Web3 is public by default, which is great for transparency—but terrible for anything sensitive. Personal files, private business data, paid content, confidential AI datasets—these can’t simply be posted openly. Many projects solve this by using centralized servers again, which defeats the point.
Walrus becomes much more powerful when paired with an access-control layer (like Seal-style encryption + on-chain rules). This allows apps to store data in a decentralized way, but still control who can open it. That makes Web3 storage usable for real-world products that need privacy, not just public archives.
Example: A creator can store premium videos in decentralized storage but only allow subscribers (token holders) to decrypt and view them.