Eth News and Links
Mainnet execution layer
- Tim Beiko’s Core Devs Update. Apps should prepare for PoW switch off by testing on Kintsugi testnet, EIPs being prioritized for Shanghai upgrade
- Erigon v2022.01.03: improved classification of transactions in the pool, experimental issuance tracking & bug fixes
- Proposal to charge rollup gas for mainnet to Layer 2 messages
Proof of Stake consensus layer
- PoS implementers call video. Notes from Ben Edgington:
- PoW switch off target of June based on difficulty bomb, focus is on getting switch off right, difficulty bomb can be delayed
- Kiln (Kintsugi v2) testnet mid-Feb, Engine API & optimistic sync updates
- Aim for client releases for public testnets mid-March
- Latest What’s New in Eth2
- consensus-specs v1.1.9: update for Engine API, full optimistic sync spec, minor refactors & new tests
- Latest Message Driven fork choice Balancing Attack
- Vitalik: single-slot proposer/builder separation using attesters as distributed availability oracle, alternative to two-slot PBS
- Teku v22.1.1: key management API, avoid timeouts in event stream, sync committee optimizations & bug fixes
- Lighthouse v2.1.1: fix for missed attestations with InsufficientPeers error
- Eth-wizard v0.8.0: update clients with a single click
- Vitalik: paths to single-slot finality (~16 seconds), via super-committees or supporting large number of attesters
PoW switch off
- Super majority client with a consensus bug would quickly finalize a broken version of the chain with no chance to intervene, possibly in 13 minutes, leading to all super majority stakers getting slashed
- Client diversity: stats & client specific instructions on how to switch
- Community call #3, Feb 11, for infrastructure providers & app developers
- Guide to setup a Kintsugi node with Besu+Teku
EIPs/Standards
- EIP4721: Transaction Expiration
Layer2
- Arbitrum update lowers transaction fees
- Bybit and MEXC Global adds support for Arbitrum deposits & withdrawals
- Arbitrum anti-censorship explainer, transactions can be forced to mainnet after 6545 blocks and 24 hour timeout
- MoonPay adds support for Immutable X ETH purchases with credit cards
- Polygon Hermez documents their zkEVM opcode-based approach
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Stuff for developers
- Models for token deployment, deploy token root to either mainnet or Layer 2
- ethereum-cryptography v1.0: 15x smaller, 5 dependencies; fun details
- Solidity gas optimizations: use v0.8.4+, calldata function parameters, immutable variables, short revert strings/custom errors & optimize for loops
- Minimal constructor bytecode in a tweet
- ClonesWithImmutableArgs: reduces cost of creation & use by replacing storage loads, proxy appends arguments to calldata of delegate call
- EC20Wrapper guide, wrap existing ERC20 to add on-chain governance
- ZKP Private Airdrop: users provide public commitment to later claim using a zk proof that they belong in the Merkle tree
- Twitter Airdrop: extract addresses & ENS from drop address Twitter replies
- Constant Rate Issuance Sales Protocol: increase/decrease NFT sale price to meet target rate, collaboration with Justin Roiland (Rick & Morty co-creator)
- Solidity Metadata Playground: decode metadata hash, view verified contracts on Sourcify/Etherscan, open in Remix if verified
- c4udit: simple Solidity analyzer, regular expressions for low severity issues
- Tenderly Simulator: access any pending transaction with expected outcomes
- Group signature primitive using zkSNARKs, proof of concept message board where identity of poster can’t be narrowed beyond the group
Security
- OpenSea uncanceled listings used to buy NFTs below market rates, listings valid until canceled by a transaction, listing cancels are being front run
- Multichain bridge post mortem, relied on a tokens permit function reverting but WETH doesn’t have permit & the fallback function doesn’t revert
- Qubit Ethereum BSC Bridge $80 million exploit, insufficient checks allowed withdraw of tokens on BSC using a 0 ETH deposit with malicious data
- ZORA fixed price sale vulnerability, seller could increase price & front run purchase, no funds lost, fix uses explicit buy price
- Austin Williams: two contracts from BoringSolidity when imported together allow ETH to be drained; safe contracts may become unsafe when combined
Ecosystem
- Ethereum.org removed all uses of ETH2 terminology, Ethereum is execution layer + consensus layer, renaming doesn’t change Ethereum roadmap
- Blockscan chat, off-chain instant messaging, Etherscan address view shows unread message count, not currently end-to-end encrypted, beta
Application layer
- Aave v3 on testnets (Rinkeby, Arbitrum Rinkeby and Optimism Kovan)
- Opyn Squeeth crab strategy live, for sideways market (narrow range price fluctuation)
- Rari Capital Fuse live on Arbitrum
- Maple Loans v2, refinancing & liquidation tools for capital efficiency and reduced gas costs
- Pika Protocol perpetual swap exchange live on Optimism, gradual rollout with increasing cap
- Syndicate Web3 Investment Clubs, each club can have 99 members, invite-only, can’t charge carry, public beta
- Risk Harbor v2 live on mainnet, includes levered vaults, AMM & risk engine
- Suggestion to replace USDC blacklist with admin function to freeze balances, save 2100 gas for each check
- ZORA v3: NFT marketplace protocol adds instant royalties, finder’s fee, non-custodial listings and fee governance right as an NFT
- Reservoir: NFT order book protocol
- MoonPay NFT Checkout supports card purchases
- OpenSea reversed 50 item limit for their free minting tool after backlash, 80% of items created are plagiarized works, fake collections or spam
- ENS voted to set expired name start price premium to $100k to prevent names being snapped up by bots, premium decays to $0 over 28 days
- on-chain art: NFT showcase, rated by how data is stored and rendered
Job Listings
- Re7 Capital – a DeFi yield fund – is hiring analysts and data engineers
- Ether Capital is hiring a 👩🏼💻 DevOps Engineer 👨🏻💻 to stake millions on Eth2
- Geth team seeks Senior Technical Writer to redo the docs & take ownership
- Nethermind 1-3 month internship program
- Are you a p2p networking whiz? EF research hiring Networking Engineer
Reach developers experienced with Ethereum. $600 for four issues (~75 character limit), payable in ETH/DAI/USDC to abcoathup.eth on mainnet, Arbitrum or Optimism. Questions? abcoathup at-gmail
Regulation/business/tokens
- US proposed America COMPETES Act would allow US Treasury to prohibit types of transactions deemed a money laundering concern without public notice or comment
- US SEC proposed amendments to Exchange Act expand definition of securities exchange
- Diem reported to be selling their tech to Silvergate Capital for $200 million
- Wonderland/Abracadabra/FrogNation CFO found to be QuadrigaCX co-founder Michael Patryn
General
- Trezor backtracks and removes Address Ownership Proof Protocol
- Joe Grand hacked Trezor wallet to rescue $2 million in funds
- Vitalik: soulbound items, limit transferability of NFTs by binding to an ENS name or proof of humanity, non-transferable items can be private
- PwnKit: Linux local privilege escalation exploit in polkit’s pkexec
- Download of a users Amazon data, includes audio speaking to Alexa
Follow @WeekinEthNews to find out what the most clicked links are. Follow @evan_van_ness and @abcoathup to get most of the week’s news in real time.
Permalink for this week’s issue: https://weekinethereumnews.com/week-in-ethereum-news-january-29-2022
Dates of Note
Upcoming dates of note (new/changes in bold):
- Feb 11 – PoW switch off community call
- Feb 15 – Apr 5 – Cryptocurrency Class (virtual)
- Feb 17 – Schelling Point (Denver)
- Feb 18-20 – ETHDenver
- Feb 23 – Mar 11 – Codeless Conduct no-code hackathon (virtual)
- Mar 11-16 – Ethereum Rio
- Mar 17-18 – ETH Austin summit
- Mar 29-31 – ETHDubai
- Apr 7-9 – ETH Portland hackathon
- Apr 20-21 – The Alliance (gaming) summit (Amsterdam)
- Apr 21 – ETHconomics (Amsterdam)
- Apr 22-24 – ETHAmsterdam
- May 3-8 – spaghettETH (Milan)
- May 20 – US Fed CBDC discussion paper feedback deadline
- Jun 10-12 – ETHPrague
- Jun 16-19 – ETH Miami summit & hackathon
- Jun 20-23 – NFT.NYC
- Jun 24-26 – ETHNewYork
- Jul 8 – ETH Seattle summit
- Jul 19-21 – EthCC 5 (Paris)
- Aug 19-21 – ETHMexicoCity
- Aug 27-28 – DeFi Security Summit (Stanford)
- Aug 29-31 – Science of Blockchain Conference (Stanford)
- Nov 4-6 – ETHSanFrancisco
- Dec 2-4 – ETHTaipei
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