The Protocol: From ‘Node Sales’ to ‘Address Poisoning,’ the Money’s in Crypto

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As a crypto investor, I’ve come across the concept of tiered node sales, which was recently implemented by Sophon. In simple terms, this means that the price for buying a node increases as more people delay their purchase. So, if you value securing the network and potentially earning rewards, it might be beneficial to make your investment sooner rather than later.

As a blockchain industry analyst, I’ve noticed an emerging trend in fundraising methods: node sales. Instead of the traditional ICO route, projects sell nodes directly to investors, bringing in quick cash and theoretically contributing to decentralization. Aethir, a GPU cloud infrastructure provider, recently sold over 73,000 node licenses worth $126 million. Other projects like CARV, XAI Games, Powerloom, and Sophon have adopted this approach as well.

As a crypto investor, I’ve recently come across a disturbing incident where someone lost a significant amount of wrapped bitcoin (WBBC) due to an exploit called “address poisoning.” According to reports from blockchain security firm CertiK and CoinDesk’s Oliver Knight, this attack involves tricking victims into sending transactions to the wrong wallet address.

Rob Gronkowski, the ex-NFL player who previously donned the jerseys of the New England Patriots and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, has reached a $1.9 million settlement with former clients of Voyager Digital over allegations against him. This comes despite a popular joke circulating online, poking fun at his retired teammate Tom Brady, suggesting that Gronk had managed to avoid crypto-related issues.

A back-and-forth broke out on X over the blockchain project Sui’s token supply.

Protocol Village

Top picks of the past week from our Protocol Village column, highlighting key blockchain tech upgrades and news.

Polyhedra co-founder and CTO Tiancheng Xie (Polyhedra)

1. The company Polyhedra Network unveiled its open-source Zero-Knowledge (ZK) proof system, Expander, which reportedly produces proofs approximately twice as fast as competing systems, while improving both security and efficiency in the ZK proof procedure. As stated in a recent blog entry, Expander manages to verify 4,500 Keccak-f permutations every second on an Apple M3 Max computer. The cryptographic hash function Keccak-256 is standardized by NIST as part of the secure hash algorithm 3 (SHA-3) and serves as the hash function employed in the Ethereum blockchain, according to the post. Expander’s development builds upon Polyhedra’s Libra paper, which was headed by Polyhedra co-founder and CTO Tiancheng Xie.

MetaMask, the widely used Ethereum crypto wallet, introduces a new feature this week aimed at helping users shield themselves from Maximal Extractable Value (MEV) risks. This opt-in functionality, named Smart Transactions, enables users to submit transactions to a “hidden queue” prior to their on-chain execution. Consensys, MetaMask’s parent company, asserts that the virtual queue will safeguard against specific MEV tactics and perform background simulations to secure reduced transaction fees for users.

At the Bitcoin For Corporations conference on Wednesday, MicroStrategy (MSTR), the largest bitcoin hoarder among corporations, announced its intentions to create a decentralized identity system based on Ordinals inscriptions. The initiative, named “MicroStrategy Orange,” asserts the objective of generating “secure, immutable, and enduring” decentralized identities through the utilization of the Bitcoin blockchain, according to founder Michael Saylor.

Aave Labs, the primary force behind Aave’s development, intends to create version 4 (V4) of Aave through an extensive grant proposal that incorporates community input and testing. The proposed timeline initiates this quarter and culminates in a complete rollout by mid-2024. The new architecture for Aave V4 will adopt an efficient and modular design, ensuring minimal disruption to third-party integrators. A major transformation includes the implementation of a “unified liquidity layer” and an innovative oracle system using Chainlink.

Five prominent financial institutions, including Citi, JPMorgan, Mastercard, Swift, and Deloitte, are collaborating on an initiative to investigate the use of shared ledger technology for processing multiasset transactions in U.S. dollars. The project, named Regulated Settlement Network (RSN), is a proof-of-concept study aiming to unify commercial-bank funds, wholesale central-bank money, and securities like U.S. Treasuries and investment-grade debt under one regulated platform. The New York Innovation Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York will serve as an impartial observer during this exploration.

Ethereum Developers Target Ease of Crypto Wallets With ‘EIP-3074’

Screengrab from the EIP-3074 proposal (Ethereum.org, modified by CoinDesk using PhotoMosh)

As a researcher studying the blockchain industry, I’ve noticed a renewed focus on simplifying the user experience of crypto wallets in order to promote wider adoption among mainstream audiences.

As a seasoned analyst, I’ve been closely following the ongoing discourse among Ethereum developers regarding their plans for the upcoming major hard fork, which they’ve tentatively named Pectra. These discussions involve the consideration and implementation of various Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) that are intended to enhance the functionality and efficiency of the Ethereum blockchain once the hard fork is activated.

Among the Ethereum community’s debated suggestions is EIP-3074, an proposed modification to the Ethereum code aimed at enhancing wallet usability within the blockchain system.

Expert Georgios Konstantopoulos, the CTO of Paradigm, expressed his viewpoint on X regarding EIP-3074 being significant and leading to a tenfold improvement in wallet user experience.

Click here for the full story by Margaux Nijkerk

P.S. THIS JUST IN: Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed an “EIP-3074 alternative” called EIP-7702. It’s super technical, but Jarrod Watts, a developer relations engineer with Polygon, put out a good tweet thread about it.

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