# Ireland

> Ireland (Central Bank of Ireland · Data Protection Commission): A central bank piloting zero-knowledge KYC. Region: Europe. Builds with privacy tech: The regime itself mandates, pilots or funds privacy-preserving technology.

Part of the Soda Labs Privacy Hub regulation map, which reads the instruments
themselves rather than summarising the summaries: https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation

## Key facts

- Entry type: Jurisdiction
- Region: Europe
- Subject: A central bank piloting zero-knowledge KYC
- Authority: Central Bank of Ireland · Data Protection Commission
- Stance on on-chain confidentiality: Builds with privacy tech. The regime itself mandates, pilots or funds privacy-preserving technology.
- Tags: zero-knowledge KYC, regulatory sandbox, EU baseline, no privacy coin rule
- Canonical page: https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-ireland

## What it actually says

Ireland adds nothing of its own to the EU rules on crypto confidentiality, and that is worth saying plainly rather than inventing local colour. What makes it worth a card is the opposite move. Its central bank ran its first innovation sandbox specifically on financial crime, and one of the seven projects put zero-knowledge proofs to work inside the compliance process itself: verifying a customer's name and address in real time against authoritative national datasets without revealing or transferring the underlying data. That is a supervisor hosting a live pilot of exactly the technique this section argues is compatible with regulation, inside the very programme aimed at money laundering. Very few of the accommodating signals elsewhere in this section are that concrete.

## The instruments that matter

- **Innovation Sandbox Programme on combatting financial crime**: launched by the central bank in December 2024 as a six-month programme, with a first cohort of seven ventures
- **A live zero-knowledge KYC pilot**: Sedicii and Permanent TSB built real-time name and address verification using zero-knowledge proofs, with a utility acting as the address data authority
- **What it demonstrated**: customer details were validated against authoritative national datasets without revealing or transferring the underlying personal data, removing the need for paper utility bills
- **No national divergence on confidentiality**: we found no Irish restriction on anonymity-enhancing assets and no national rule on self-hosted wallets; on those questions Ireland applies the EU baseline

## Sources

- [Innovation Sandbox Programme](https://www.centralbank.ie/regulation/innovation-hub/innovation-sandbox-programme)
- [Sandbox programme on combatting financial crime](https://www.centralbank.ie/regulation/innovation-hub/innovation-sandbox-programme/financial-crime)

## Related entries

- [Austria](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-austria): EU baseline, with an early transition close
- [Belgium](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-belgium): EU baseline, with no national layer on confidentiality
- [Czechia](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-czechia): EU baseline, supervised by the central bank
- [Denmark](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-denmark): EU baseline, with tax as the historic pressure point
- [Italy](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-italy): Customer-level reporting to a public registrar
- [Luxembourg](https://www.sodalabs.xyz/privacy-hub/regulation/jur-luxembourg): EU baseline, seen through a fund domicile