Binance, the largest crypto exchange, has made it known that it is ready to issue Binance Account Bound (BAB), the first-ever Soulbound Token (SBT) built on the BNB Smart Chain. BAB will be introduced as a pilot project at the start and will only be available on the Binance mobile app.
An opt-in feature will allow only those Binance users in compliance with Know-your-customer (KYC) to mint their BAB directly on their wallets as they use the platform.
BAB is majorly developed to act as an online identification for Binance. Third-party protocols can also leverage it to accredit BAB tokens for different activities such as avoiding bots, airdropping NFTs, and a DAO using it for quadratic voting, etc.
The official blog post of the BAB token said it pioneered Soulbound Token issued on the BNB Smart Chain, whose major focus is on tackling the identity issues in the decentralized society. It is a non-transferable and non-financialized token. The report notes that “transferability” may not be tactical for decentralization. It can affect the distribution of governance power.
Hence, BAB is not the same as traditional assets such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, representing momentary sums.
The blog post further explained; “As we begin to explore how credentials will function in Web3, whether it be in the form of a verifiable skillset or an earned title, further use cases for the BAB token will arise. This sense of accountability paves the way for a more efficient decentralized community and space.”
Binance expects more use cases for BAB will come up as the web3 landscape changes.
SBT was first introduced by Ethereum Founder Vitalik Buterin, E. Glen Weyl, and Puja Ohlhaver. Earlier this year, Buterin made known the downsides of transferability and commercial viability features of NFTs.
Soulbound is a new token standard that could form an important building block for the Decentralized Society or DeSoc. In the paper, Buterin expatiated several ways SBTs could be used, from university degrees to education credentials and web3 credit scores.