CC BY
6
УДК 37.01:007
Dziatkovskii A.,
PhD in education (Information Technologies), PLATINUM software development company
Palo Alto, USA
ZERO-KNOWLEDGE PROOFS IN TEXTBOOKS FOR ESD Abstract
This article poses the problem of updating textbooks for Sustainable Development Goal 4. and shows that education for sustainable development cannot be limited to one paragraph, topic, or textbooks in one subject. Education for Sustainable Development is a global vector for updating the content of the entire educational process in the world, which requires working with big data. Using the example of textbook updating, the feasibility of using digital technologies of the distributed register is substantiated. Interactive and non-interactive blockchain protocols are compared. The author describes the possibilities of zero-knowledge proof technology for different areas of education as a new approach to education for sustainable development.
Keywords
Education for Sustainable Development, textbook, blockchain, zero-knowledge proof.
Introduction. Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is a direction of renewal of the whole world educational space. Its goal is to implement Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4), improving the quality and accessibility of education throughout human life [7]. The state of education in the modern world is a serious brake on social and economic transformations on the way to sustainable development. The Jubilee Report of the Club of Rome "Come On!" testifies to the critical lag between education and the progress of science [1]. This concern is shared by UN Secretary-General António Guterres, because renewal of education is a prerequisite for achieving all 17 SDGs. The UNESCO Global Education Monitoring Report (2016) called on governments to urgently review the content of their textbooks. UNESCO emphasizes that ESD is not a separate subject, not education about sustainable development [9]. It is a revision of the content of all education to orient it towards a culture of sustainable development, not just information about sustainable development. According to the UNESCO Global Report "Textbooks Paving the Way for Sustainable Development" (2017), Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) needs to be integrated into all curricula and all school activities in a whole-institution approach [8]. Existing textbooks today do not meet this challenge. The purpose of the article - to justify the possibility of using digital technology for education for sustainable development.
Methods: complex approach, analysis, synthesis, generalization, modeling, theory of digital technologies of distributed registers. Results.
The need for updating textbooks to implement SDG4 is obvious [6]. But this way gives rise to many problems. Let us try to list them.
First, in the 21st century there remain countries where textbook authors, as well as a large part of the population, know little about sustainable development. Second, textbook authors who incorporate sustainable development ideas into educational content often have a vague understanding of the content of textbooks in other subjects. Third, if all authors decide to revise textbook content for sustainable development, there is a big challenge to synchronize their efforts horizontally and vertically. However, coordinating textbook content across subjects, even for one year of schooling, is a big data problem that cannot be handled manually. There is the problem of verifying the data that are included in the content of textbooks. The list of difficulties arising could be continued [2].
The listed problems (this list is not complete) show that it is difficult to solve them without digital technology. As we can see, we are talking about "big data". [10].
What can help? We usually think of blockchain technology. It is a technology for creating and storing records that uses a distributed database. Being transparent, blockchain can make changes made to one textbook visible to the authors of all other textbooks. This makes it possible to coordinate content based on meta-language and create interdisciplinary content. Blockchain is also indispensable in the design phase of an end-to-end, holistic, institution-wide system for testing and assessing knowledge (criteria, indicators, and measures of ESD outcomes). The connection between blockchain and artificial intelligence makes it possible to ensure the "horizontal" and "vertical" integrity of ESD, to implement an institution-wide approach to ESD (even if the structures of the educational organization are located in different countries) [3].
Zero-knowledge proof technology (ZKP or zero-knowledge proof) opens up new possibilities. It is a cryptographic technology that allows the verification of the truth of information (or parts of it) without disclosing the information itself. It is commonly used in finance and commerce because it increases the confidentiality and security of transactions [4]. However, this technology can be useful for updating textbook content. This technology is used when it is necessary to verify the correctness of the information without providing access to it. Textbook authors, driven by the desire to improve their textbook, are known to use different sources. For many authors, the field of ESD is relatively new; there are many sources of information and not all of them are valid. The information is often politicized and often not verified. The situation is complicated by the authors' failure to cite the sources they use in their texts. Therefore, viewing the original information can be difficult and cannot always be used for evidence.
Distributed registry technology (DRT) provides cryptographic connection of data (textbook materials), which are stored indefinitely until the next change; agreement of these data; mechanisms for structuring the data stored in the distributed registry (smart contracts) [5]. To do this, the data must be open and available for validation by all validators of the system. But there comes a time when the author endows the system being created (textbook, teaching complex, methodology, etc.) with confidentiality properties. If the issue of copyright arises, then information systems that store and process data are subject to the requirement of information confidentiality. Openness of distributed registries and confidentiality requirements begin to contradict each other. This complicates the application of distributed registry technologies with interactive protocols (transparent data).
Can privacy be ensured without compromising decentralized data processing? Yes, such digital opportunities exist. One of them is zero-disclosure protocols [11].
The peculiarity of zero-disclosure protocols is that they build on verifiable information without its disclosure, reduce the amount of metadata in distributed registries, and accelerate the verification process.
In non-interactive protocols, interaction between the participants is reduced to a single round, namely, the forwarding of ZK-proofs from the proving to the verifying one. And it is enough. The problem of scaling blockchain networks is also solved: several operations are combined into a single, larger one.
The combination of interactive and non-interactive distributed registry protocols will solve the problems of validity of the information provided in the textbook,
linking them across subjects, coordinating curriculum changes while preserving authorship; assessment of personal results of students while preserving their confidentiality for each studentimplementation of a whole-institution approach to ESD;
reducing the risks of including an educational organization in educational ecosystems of different levels;
increasing the level of trust in educational ecosystems, etc.
Conclusion
Why are textbooks the focus of ESD? Children spend a lot of time with textbooks, even in countries
where the Internet is available. School textbooks are respected by teachers and students. They inspire trust. The inclusion of sustainable development ideas in textbooks is especially important in countries where they are still little known to children, parents and even teachers. Textbooks are used to prepare for exams. That is, textbooks are required reading for students. The formal inclusion of sustainable development ideas (sustainability education) in textbooks (e.g., in the text of the introduction) devalues the idea and undermines the social, humanistic, and moral goals of SDG4.
Blockchain and ZK-technology make it possible to solve the problems of quality, accessibility (openness) of education while ensuring the veracity of information and preserving its confidentiality. Mathematical solutions for such provision have already been developed. Today, the possible areas of its application are being considered. Technology makes it possible not to use passwords and other confidential data without fear that transmitted information will become known to a third party. This feature is also necessary where it is necessary to confirm the identity while keeping it anonymous (e.g. voting or opinion gathering). Zero-disclosure evidence can be used to communicate necessary information to higher-level regulatory and supervisory authorities in a confidential manner, etc. These include zero-disclosure of medical diagnoses, law enforcement data; "invisibility" of a child's evaluation results to other children; digital identity - verifying the identity of people coming to school without revealing any personal information. This technology can also be used to verify ownership without publicly disclosing any other information.
Список использованной литературы:
1. Come on! https://malakhov.link/come-on-report.
2. Culture in, for and as Sustainable Development. Conclusions from the COST Action IS1007. Investigating Cultural Sustainability / edited by J. Dessein, K. Soini, G. Fairclough, L. Horlings. www.culturalsustainability.eu/conclusions.pdf
3. Dziatkovskii A (2021) Education through the lens of blockchain and vice versa. Journal of Modern Education Review 6:886-889. DOI:10.15341/jmer(2155-7993)/08.11.2021/009
4. Goldwasser S., Micali S., Rackoff C. (1989) The knowledge complexity of interactive proof systems // SIAM J. Comput. 18: 186—208.
5. Kruglov S.A. (2019) Zero-disclosure proof protocol in blockchain technology // E'konomika glazami molody'x. NacionaTny'j issledovatel'skij Tomskij gosudarstvenny'j universitet institut e'konomiki i menedzhmenta. Tomsk Izdatel'skij Dom Tomskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. 2019. S.16-21 [In Rus.]
6. Michel J, Holland LeM, Brunnquell C. et al (2020). The Ideal Outcome of Education for Sustainability: Transformative Sustainability Learning. New Directions for Teaching and Learning 161: 177-188.
7. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (2014). UNESCO. Paris https://www.eda.admin.ch/agenda2030/en/home/agenda-2030/die17-ziele-fuer-eine-nachhaltige-entwicklung.htm.
8. UNESCO MGIEP (2017). Textbooks for Sustainable Development: A Guide to Embedding. New Delhi. https://www.unesco.at/fileadmin/Redaktion/Publikationen/Publikations-Dokumente/2017_UNESCO_MGIEP_TBforSD.pdf.
9. UNESCO (2016) Global education monitoring report 'Textbooks paving the way to sustainable development. https://gcedclearinghouse.org/sites/default/files/resources /246777e.pdf.
10.UNESCO (2019) Steering AI and advanced ICTs for Knowledge Societies. https://dig.watch/resource/steering-ai-and-advanced-icts-knowledge-societies-rights-openness-access-and-multi.
11.Zero-Knowledge Proofs (2018) // Github. URL: https://github.com/ing-bank/zkproofs.
© Dziatkovskii A.D., 2023
