american constitution, it is said that someone asked Benjamin Franklin what type of government they would have. He responded, “A republic if you can keep it”. What he meant is that governance is not a static thing written in stone, but rather a living set of procedures, checks, and balances, intended to allow a group of people to address unforeseen circumstances going forward into an indefinite future.

The governance of the EBA is not unlike traditional governance frameworks in this regard. The governance that the EBA founding members have drafted is intended to change over time. The unanswered question however up until now was, “How will it change?”

Today we can answer that question. We’ve converted the original plain text of the EBA governance document and membership forms into code which itself outputs a beautifully typeset final document in .pdf format. We’re using LaTeX, the de facto standard for the communication and publication of scientific documents. By writing our governance as LaTeX code we are able to ensure a single always up-to-date version is available to everyone. Feel free to check out the code here.

Furthermore, we’re handling the governance as we would handle any open source codebase. We’ve put it under git version control which will allow vast numbers of people to contribute in a highly organized and transparent manner. In the coming weeks, we’ll be publishing guidelines outlining the user journey for EBA members. We’re also working on a detailed description of the technical steps EBA Members need to take in order to get access to our github organization and submission guidelines for EBA Governance Improvement Proposals via pull request.

Additionally, we’ll be publishing procedural guidance on how to form working groups and extra working group entities. Further procedural guidance will include how to set up teams within the github organization in order to collaborate on the code and non-code outputs of those groups. Keep an eye on our wiki as we plan to repurpose it for organizing all of the operational guidance built on top of the EBA governance.

The post Code is Not Law But it Can Be Governance appeared first on European Blockchain Association.

Our governance model specifically addresses the needs of our organisation which is designed as a decentralized semi-autonomous system DSAO: starting as an association (legal entity) based out of Germany, EBA is set to incentivize all members in a way that no central incentive will be needed to run and bring the organisation forward. A token-based incentive scheme is used to reward members for adding value to the organisation.

Beside being organised by its governance model, the members of the organisation must have the ability to change its own governance model – i.e. the ability of self-regulation.

Finally, the EBA governance model has been designed in accordance with other existing and widely accepted regulatory frameworks, such as Eclipse and Apache, in order to facilitate the acceptance with potential members.

These three key principles, the ability of self-regulation, being based on accepted regulatory frameworks, and the integrated incentive scheme, should constitute a sound basis for a successfull start of our decentralized semi-autonomous organisation.

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