A bonded warehouse holds goods a customs officer can inspect at any time. The owner is not present for the inspection and does not need to be. What the officer gets is a right of access, not ownership of what is stored.
The distinction sounds pedantic until you notice how rarely software gets it right.
Phoenix uses viewing keys. Users can selectively reveal information where regulation or auditing requires it, and the key grants visibility into the notes, not the ability to spend them.
So an auditor with a viewing key sees what they need. They cannot move anything.
Most systems collapse those two capabilities together. Handing over access to your bank records is a different act than handing over your card, but the moment you give a platform full account access, you have often done both.
Where the warehouse analogy fails is reach. A customs officer inspects one warehouse on one day. A viewing key can cover an entire transaction history from the moment it is issued, and unlike a physical visit, the inspection leaves no trace the owner can see.
Read-only is not the same as harmless. It just moves the question from what they can take to what they can learn.
#dusk @Dusk $DUSK