The $320 Billion Black Box (And Why We’re Breaking It Open)
Author: Tommy LaRocca, CEO, HumaTek Category: Vision & Impact
Let’s pause for a brief moment, I want you to imagine something for a second.
Imagine you walk into a store, hand the cashier $100 for a pair of sneakers, and they hand you a shoebox. You walk out, open the box, and… it’s empty. Or maybe there’s just one shoe. Or a receipt that says “Processing.”
You wouldn’t stand for it. You’d demand your money back. You’d demand to know where your cash went.
Yet, every single year, the world donates $800 billion to humanitarian aid, and nearly $320 billion of that effectively disappears. It vanishes into what I call the “Black Box”—a messy web of administrative fees, slow banking transfers, corruption, and old-school inefficiency.
That isn’t just a “logistics problem.” That is a tragedy. Because that missing 40% isn’t just a number on a spreadsheet; it’s food that didn’t reach a starving child. It’s a shelter that didn’t get built.
We decided it was time to turn the lights on.
At HumaTek, we stopped asking “where did the money go?” and started building a system where you never have to ask.
We built HumaDash, a platform that takes that “Black Box” of global aid and turns it into a Glass Box.
Total Visibility: When you donate, you shouldn’t just get a “Thank You” email. You should see—in real-time—exactly when your funds arrived, who received them, and the project they are funding.
Zero Friction: Why does it take days (and heavy fees) to wire money to a disaster zone? With HumaCoin, we move value across the world in seconds, for pennies, not percentages.
But technology alone is cold. We needed to bring the human back into humanitarianism.
That’s why we’re building HumaClub. Think of it as if LinkedIn met TikTok and had a baby. Imagine a social feed that isn’t full of mindless scrolling or arguments, but full of proof. Real-time video updates from the ground. Volunteers checking in. Schools opening their doors. A place where the “news” is actually the good we are doing together, verified and visible for the whole world to see.
We aren’t just building a software company. We are building the Trust Algorithm for the planet.
We are taking the guesswork out of giving. We are making “impact” visible. We are HumaTek. And we’re just getting started.
Tommy LaRocca- CEO, HumaTek