Ethereum Foundation Board Publishes Onchain Mandate on Censorship Resistance as ETH Rises Over 5%
The Ethereum Foundation Board released the EF Mandate on March 13, formally defining censorship resistance, open source, privacy, and security as core protocol principles and permanently publishing the document onchain via Etherscan, BeInCrypto reports. Vitalik Buterin backed the mandate, describing Ethereum as "sanctuary technology" and outlining CROPS as applying to both the base protocol and user-facing applications the Foundation develops, while emphasizing a "walkaway test" under which no single organization should be essential to the network. The Foundation characterized itself as "one of many" stewards rather than Ethereum's ultimate authority, and the mandate ties EF funding and support to CROPS-aligned projects, excluding protocols that depend on surveillance or heavy centralization. The publication follows the Foundation's recent 70,000 ETH staking move and leadership changes, with upcoming protocol work including FOCIL for censorship-resistant transaction inclusion in the Hegotá upgrade planned for H2 2026; ETH was trading near $2,155, up more than 5% over 24 hours at the time of reporting.