00:00These digital wallets or these wallets that you create, these physical devices, do you see them as being less of an issue for hackers than information stored online or in the cloud or if people don't do self-custody?
00:15Well, I think, you know, again, looking at how does a ledger wallet work compared to a custodian such as Coinbase?
00:22I mean, this is self-custody, meaning you own the digital data.
00:27Sorry, you own your private keys, therefore the keys to your crypto out there on the blockchain.
00:33And, you know, you don't you you you as the individual can share or can control what data you share.
00:39You know, you can walk into a Best Buy store here in America, buy a ledger, set it up, never share any personal data with anyone.
00:48And at ledger, we've developed some some technology to allow you to log in without ever giving up even even a username and a password.
00:56I will say we should note that your company has not been immune from hacks, hacks in the last few years where user data has been exposed.
01:04Customer information such as emails have been exposed.
01:07So in 2020, there was there was an incident similar where the Shopify data from our customers was targeted.
01:15And, you know, the reality at the end of the day is it exposes how precarious we all are in sharing personal data online and how much attention we need to share to exactly how and where.
01:26So what we try to do is to build solutions where you don't need to share that.
01:29You know, at the beginning of the Internet, we had this username and password.
01:31And then we kind of moved into this Web 2 phase, log in with Facebook, log in with Google, log in with iCloud.
01:37We've all experienced that.
01:38And, you know, we've long believed that the future is connect your wallet.
01:42And when you do, you can actually authenticate, you can prove you're human, you can prove your identity, you can prove you're above a certain age, all without sharing your personal information.
01:53And that's why this is superior.
01:54This isn't just Ledger who thinks this, you know, the biggest companies in the world, Google, Apple, Microsoft, they're all moving to passwordless using passkeys.
02:01You know, as a user, you may have bumped into, you know, the word passkeys online and this notion that, you know, big companies like Microsoft are going passwordless.
02:08Well, the most secure way to do that is with a Ledger.
02:13And this is what we build is the security hardware to give users the choice to log in how they want and share the information that they would like.
02:20Ian, I'd love for you to hold some of these up because these are pretty gorgeous pieces of hardware.
02:24You said designed by Tony Fidel.
02:26Yeah, this is Ledger Stacks that was designed by Tony Fidel, Tony being the person who invented the iPod, co-invented the iPhone, created the company Nest.
02:36And this is the world's first curved e-ink touchscreen.
02:39So we're a traditional, and this is our Ledger Flex, which has a more traditional e-ink display.
02:44That's silicon on glass.
02:46This is actually an organic substrate on plastic.
02:48So you get this amazing five millimeter curve around the side.
02:52So it's just a beautiful piece of industrial design.
02:53But what's inside is a secure element chip that protects your private key, and you can use it to, whether that's log in or protect your Bitcoin, protect any of your digital private property.
03:04Now, one question I have about this, this sounds very silly, but if it's up to me, I actually hate keeping things on me because I will lose it.
03:12No matter what you give me, I promise it'll be gone within a couple of months.
03:17I mean, how difficult is it for people to physically store their crypto assets?
03:22It's a huge question these days because as you get further down the food chain, remember, if you buy a Bitcoin ETF, you are looking at a lot of people before you actually see the Bitcoin being held.
03:33And then you wonder how that's stored, too.
03:34Yeah, of course.
03:35And the enterprise security is just as important as the user security.
03:39And, you know, you are carrying something every day.
03:41You're carrying your phone, and the security of your phone is pretty poor compared to...
03:44You can't tell, but it's broken.
03:45Compared to a Ledger device.
03:49But, you know, really, there are three problems, really, that Ledger solves.
03:55One is security.
03:56You know, if you have digital private property, then you need a device that's more secure than your phone or your computer to protect that digital private property.
04:04The second is ease of use.
04:06You know, I mean, we're kind of in the early days, which is a lot like the early days of the Internet.
04:09The Internet wasn't super easy to use in the mid-'90s.
04:12And the third, as you're alluding to, is recoverability.
04:15You know, if I do lose my device, how do I recover it?
04:18And Ledger has the best solution for all three of those problems.
04:20Ian, I know you handle customer experience, but you're an executive in the crypto industry, so I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you about overall security in general,
04:28given the spate of kidnappings that we've seen in recent months, including one of the co-founders of Ledger, who's no longer involved in the company.
04:34He was ultimately released in January.
04:37How are you looking at what's happening to crypto executives and their security?
04:41You know, really, I think it's a question much better for the French police in this case than for me.
04:47But certainly, you know, everyone needs to, you know, pay close attention to their own personal operational security, how they share their, you know, their private data online.
04:56And for that operational security, you know, Ledger is that's exactly the kind of solution that we build for.
05:02Ian, one question I had for you.
05:03I'm glad that you've been able to join us here on set because you actually moved out of America years ago.
05:07And I'm wondering, when you look at the state of the country now, do you think more people will go the way you did and maybe leave based on the state of the world?
05:16Or is it actually more attractive to come here today?
05:18That's a great question.
05:20It's so individual, you know, and I think America is, you know, continues to be a great place to be, a great place to build country.
05:26I mean, companies, you know, it's there's there's no question about that.
05:30And I think particularly in the crypto industry, we were Pascal, who's our CEO, and I were in Washington, D.C. last week.
05:36And we're in a completely different place in America than we were when I visited you guys a year ago.
05:40Put it that way.
05:41There's there's there's a real tailwind and, you know, rational conversations around cryptocurrency.
05:47Would it bring you back?
05:48You know, we the our biggest market is America.
05:54So, you know, we do spend a lot of time here, you know, but we're really a global company and crypto is a global industry.
06:01It's a you know, it's it's much more global.
06:04It's much more bipartisan.
06:05You know, where I feel like, you know, we're we are a network state company more than a state state company, if if that if that makes sense.
06:12So, I mean, we're we're a very global company, global citizens and, you know, U.S. is a great market for us.
06:17So we spend a lot of time here, particularly on the enterprise side, you know, for me, you know, it's a personal choice this moment.
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