Many stories about privacy public chains have been heard, but projects that truly combine privacy and compliance are rare. DUSK Network is an interesting case.

This project started exploring back in 2018, with a clear positioning — not following the old path of "privacy first, regulation on the sidelines," but instead directly addressing a major industry challenge: how to protect user privacy while meeting the audit requirements of financial regulation. At first glance, it sounds paradoxical, but the team used zero-knowledge proofs and homomorphic encryption technologies to develop the Hedger privacy engine, which defaults to encrypting transaction data and allows selective disclosure when needed. In other words, your transaction information is locked but can be opened for regulatory review when necessary, satisfying both sides.

They also put effort into the consensus mechanism. SBA (Secure Byzantine Agreement) combined with blind voting proof ensures decentralization of nodes and effectively prevents miners from arbitrage, thus maintaining the network’s security and stability.

Regarding real-world applications, this is the key point. DUSK has obtained the EU’s MiCA compliance license, partnered with leading protocols like Chainlink and NPEX, and has already completed over €200 million in regulated security tokenization. What does this mean? Compliant assets from Europe can now flow efficiently on-chain. Previously, settlement cycles took days; now, they can be completed in seconds. By 2026, with the launch of DuskEVM mainnet, compatible with Ethereum’s toolchain, developer barriers will further lower, and compliant DEXs, privacy lending, and other applications will have the opportunity to be implemented.

The DUSK token itself is also quite practical — used for paying Gas fees, staking for consensus participation, on-chain voting, and can also increase holding yields through Hyperstaking. Currently, the total value locked (TVL) in staking within the ecosystem exceeds €20 million. It seems that this combination of "privacy + compliance + practical applications" could present many opportunities during the transition from traditional finance to Web3.