Information Escrows Get a Power-up
How financial escrows help individuals validate reports of sexual assault
What is an information escrow?
Information escrows are a concept introduced in the title of a 2012 Michigan Law Review article by Ian Ayres, who is an economist and a professor at Yale Law School, and Cait Unkovic, who was a grad student at UC Berkeley. An information escrow is a system designed for two parties that allows them to entrust information with a trusted third party. This information is then released under conditions agreed to by both parties.
Some examples of information escrows
Shared interest escrows
- Facebook’s find my crush — A Facebook Dating feature known as “Secret Crush,” lets you express interest in up to nine friends. If that friend has opted into Facebook Dating and likes you back, they get a notification saying someone likes them. If they pick you as one of their secret crushes, you both get notified.
- Tinder — online dating application that allows users to anonymously swipe to like or dislike other profiles based on their photos, a small bio, and common interests. Once two users have “matched,” they can exchange messages.
Allegation escrows
- Project Callisto — allegation escrows, such as Callisto, connect people who have reported incidences of sexual harassment or assault when participants have been assaulted by the same individual. This enables them to file their complaints together. Allegation escrows provide a mechanism to overcome the “first mover disadvantage.” This refers to the challenges victims face when they are forced to file complaints against their assailants. The first accuser of a serial predator faces the greatest risk of retaliation or skepticism. Allegation escrows reduce the fear of potential retaliation from the accused harasser and the potential reputational risk. Allegation escrows enable multiple victims to come forward together to eliminate the “he said, she said” situation. The existence of similar reports of misconduct reinforces a victim’s confidence that the actions of the assailant was an unacceptable act of harassment.
Allegation escrows in academic literature
Information Escrows (2012) — Seminal paper on the subject of information escrows. Initial research into methods of reducing the first-mover disadvantage that can deter people with socially valuable private information from disclosing that information to others.
It Takes Two to #MeToo, Using Enclaves to Build Autonomous Trusted Systems (2018) — Technology providing enhanced security against insider attacks that manage extremely sensitive data. #MeToo use case where sexual harassment complaints are reported but only revealed when another complaint is filed against the same perpetrator. Removes the use of a trusted third party by transferring responsibility for the sensitive data from administrators to secure and verifiable hardware.
Callisto: A Cryptographic Approach to Detecting Serial Perpetrators of Sexual Misconduct (2018) — Description of technology for an online “matching escrow” that will detect repeat perpetrators and create pathways for supporting victims. Users submit encrypted data about their perpetrator. This data can only be decrypted by the Callisto Options Counselor (a lawyer), when another user enters the identity of the same perpetrator.
Finding Safety in Numbers with Secure Allegation Escrows (2018) — Research into Secure Allegation Escrows. Description of technology which allows a group of parties to act jointly as an escrow for collecting allegations from individuals. Allows for the matching of allegations, and de-anonymizing of allegations when designated thresholds are reached.
Reporting Sexual Misconduct in the #MeToo Era (2020) — When faced with the question of reporting harassment, individuals face a coordination problem and strategic uncertainty over whether others will also report misconduct. The coordination problem occurs because reports from multiple individuals are needed to corroborate a pattern of behavior and mitigate the chances of retaliation.
Issues unresolved by information escrows
Information escrows make it easier for initial victims of sexual assault to create a historical record which can be used to corroborate a future victim’s claim. This comes with advantages and disadvantages. Here are some issues which these architectures have yet to solve. Quotes are provided by experts who express these concerns in their own words:
- Imbalance of staleness — “the benefit that you’re providing to the victim, you’re not providing to the accused. The victim is able to (use allegation escrows) to store certain information and save it (for later). The accused doesn’t get the same benefit unless they are writing down every consensual sex act they’ve ever had. There is a concern about equity. That (allegation escrows) might lead to less weight on uncorroborated claims.” — Jessica Ladd
- Wrongdoing uncertainty — “I think there are some grey areas (with regards to sexual harassment). Because of cultural influences a victim cannot be sure if they’ve been assaulted or harassed. Predators thrive in (grey) areas. (Uncertainty) can create an avenue to open up an assault or an instance of harassment. If (predators) know that the person they’re attacking isn’t going to claim with certainty that something bad happened to them (this can create an avenue for assault). ” — Kelsey Gilmore-Innis
- Bad faith complaints — “What is happening if somebody is falsely reporting? Do (allegation escrows) create incentives to encourage these bad faith complaints?” — Jessica Ladd
- Increase of orphan complaints — “If you offer a way for people to file complaints that never actually get seen by the appropriate authorities, you could actually reduce reporting in general. If you end up with a lot of what we call orphan complaints, which are complaints that go into the escrow but are never matched, you could end up with a lower overall rate of reporting, which is not exactly what those systems were designed to do.” — Kelsey Gilmore-Innis
- Reporting can be traumatizing — “A website is not a person … and going through this process of filling out this form can be really traumatizing. Having someone with you, either when you’re filling out the form or going to the police can be really helpful.” — Jessica Ladd
How financial escrows create authoritative records documenting sexual assault
The most authoritative records that can stand in a court of law are insurance claims. Information escrows are good but they lack the authority of an insurance claim because an information escrow is not a formal financial contract. Allegation escrows, such as Callisto, can be important tools for making campuses safer places. But, there has not been sufficient research to conclude if financial escrows for mutual insurance contracts can be used to solve this problem. I describe my research here:
It’s not clear if records created by information escrows have legal standing exceeding the testimonies provided by the victims. What grants a record generated by an information escrow the legal authority to serve as an accurate record of historical events? A financial escrow based on a financial contract would generate not just a report but an insurance claim. An insurance claim is a legal document with legal precedence in case law. Provided some additional assumptions explained in this post, the findings of a TandaPay group may be used as evidence in judicial proceedings.
An insurance policy which provides coverage in the event of a sexual harassment incident would serve to generate these types of records. Since a TandaPay record is an insurance claim a false claim exposes the participants to insurance fraud. This dynamic makes a TandaPay record a more authoritative record. A TandaPay claim should rationally have more authority because more is invested into each claim by the community to validate it. This is why TandaPay records give communities substantially more power to speak authoritatively when compared to an information escrow.
TandaPay gives communities substantially more power to speak than an information escrow
The critical breakthrough of my research is to enable groups to hold money corporately without entrusting funds to a custodian or a third party intermediary. This cannot be accomplished without breakthrough technology using cryptocurrency smart contracts. I spend a great deal of time describing this breakthrough in these posts. Most of the game theory is explained here:
- The Law and Smart Contracts — Smart contracts create coordination not obligation
- Fraud Protections within TandaPay — How TandaPay safeguards policyholders from fraud
The crucial reason why these records can stand in a court of law is because the architecture incentivizes groups to collapse if a false claim is ever submitted for payment. Charters work to guide communities to reach consensus. The protocol works to coordinate people to decide if a claim matches the standard of a group’s charter. If a claim does not match that standard then the group should collapse. Given the ease at which the members can leave the group, any claims that are approved and paid are likely to be valid. A statistical model which proves this is the case does not currently exist, but it seems very likely that this is a property of these types of groups.
If a claim is approved that does not match the criteria for validity then the group should collapse.
All this research seeks to find ways to empower victims of sexual assault to create an authoritative record of what happened. Information escrows produced a seminal finding towards solving the first mover disadvantage problem. But, there still remains some challenges to reporting sexual assault that allegation escrows can’t solve.
Are financial escrows relevant to information escrows?
Both types of escrow systems attempt to make reporting easier for victims of sexual assault. The latter produces reports where at least two victims are willing to come forward with a claim of assault against the same harasser. The former provides a means by which a community can determine if a claim matches the criteria for validity established by a community’s charter.
Arguments against:
- Generation of two time stamped records: Accusation escrows exist to solve the “first-mover disadvantage” problem victims face when reporting a sexual assault. The escrow allows, “a victim (to) place the first allegation … with diminished fear that she will bear the sole brunt of the adversarial reaction, and with confidence that her escrowed allegation will be released only if accompanied by at least one other allegation against the same individual.” They do this by allowing a victim to generate a secure, time stamped record which is kept until another victim comes forward with a supporting accusation against the same assailant. Financial escrows do not perform this function.
- Generates reports established by the testimony of two victims: Accusation escrows seek to solve the “reporter’s dilemma” problem by providing the means to appease a victim’s fear of retaliation. They do this by matching the victim’s report to another report filed against the same harasser. This provides both victims with the assurance that an official report filed against their harasser is supported by the testimony of at least two victims. Financial escrows do not do this.
- Does not attempt to provide credible validation of claims: Allegation escrows do not attempt to validate the contents of a victim’s claims of sexual assault to determine the veracity of the claims within the report. Financial escrows do this.
- Does not preclude claims in the absence of evidence: Allegation escrows do not exclude victims from reporting a claim when they lack specific evidence. Financial escrows require victims to submit a report only when the report contains sufficient evidence to constitute a valid claim as determined by the standard of a community’s charter.
Arguments for:
- Generation of a time stamped record: Similarly to allegation escrows, financial escrows allow victims to generate a secure, time stamped historical record of their assault. This record obscures sensitive information from the public to protect victims from potential retaliation from their harasser.
- Generates reports established by the reputation of a community: Similarly to allegation escrows, financial escrows seek to solve the “reporter’s dilemma” problem by validating the contents of the victim’s claim against the standard of a community’s charter. This allows victims to overcome any “wrongdoing uncertainty” associated with reporting assault to authorities. Victims have the assurance that their claim has been evaluated by a reasonable standard. Approval and payment of a victim’s claim is proof that the community believes that the claim meets the criteria for validity set by a community’s charter.
- Making reporting easier for victims: Allegation escrows aim to make the reporting of sexual assault easier for victims. This is with the goal of increasing the rates at which incidents of assault are reported. Allegation escrows accomplish this by attempting to find another victim who can provide testimony that supports their own claim of assault. Financial escrows make reporting easier by providing proof that a claim has met the requirements of a community’s charter. This proof is generated when a claim receives payment by all the members within a community. This payment is an affirmation that the members believe the claim has met the criteria for validity required by the charter.
- Generating support for a victims claim: In the absence of testimony from a second victim, financial escrows are required to validate the contents of a victims claim before a community can assert that a claim meets the criteria for validity. Only valid claims can be submitted to the group for payment.
When either system works for victims the desired result is the same:
- Wrongdoing uncertainty decreases: Because a victim gains additional information, they are better able to determine whether or not the assailant’s behavior crossed the threshold of acceptable conduct.
- Providing victims safety in numbers: “Survivors worried about being disparaged for an uncorroborated allegation are assured safety in numbers.” — Ian Ayres
Conclusion
Believing that there is a potential relationship between information escrows and financial escrows is not a binary leap of faith. After reading this article, should you decide to update your beliefs to incorporate this new data, you will have broadened your perspective on this issue. By applying a fact-based mindset, we can come up with new models to help communities of women. We want groups to understand the potential risks of sexual assault and how to mitigate them. The foremost tool that societies have used for half a millennia to manage risk is insurance. Insurance also creates an authoritative historical record of events from the perspective of the insurer and the insured. It is not unreasonable therefore to conclude that, financial escrows can provide a relevant solution to the problem of reporting instances of sexual assault.
The foremost tool that societies have used for half a millennia to manage risk is insurance. This is why insurance can help communities who want to reduce the risks associated with reporting instances of sexual assault and harassment.
Our goal is to increase the rates of reporting in our communities, on our college campuses, and within our workplaces. If new innovations let us achieve this goal, we must consider their potential to solve this important problem.
“The truth is not a binary question … science is in the business of producing probability estimates for various claims.” — Shankar Vedantam
“We shouldn’t be looking for certainty instead we need to be (thinking), ‘when do we have enough evidence to make good decisions.’” — Killen O’Connor