Two of the things that I think are new vs the current system are:

Wallet: anonymous holding of currency without a custodian. You can’t hold fiat currency digitally today without a bank or other entity providing that service.

Transfer: moving fiat currency anonymously and under your own direction without intermediaries. You can’t make a digital payment or transfer in pure fiat currency today without that custodian providing the service (often through fee-based payment network). As a result, your identity is known when that transaction happens.

True. I should have said that there was enough information there to satisfy my interest in the matter. Which was small.

I wondered too. It was explained here: https://lemmy.world/post/28040267

Yes indeed. Everyone arriving goes through immigration, collects bags, clears customs; and only then may proceed to the exit, or recheck bags and go back through security to catch a connecting flight.

The only exception is if you originated at a pre-clearance airport and did the immigration stuff before departure. But that means you still need a visa. And it’s only at a handful of airports in Canada, Ireland, UAE and the Caribbean.

In the US, if you land, you must pass through immigration.

At least I’m not aware of any airports where there is an international terminal like you find elsewhere in the world. Ours require entry to the country even if you are connecting to another international flight.