Alvin Kan is a distinguished figure in the Web3 space. He brings a wealth of development and managerial experience to Bitget Wallet in his current role as the COO. Before joining the Bitget Wallet team, Alvin had worked for over 15 years on different projects, including leading ecosystem growth at BNB Chain and heading up Sei Labs in Asia.
Alvin spent eight years with LinkedIn before taking the position of Head of Insights, APAC Talent, and Learning Solutions in his final two years. His high-level management expertise today comes from leading top tech and blockchain companies, where he gained valuable knowledge and skills.
[00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to the Crypto Hipster podcast. This is your host, Jamil Hasan, the Crypto Hipster, where I interview founders, entrepreneurs, executives, thought leaders, artists you name it across the world of crypto and blockchain.
[00:00:14] And today coming to me from the other side of the world from Singapore. Is the Chief Operating Officer of Bitget Wallet, his name is Alvin Kan, Alvin welcome to the show? Hey everyone, thanks for inviting me. Great to be here. Thank you for joining me.
[00:00:34] So let's get things off and I ask you the first question I pretty much, let's do I standard question is this? Is what is your background and is it a logical background for what you're doing now? Great question. I'm, wow, I don't even know if it's logical.
[00:00:50] It's been a long time and many into twice there. I started off my career in the government sector. I was in Singapore Tourism Board trying to get events and business tourists in the Singapore, did that for a couple of years.
[00:01:03] And then somehow stumbled into tech. So I was at LinkedIn for nine years pretty long. So I did a couple of roles there and sales and I did a pivot of my career into data analytics.
[00:01:15] So there was kind of a sweet spot back then when data analytics was becoming the hot topic and I joined LinkedIn back in 2012. So that was a time when not too many people knew about it.
[00:01:27] And you know, so after nine years, I was kind of looking for something more exciting, something that's on an emerging front. The reason why I joined Web3 was very much because it reminded me of why I joined LinkedIn in the first place.
[00:01:43] It's kind of like a hidden gem, something that's, you know, a movement was underway but many people didn't know about it yet. And there was a time when I really paid notice around 2019, 2020 to crypto and then I joined finance back then.
[00:01:56] So it's true data analytics and then was in charge of the ecosystem development at BAB chain.
[00:02:01] So ever since then I've been doing a range of like BD and growth growths, you know, so it's a BAB chain after that in an L1, let's say and now it big at wallet. How many of that's logical. Oh, it's a lot more logical than you think.
[00:02:17] It sounds good. So that get wallet right there a lot of while on the world right. So if I know what you're all about and what different you secure wallet from other wallet providers.
[00:02:31] Sure, so we get wallet in essence is a self-institute wallet right if you use to madame on us and the rest is it's the same kind of wallet but with a lot more functions are good into it later.
[00:02:42] We have 20 million users globally and where we really differentiate from the rest is in the comprehensiveness of what you can do.
[00:02:50] Right, if you if you look at say madame as trust wallet, I mean there are many many other wallets out there but essentially you know you can do things like simple swaps.
[00:03:01] You can probably connect to some of the EVMs but if you're looking to access the new opportunities right and there's so many opportunities and we're through this emerging. This is where we really shine.
[00:03:11] You know we are probably the one of the very very few wallets where you're able to swap across Ethereum, Solana, Bitcoin, non EVMs and so on and you're trying to get I think most users are used to having like all right I've met a mask for this I have maybe I don't know okay, I scroll up for that and so on I've found them for Solana and we actually realize after getting feedback from users that they want one place to access all these kind of opportunities.
[00:03:34] So today if you're looking at say whether it's qualified points whether you're looking at coins that you know just emotion the last few hours we're usually one of the first few wallets where you can just swap very very easily within our in that swap.
[00:03:47] That's just one of the ways we look at it. The reason why we can help users to access all these new opportunities is really because of the DNA of the team itself. So a lot of us are very much de-gence in the space.
[00:04:02] If you look at the innovation we were established in six years ago we were the first wallet to have you know, same something as simple as candlestick charts in the wallet itself when you're looking at coins right today I think on most wallets you still don't get there and this chart allow you to decide like when to buy in for example.
[00:04:19] We are the only wallet right now with smart money. So if you're looking at a token we can tell you you know what the wheels and the shops actually buying what are they buying how many of them are buying and how many they're selling and so on.
[00:04:30] We have some features like instant gas right if you have you know Ethereum on Ethereum chain but you're trying to buy something on base or polygon but you don't have gas fees there.
[00:04:38] We allow you to actually just do a simple question and so on without meeting gas fees on the other chain. So a lot of this happened because we are very much de-gence ourselves while always pursuing these new opportunities right and we get this feedback from users along.
[00:04:52] So today I'm pretty confident to say that you know big at wallet is the best wallet for trading as well as learning tokens especially for new emerging areas that you're interested in.
[00:05:04] So you tell me you just want to swap from Ethereum, just to line it to some kind of meme coin without paying any gas fees.
[00:05:11] Well you have to pay gas fees but you don't need the gas fees from you know the new chain right for example for polygon you're just an if you are a minifigure right and you say you're not buying this token on polygon that's fine you don't need to have magic on polygon.
[00:05:24] We do this for a few chains not all the chains right but we're slowly expand and that's just one simple feature of how we make it easier for users to trade. Sounds good. It is. Yeah it's those um well okay so um.
[00:05:41] I have a lot of questions you could pick any random coin I can tell you any random coin and tell you and you could tell me if it's faster but real people. If it's what? Bots or if it's real people.
[00:05:55] You mean that the token itself so we have token screening right and you know I'm sure we talk about security later what we've done is we're integrated you know vendors like service providers like go class and so on and they screen all these tokens and you know.
[00:06:11] So got fishing sites as well and we actually integrate that within our wallet so today if you're selecting a token in our swap right and we show.
[00:06:19] So what kind of risk and how many risk factors there are with each coin right you can see that before you decide to buy.
[00:06:26] Same thing with a depth as well so true our fishing site screeners we make sure that we are only integrating wallets in our depth connection section that are safe right so again this are very small things but they the matter a lot because like I myself you know many years ago was also kind of scan small amount but on you know some kind of token.
[00:06:46] In the past you wouldn't know right where they are it's a honey portal whatsoever you need to really dive deep into it and what we're trying to do is look it's going to be more and more users coming to our free right and they're not familiar with what's a honey port for example.
[00:06:59] We've got to make it really, really simple and just you know surface that alert with every day by and a lot of times that's in the wallet itself.
[00:07:08] I gotta ask for my new you from my new listeners because I do have new listeners all the time what's the honey pot.
[00:07:15] So essentially you get all kinds of scams so for example this one is really where you know you can buy it but the contract is in the law you to sell. Right and there's this a lot more respect to the cyber core.
[00:07:28] Go-plows probably has like 60 to 100 screen factors that they look at probably this more that has come up since. Yeah I've got so I've got to ask him to let's talk about security. You know, a sur-tech release there 20 23 web three industry security report.
[00:07:51] I'll get the numbers here and identify seven hundred and fifty one securities incidents resulting in 1.4 1.84 billion dollars in losses. And this was actually an improvement from 2022. How can we reduce this number you know it's even further in 2024 and I mean this massive number will play for billions so.
[00:08:18] How can we actually bring that down and what's improved. Okay, I would say well the reports and the numbers are correct but this is all context there so I'll say it's true and false in a way. There's greatest security awareness right now.
[00:08:34] We talked about you know honeyplows and respecters just now and I see we call that there was this project called I think was squid game and if you recall the Netflix show where it became really really popular because of that people started buying to this squid game token.
[00:08:48] And itself the token doesn't allow you to sell it by the time this kind of scams are still quite new right but today all the others and all the token screenings would already have such screening factors in their mechanisms.
[00:09:01] And it's a continued improvement a lot of this previous scams are already included in assessments today right so you you get less chances of being scammed that way.
[00:09:12] You know all these are becoming more comprehensive this is also more audit providers during the boom market last year last year.
[00:09:19] So it could take as long as if you know three months for months like the audit providers will all back up right there was so much back lock for them to clear but today is a lot better because like there's a lot more security providers are there.
[00:09:33] And also like the breath of it we mentioned about token screening that the fish and site screening as well and there is also you know company and like I think that's one called dople for example.
[00:09:42] And what they do is they they're looking to if you know if you subscribe to the service looking to all your this got channels this the screen through or Twitter and they try to understand and try to screen for fix sites right or thicker counts they're trying to be you right.
[00:09:56] So there's a lot more broad services broadens services out there that is trying to prevent all these things from happening and I think that is why. And it's leading to a decline or in that way the kind of a year but the flip side is that last year.
[00:10:10] May have been an improvement because last year was a bad market right if you compare to the year before so less activity less liquidity obviously that's going to be you know less scams and less scammed amounts this year however has been a boom market right since last year November.
[00:10:27] So I'll be interested to see if that number really continue to drop. Hopefully they'd but you know with the amounts coming up I'm sure there's a lot of scammers out there is not uncommon to see like projects telling talking about like ad rock findings and they have to put like the last tweet to say this is the last tweet you didn't have to do this a few years ago but today if you don't do that all the scammers are going to follow up with the next tweet.
[00:10:51] And you know kind of scanning people and many people have fallen you know tricked to this as well so I think the projects themselves the users we all need to play a part in preventing this.
[00:11:06] It was a boom market and it might still be a boom market but the prices in the past few weeks haven't shown a boom market. I get everything's been tough. The last few days has been terrible yeah.
[00:11:17] Is that just a summer thing leading up to six months after the Bitcoin having and will she should expect everything come back and out over? I'm thinking that. I hope so.
[00:11:27] I mean, I think I saw a tweet by one influencer who analyzed the last two cycles I think he mentioned that the peak of the old cycle came I think 54060s after the Bitcoin popping.
[00:11:38] So if he's right, you know there's still some leaks to go through October next year.
[00:11:42] But look it's going to be volatile if you ask me is the blue cycle over I don't think so that's not personal opinion right and I think there are many leaks to a blue cycle right there's there was another.
[00:11:53] You know good analytics do we want on Twitter and she mentioned that that three leaks to a blue cycle and you know this could be the second of it but it's going to come up again. Okay, so we're still in a bull cycle.
[00:12:06] Scammers are still out there and you have created a very robust security agenda right in addition to the fishing tracker and the token tracker what features have you implemented that will help improve the overall risk tolerance.
[00:12:25] Yeah, I'll say they talk and screening and fish and size screening they do help prevent a huge number of scans.
[00:12:33] There is also I think one part that we want to don't talk enough about a river gut security and that's making the UI simple and easy and what do I mean by that so you know.
[00:12:44] And so, trust well it started out as a mobile app right and for a very long time the only start to a mobile app and not a from extension although they recently did it and one of the reasons why they were they were so insistent on it was because of security.
[00:12:57] Using your phone instead of your browser extension to me has a lot more natural protection and that is also why we put a lot of emphasis and technical engineering resources into making sure that you know you can swap you can do anything that you want on the mobile app.
[00:13:14] And this cannot be saved the same for most projects or even wallet from that three right I think ask most of actually people when they say yeah I still use a desktop because the experience is so much better than on a mobile.
[00:13:25] But the reason why mobile is more secure is because every transaction that you do you need to have a face I.
[00:13:31] Right and the face ID is a much better way than kind of signing transactions or just king a password on your on your Chrome extension so enabling all these features to be easily used right on mobile to me is a huge huge security advantage.
[00:13:46] The other one is also making sure that there's a great aggregator what do I mean by that so today on our swap itself right if you go to the wallet go to the swap section.
[00:13:55] You can do question swap across like you know 30 overchains and when you swap you get options from 100 over aggregators and and taxes that we aggregate.
[00:14:04] So for example you want swap a token right all right which act is this unit swap we connect the unit swap we connect the one inch we connect the zero acts we connect to all these aggregators to make sure that you're getting the best of the best rates.
[00:14:18] And why that matters is better than the user going to kind of authorize and sign into different taxes right say you sign the 10 different taxes to swap 10 different tokens or or the check the course.
[00:14:30] And then you're exposing yourself to 10 times the kind of risk right especially for newer tokens where you may have to go to smaller taxes that you're not familiar with.
[00:14:37] But on an aggregator what you're doing is you're just signing into your wallet and you're able to access these tokens in the same safe familiar environment rather than going to a new side in signing you know.
[00:14:47] The different contracts so that's why I say having these features and comprehensive features within the wallet is a really great way to protect the user and that's why we're so focused on that.
[00:15:02] You know we talk about decks aggregators and I can think about like I don't have this on telegram anymore. But I had it where like I could see like all the new all the new mean coins.
[00:15:15] Like the thousands of them that created every single day show up on an aggregator you know when you're looking at it the numbers like all you make 10 billion percent you know that kind of looks kind of look fine a good.
[00:15:28] You know from a number perspective but like there's risk there you know and what should people be worry of and you know when I see that it's maybe they could think they could make 10 billion percent.
[00:15:40] Yes, so it is risky and and that two things here right so one is for me for me service provider perspective right from wallet or decks.
[00:15:51] Do you try to play um you know government and say that you should buy this and you shouldn't buy this and and to what extent right and I'll take us we believe in
[00:16:00] We've been in decentralization we believe if in getting control back to people and so the how you actually show the risk is important and this what we are focused on as well.
[00:16:10] So we have all these APIs bringing in like token screening factors and so on but being able to demonstrate that and show that very very clearly to the user. All right you're free to do what you want to do but we got to alert you to this risks.
[00:16:23] So that's one part right how do we balance that. The second one is then like you mentioned um you know can you really earn you know 100 eggs 1000 eggs from it.
[00:16:33] Look it's possible but there's also a lot of risk like I mentioned it could be a kind of thought it could be that there is a you know text reflections for example when you sell some of the coins have like a 10% tax.
[00:16:44] And that itself you know some people are you as a designer of the token some people are you as a scam.
[00:16:50] You know I think people who earn money say it's a design people who lose money say that it's a scam so so it depends I think just making sure that we're able to show the different types of risk and exactly what it is to the users that's important.
[00:17:03] And ultimately a lot of people also kind of like dump in huge amounts into small liquidity pools that's also a risk right and sometimes that's.
[00:17:13] That sort of risk you know the token created didn't mean for it but then users who are not used to it right you don't know because many of us are familiar with right all right I'll go to an aspect of ice and stocks and you know it's always in the market price.
[00:17:27] But in in Tolkens the liquidity pool could be small enough right for your slipage to be super high and that's something people need to understand as well.
[00:17:38] I'm trying to think about to successful things where they were created by the creator right and where somebody just put like 10 grand and look what do you call it took off.
[00:17:50] So I think that's all that I saw that on pork and Pepe right but not everything is going to be that successful right actually a much much more failures right so. What risk measures do you have in in place where you have people just creating stuff.
[00:18:07] Not validated not audited maybe like like one of those two or maybe like a slurf where the code is just wrong, you know to to safeguard people from losing all their money.
[00:18:19] So it would show right in in the token screening and so on our part we make sure that we're working with the rights of his providers we always questioning like you have the latest tokens how frequently do screen is tokens.
[00:18:30] How wide coverage do you have and one thing you know providers need to do better.
[00:18:35] Is to support new and non EVM chains a lot of these providers say all right we screen hundreds of a chains and then when you ask us all EVM chains right many of them don't support so Lara, many of them you're not support and on a corner is coming up right and there's money being as well.
[00:18:50] So I think we have to continually find service providers that provide screening for this different blockchains make sure the coverage is wide enough and then on outside in the wallet whenever you're buying we would actually show.
[00:19:03] So we even go down to showing all right there's two other risks there is three specific risks with this token right and you can click and to see exactly what kind of risk so it's important for us again to make sure that the user has the right information before deciding what you want to do with it.
[00:19:21] So what you're saying is a lot there's a lot more room for infrastructure builders to enter the space of the non EVM chains and improve. Yes, yes I think so everyone is saying the same thing right from an infrared.
[00:19:35] Yeah, yeah we can expand a lot if you can change but then for example if you move if you expand your services to Lara it's not as easy as all right let me just be searching it you need to hire a rusted developer right so you need to start thinking about a hex house in expanding a team.
[00:19:49] It's a totally different ballgame for them. Got it so I see potential on SC opportunity. So I want to talk about you mentioned you mentioned a wallet and you mentioned the trust wallet before and you mentioned you know different types of technology but keyless technology.
[00:20:11] You know because we're all told you know not your keys like crypto but you know keyless technologies not becoming a thing so why is that the future wallets. Yep, I think two reasons that there are many reasons but two big ones one is it's just easier.
[00:20:31] You know we are so used in back to right or signing with Gmail signing for your Facebook account Instagram account and so on.
[00:20:38] And then when I first came to back three for the life of me I couldn't understand like why do I have to remember these chocolates and you know all right you join it down and we're going to keep it right if you keep it on one place is not a safe right and then you split into three and you kind of forgot where you put you know some of the words.
[00:20:55] So it's very very cumbersome to be honest when people have the physically kind of store this place.
[00:21:00] I know of many people who just kind of type out the trust keywords and save it in their notes in their MacBook and so on and it's not always safe right but it happens.
[00:21:10] So I think it's just easier for users to onboard right create a wallet and start going when you have a keyless wallet is so much easier. And you know there are also kind of things in between.
[00:21:24] For example, today when you sign up for a non-keyless wallet I think you can opt to kind of back up your keys later so you can kind of start doing some stuff that's great but I think keyless is kind of a very big part of our future here.
[00:21:38] So easy onboarding is one the other one is just you know like I mentioned it's just more secure. A more secure way to store your keys, right especially if you're someone who can forget where you put your keys.
[00:21:51] And most of the cases where this kind of you know assets are lost is because the keys will lead right we've seen it so many times and the funny thing is it's not just individuals right we hear of this on projects.
[00:22:05] You know when I was being with you and I saw quite a few projects there right and hopefully I'll be changing by the projects themselves and many of these projects are very very seasoned developers and but treat people right this these are.
[00:22:16] Developers who have gone through like multiple cycles they've made several projects they're very experienced and but. And yet they still lose their private key and get hacked.
[00:22:26] So if if very experienced people you know that happens to them then you know it will happen to individuals right for sure in some kind of probability. So I think again having a MPC wallet kind of reduces that threshold guy so.
[00:22:46] You mentioned B and B and I want to get it I want to get it at a little bit later after this question. So we put we for all these guys together you know. And FTX people who went to jail because people who should be going to jail.
[00:23:00] You know I won the names and not see it's the amount of time I see is a. You know there was a we had a pre F we had a pre FTX world that where everybody was putting money and see if I you know.
[00:23:14] And we learned a lot of lessons right since then with those lessons that learned today you know what would have been addressed and that see if I boom. And then what difficulties are we still presented with now that we have to deal with.
[00:23:33] Yeah I've always felt that you know see if I is important but see if I is important as a gateway in two back three. It's always been about the decentralized world right it started with Bitcoin and blockchain with Ethereum.
[00:23:47] But you know see if I made it easier for people to kind of onboard on ramp and so on but the ultimate game was always towards the default.
[00:23:55] And I think what it reminded and why I think that's an important question of why decentralized is the future right is because there is this movement underway where people don't trust centralized entities or they feel that there's a way for.
[00:24:07] For you know communities or stuff to be organized in the more decentralized men.
[00:24:13] And so I do think with FTX that kind of scandal it serves as a reminder that hey the angle is to code decentralized right and so we see in wallets we see you know taxes becoming way more popular and trading volumes as a proportion to see if I volumes have been going up right ever since then.
[00:24:34] So you can say it's a distrust of C5 but to me it was just a natural evolution and just a reminder that hey let's go towards more taxes and more you know battery, software, so they're wallets in the future.
[00:24:46] I think it has changed the game for C5 as well. They feel that they need to do they need to work harder to earn the trust right after that.
[00:24:56] And what it means is you know for example proof of assets right it's become a thing now right every major C5 has you know this ledger or somewhere that shows all right I have all these assets on change proof that I have all these reserves so proof of reserves is a big thing now.
[00:25:11] I think security measures and folks will come up I think recently where there's okay I saw a few others I think we're starting to see you know some of this.
[00:25:19] I would say like security lapses and measures going up and down so we're going to see C5 having to become more responsible and kind of how would I put it. They have to work harder I think to under trust in a very short we are putting it.
[00:25:39] I think we're going to talk about B&B or be who or I dance. You know what does buy an answer and what does B&B chain need to do to regain trust you know in this environment since everything is going down the way it has.
[00:26:05] In a way I I feel that there is the non crypto crowd and the crypto crowd right and the non crypto crowd has probably always seen finance in a more negative light because of you know the way you know,
[00:26:22] I think that's the reason why I'm not going to be a person media always writes about finance and so on. To me honestly like I feel the finance is changed a lot over the years you know personally being meeting the CZ as well.
[00:26:33] And I don't know what happened in past but I do think that the non-wactory world will probably always see finance in a more negative light but the WAC tree folks right if you look at say how many people are holding B&B right now.
[00:26:47] I'm not sure if there's change that much. Yeah some some people probably lost the trust but again a lot of people are here for profits and if you that you know,
[00:27:01] I agree with you and one of the things that used to happen was these same called scam wicks. They don't you know have many more like scam wicks are like where a price of a token just flash you know.
[00:27:17] Yes goes to zero you know then that you're up for every it I don't see that anymore.
[00:27:24] Well yeah I don't know many of them are probably not reported as well but yeah I do remember they were one or two I think one happened will be coin as well. Yeah so I think the trust is improving actually. Yeah so.
[00:27:44] I want to thank you very much for speaking with me today taking the time out of your schedule and I enjoyed speaking with you and.
[00:27:53] I have one last question and that's how can people find out more information about you about that get how can they get a bit get wallet and what. Can they look for it to do it once they get their big hit will get wallet.
[00:28:08] Let me know what are your thoughts. Yeah well the best way to learn about we get wallet or battery easily is just to download you know go to your app store and draw store. And just search for big get wallet.
[00:28:21] I promise you that you know it will be the best mobile battery wallet experience that you have and the what you can do with it so we want to be the best wallet or token trading as well as earning so I will just touch a bit on both.
[00:28:36] Now in terms of earning. Big get wallet today we do about three to four campaigns every single week.
[00:28:44] And for each week we probably give out over a hundred thousand dollars USD worth of reward tokens so that itself means that there's a lot of opportunities for users who are coming in just to earn tokens by simply doing things like you know five minute task and so on and all this can be done easily within the wallet app itself.
[00:29:03] I don't think any other wallet actually comes close in terms of the. Number of campaigns and the amount of rewards that they can be. So try it out right and the second one is just trading of tokens again across big coins a lot of EVMs.
[00:29:17] I think this is the wallet where you'll probably get the most opportunities of accessing these new tokens and new new chains so try it on. Yeah. I'm going to try it out. Thank you. Yeah thank you very much for your time today. Same here.