GNU Taler is a Free Software privacy-friendly payment system from the GNU project. Taler does not use a blockchain: monetary policies are expected to be set by a central bank. Digital money can be issued either by retail banks or by the central bank. Paying with Taler is extremely efficient: customers authorize transactions with one click, and then the system takes only a few milliseconds to finalize the transactions. In this lecture, we will introduce the political goals, architecture and technology behind Taler, demonstrate the current state of the art and outline likely future developments.
