katelyn perna — kp. engineer. atlanta, ga.
i've spent twelve years designing, building, and implementing the systems that hold digital assets without losing them — most of it for the crypto industry as it was being built. i've stood up security at the first retail and institutional banks to offer crypto, at one of the fastest-growing startups in history, and at major crypto exchanges. i work where architecture meets the real world: how money actually moves, who can touch it, and what happens when something goes wrong.
right now i'm developing the human protocol — a theory for how people use financial systems safely. the cryptography is solved. the hard part is the human layer. security breaks where people touch it, so that's where i build: the defaults, the guardrails, and the interfaces that let ordinary people hold real value without needing to become engineers themselves.
design, build, implement. then make it safe enough for everyone else.
2twelve is my creative concept studio — fashion, wearable technology, human identity.
we build 2twelve os: an operating system for physical objects. an nfc chip lives in a garment; tap it with a phone and a living experience opens — a poem, a credential, a memory. no app, no friction. the studio is proof the platform works.
open 2twelve.studio ↗
the supper club is invite-only dinners across atlanta, new york, and san francisco — a room of women who'd rather build than network. you don't leave with business cards. you leave with something you made.
small rooms, real food, no panels. sometimes we just eat. sometimes everyone ships something live before dessert. “i'm not technical” is officially retired as an excuse.
— coming soon —
a love story embedded across fifty rfid tees. tap any shirt with your phone and a love note opens — poems written by me, inspired by life.
that line is the whole idea. whatever shirt you tap, the note that opens was meant for you. one of fifty — 1/50, 2/50, each a different piece of the story.
i guest-lecture at georgia tech's college of computing — one of the best engineering schools in the country, and an honor every time.
twelve years of building and breaking real custody systems makes for good material. i bring it straight into the room: how digital assets are actually held, where security fails in practice, and the parts the textbook leaves out.
crypto security leader. twelve years designing, building, and implementing custody and security — at the first retail and institutional banks to offer crypto, one of the fastest-growing startups in history, and major crypto exchanges.
SoFi
senior principal engineer, crypto
present
effective ciso/biso of the crypto security program. founding member of the crypto team; shipped the first retail-bank crypto product in the u.s.
Robinhood Crypto
chief information security officer
BNY Mellon
head of security
BlockFi
deputy ciso · head of custody infrastructure
retained as an expert witness in high-profile crypto cases — ongoing.
Florida State University
master's degree
Stetson University
b.b.a.
Fashion Institute of Technology
patternmaking
© 2026 kp®, all rights reserved
work i've helped invent.
2024 · co-inventor
tantamount labs is a community i co-created for web3 artists, brands, and creatives — more tools to do what they do best, on chain.
the patent covers project origin, its first open-source project: a way for artists to cryptographically sign their work on-chain, using cryptography and steganography to hide proof of origin inside the artwork itself — without changing how it looks.
my substack. theories i'm still working out, in public — custody, crypto, ai, and how we use systems we don't fully trust. nothing here is finished. that's the point.
read the working theories ↗"crypto's biggest barrier to adoption? it's not regulation — it's ux." an op-ed for coindesk: the next wave of crypto is won or lost on human-centered design, not policy.
read on coindesk ↗"crypto explained: what it means for you" — breaking it down for everyday people, on 11alive.
watch the 11alive interview ↗named a 2026 tastemaker for meals on wheels atlanta's taste — supporting the work to end senior hunger and isolation.
read the feature ↗| # | Title | Author |
|---|---|---|
| 01 | crossroads | jonathan franzen |
| 02 | creativity: flow and the psychology of discovery and invention | mihaly csikszentmihalyi |
| 03 | the best american short stories of 2023 | min jin lee |
| 04 | the big oyster | mark kurlansky |
| 05 | tiny beautiful things | cheryl strayed |
| 06 | liberation day | george saunders |
| 07 | is it hot in here? | zach zimmerman |
| 08 | bird by bird | anne lamott |
| 09 | a carnival of snackery | david sedaris |
| 10 | the elissas | samantha leach |
| 11 | luster, a novel | raven leilani |
| 12 | meet me in the bathroom | lizzy goodman |
| 13 | bill no-mates | max dickens |
| 14 | shuggie bain | douglas stuart |
| 15 | the infinite machine | camila russo |
| 16 | the bitcoin standard | michael saylor |
| 17 | the innovators | walter isaacson |
| 18 | cult of the dead cow | joseph menn |
| 19 | the time paradox | john boyd & philip zimbardo |
| 20 | psycho-cybernetics | maxwell maltz |
| 21 | the wisdom of insecurity | alan watts |
| 22 | the 12 million dollar stuffed shark | don thompson |
| 23 | tomorrow, tomorrow, & tomorrow | gabrielle zevin |
| 24 | never split the difference | chris voss |
| 25 | the 12 week year | — |
a running list of things i am thinking about or working on in some capacity. if you are interested in any of these let me know.
crypto is a tool for self sovereignty, it provides a way to own your own data, own your identity, to transact with who you want to, and allows you to create your own platforms. these platforms can be money platforms, technology platforms, etc. and are outside of the control of any one person, place, government or corporation. when you combine ai and crypto what you are building towards is a new type of intelligence that is also sovereign. we can create highly capable systems that are also not under the control of any one person, place, country, or establishment. ai can fuel the development of crypto platforms, products, and services by combining the generative nature and conversational human language nature with all the great things crypto already provides us.
crypto policy conflict is a power conflict. political parties use crypto for votes for no impact to the people they serve. self custody is a right. mining bitcoin is a right. cbdcs are dangerous. there needs to be an end to harmful regulation.
the technology we need for privacy exists. cryptography can be used to track the provenance of digital objects and protect privacy across crypto and ai surveillance mechanisms. for crypto to reach its potential of full mainstream adoption, the privacy features available must be implemented and need to work. the goal is not to hide activity. security properties and features need to be a design priority. crypto is actually a huge downgrade in security and privacy from commercial banking.
who are we building for? why are we building it? designing with end users in mind often gets lost in the race to be a first mover and achieve competitive advantage. do the features we ship to end users protect or exploit them? are we making it easy for them to always do the right thing? ultimately, the cost of building outweighs who and what we are building for. speed, scalability, and profits outweigh security and end user experience. are we leading users down a path of exploitation and financial loss for our own gain? the use of gamification of complex financial instruments to increase revenue and profits is misleading and creates a false perception of inclusivity and transparency.
to what degree can defi facilitate financial inclusion? how can the current economic, financial, and ecological crisis be addressed when it is a crisis about democratic, inclusive, and transformative governance. how to bring innovations to democratic economic and financial governance in the context of increasing social divisions and political polarization is anyone's guess. prior technology thrives under a light regulatory touch, for example TCP/IP and SMTP for the internet in the 90s. imposing centralized regulatory models on decentralized ones hinders innovation and growth. the goal should be to design for coexistence and aim for clear and consistent regulation that does not hinder current operating models (i.e. privacy). the need for consumer education and awareness remains essential so that end users can understand risks and benefits.
the battle between centralization and decentralization reflects the people and the state, the tangible and intangible, individualism and collectivism. political struggles and technological struggles are synonymous. the technological struggle is essential to shape and preserve a more equitable and just future. decentralization must be preserved at all costs to protect and preserve individualism, creativity, and development which are essential to geopolitical competitiveness.
crypto markets can be created and collapsed seemingly overnight. this makes crypto the most interesting case study for market mechanisms of our time. while most criticize the industry, it begs the question, is this just another product of capitalism? what are the lessons we can learn when the interiors of capitalism are exposed? DAOs and NFT communities show possibilities of highly incentivized local anarchy facilitated by shared containers of value encoded with smart contracts.
if intermediaries are eliminated from transactions, and those transactions are neither facilitated nor backed by publicly regulated financial reserves, who secures the promised funds and who ultimately protects the reliability of the regime through which transactions are channeled? who or what is behind the financial peer to peer transactions? there are two takes on how defi can democratize access to capital. non hierarchical access controlled system of financial transactions housed in technology rather than institutions could lead to universal inclusivity and transparency, or a deepening asymmetry between those who can benefit from the evolving technology and those who find themselves further descending into debt and self-exploitation.
the history of fintech goes back to the introduction of computers with significant but disruptive effects in the expansion and acceleration of services and financial markets. technology played a key role in the creation of the globally connected mortgage crisis and some refer to 08/09 as a man-made economic assault. there is a need to connect today's concerns with defi risks for financial stability with the insights into the multiple dimensions of risk that were gained through the financial crisis. there are significant costs of lingering financial instability. the rise of fintech begs broader questions about the role and limits of bureaucratic expertise in our society and the ability of government experts to engage in public serving innovation that spews the debate around public vs private in the financial system. are the barriers to entry we see in defi really that different from what we see in tradfi? are algorithmic and ai ethics really focused on fairness and distribution?
what if users were rewarded for wearing and sharing fashion items? this is very unlike what we see on web2.0 today and how influencer culture operates. users can earn crypto rewards for promoting brands, verified by interactions and the blockchain tracks public engagement through smart tags, or qr codes on garments. brands can offer tokens for posting location-verified pictures of their clothes, shoes, or bags at various landmarks, locations, or events.
how do we ensure that in-game assets, clothes, bags, etc. are transferrable across various protocols and ecosystems. gucci sold a bag in the metaverse that is the same price as a physical bag. if i purchased that bag in my game i would want to make sure all my avatars can wear it and it can be used in other metaverses. just like IRL. decentralized storage for virtual and physical wardrobe assets is the concept. a secure self-custody wallet and app is needed for managing both digital fashion NFTs and their real-world counterparts. users should be able to retain ownership across metaverses, AR apps, and physical stores.
sustainable, sustainable, sustainable… the merging of sustainable fashion with blockchain protocols and solutions for carbon tracking. imagine buying a sustainable dress NFT and you would be able to see the full carbon impact breakdown and offset contributions for that garment. putting this on chain ensures transparency and incentivizes sustainable practices through token rewards. carbon credits could also be tracked and used as their own tokenized assets, these assets could be leveraged in carbon-neutral and carbon-negative marketplaces.
Katelyn Perna (KP)
Atlanta, GA
kp@twotwelve.studio
@jockinkp
@2twelve.studio
2twelve is a creative concept studio working at the intersection of fashion, wearable technology, and human identity. open to collaborations, commissions, and conversations — especially things that don't have a clear category yet.
a field briefing: how one duct-taped banana, a faceless ghost named satoshi, and the whole nft bubble run the same play — the value was never in the thing, it's in the paperwork that says it's valuable. dressed up as a classified terminal dump.
0 items.
the bad ideas didn't make it. the good ones are in the folders.