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This article is featured in The Protocol, CoinDesk’s weekly digest focusing on cryptocurrency technology. Sign up here to enhance your knowledge on cryptos every Wednesday.
Welcome to The Protocol! In this roundup: Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, emphasized in a recent event that the cryptocurrency industry stands at a crucial turning point. He stressed the need for genuine decentralization to transform from mere rhetoric into safe practices that users can trust.
During his address to a large audience at the Ethereum Community Conference in Cannes, Buterin outlined several practical evaluations all crypto initiatives should undergo:
- Walk-away Test: If an application provider vanishes, can users retain control of their assets?
- Insider Attack Test: What potential risks arise from malicious insiders or vulnerable front-end designs?
- Trusted Computing Base: How much code must users trust to keep their data and assets secure?
Buterin cautioned against the growing trend of new layer-2 solutions, decentralized finance (DeFi) initiatives, and ‘decentralized’ interfaces that might be insecure and riddled with hidden vulnerabilities.
Additional Highlights:
- Bitcoin Layer-2 Botanix: The Botanix mainnet has been launched, allowing new blocks to be added every five seconds. This initiative aims to replicate Ethereum-level functionalities on Bitcoin, enhancing its utility.
- XRP Ledger Updates: XRP has officially activated its Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) sidechain mainnet, boosting accessibility for developers deploying Ethereum-based applications on the XRP ecosystem.
- Securitize & RedStone Whitepaper: Both companies have unveiled a novel framework for trustworthy verification of Net Asset Value (NAV) for private funds in DeFi, addressing significant challenges regarding data accuracy and integrity.
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