Below is a video demo of the FogBlock4Trust project, which aims at realising a Fog-assisted Blockchain-based credential management solution to strengthen the trust and privacy of users.
Innovation: The most important novelty of FogBlock4Trust is the provision of two distinct major services within one framework, namely global institution accreditation, and distributed credential verification. Other recent proposals for credential management are inefficient, unreliable in terms of storage management and privacy AND/OR provide only one of the two services.
Use case: The FogBlock4Trust solution is planned as a global institution/provider accreditation and credential verification system. It will support the use of one-way encryption, symmetric and asymmetric encryption, digital signatures, Zero-Knowledge-Proofs, and an improved Proof-of-Signature consensus algorithm. Exploiting these methods and technologies for providing end-users with full privacy-preserving distributed accreditation and verification services is the goal of FogBlock4Trust.
Scenario: The assumed scenario for the demo is that there are issuers of online credentials, in a zero-knowledge setting. A real-world example would be a group of universities providing trustable digital copies of certifications from students to each other. Such a setting (a group of issuers, a multitude of certificates/documents, and a large number of single users who can access the system for certain tasks) can be found in a range of domains.
Demo: The 20-minute demo shows how cloud and fog computing can be enhanced with blockchain features.
Settlemint, a company from Belgium, offers a low-code platform enabling any company to start projects, with simple steps and a visual overview of set-up, costs and tracking of performance. TruBlo invited Settlemint to talk about their low-code platform for fast blockchain onboarding.
Settlemint is a tech start-up from Belgium, five years in business by now and a leader in this particular field. There are a number of reasons why making it easier to launch blockchain projects will meet a lot of demand.
Firstly, there is by now much interest in how established businesses can actually use blockchain technology, in order to enhance and extend their workflows.
Secondly, there is a severe scarcity of developers who have experience with blockchain. This means that only a few companies can start exploring blockchain right now.
With Settlemint it is possible to get started much fast, connect data from your current cloud and then explore the options with a variety of available blockchain protocols. Settlemint offers a cost calculator, provides a visual overview and all other needed components.
We want to hear about the Settlemint platform and see it in action. Stefan Günther from Settlemint will provide an overview and a short presentation in our one-hour event.
The event is organized jointly by Settlemint and TruBlo, an EU-funded project funding innovative approaches towards “trusted content on future blockchains”. https://www.trublo.eu
News and updates from the intersection of trust, content and blockchain. Estimated reading time: 4 minutes, 49 seconds. Contains 965 words.
FEBRUARY 7, 2022
This week:
Info event for TruBlo open call 3
Facebook shrinks (a little) and loses (a lot of) stock value
Pecan gets funding for predictive analytics
Dune Analytics enables blockchain dashboards
China designates blockchain test areas
The newsletter is brought to you by the TruBlo project: We are funding 45 early-stage ideas for “trusted content on future blockchains”.
The current open call #3 is available until March 30, 2022. Consider applying if you have a good idea.
Information event: How to apply for TruBlo open call 3 – February 8, 11:00 CET
Join us for this one-hour event on February 8, 11:00 CET. What we cover: How to get funded by TruBlo and how to apply. Mirko Ross from Asvin GmbH will report how their project D-SBOM got funding (open call 2). Further, he will talk about why they participated. The info event is organized in collaboration with Berlin Partner, an economic development agency initiated by the city of Berlin.
A second spy firm exploited an iPhone security flaw
Last week, we linked to articles where a human rights activist reported how her iPhone was hacked using the NSO Pegasus software. This week, Reuters reports that another spy software firm also used the security flaw. Apple fixed the flaw in September 2021. The exploit allowed for forced entry and did not require any installation of malware by the user.
Machine Learning “lacks access” to training data against bias
Machine Learning researchers questioned in a survey said that they “lack access” to datasets that would help train their models. This would be needed to avoid biased judgement and other ethical issues. ML models tended to make biased recommendations in the past, e.g. when judging criminal suspects based on available data.
Have you seen “Line goes up” and what do you think?
“Let me tell you a story”, these are the opening words of Dan Olson, creator of “Line Goes Up – The Problem with NFTs”. The YouTube video is a deep (and lengthy) criticism of the current NFT (non-fungible token) market. Published on January 21, 2022, the video has already reached four million views. Olson NFTs says NFTs are currently “the topic that sucks all the air out of the room”. Crypto news website “Coindesk” published a review of the video, but by and large, agreed that the views presented in “Line goes up”.
The company behind Bored Ape NFT seeks multi-million dollar investment
Despite the many doubts about whether NFTs are a sustainable business, companies have no big problem finding investors. The “Financial Times” reports that Yuga Labs, the company behind the “Bored Ape Yacht Club“, is in talks with top venture capital firms such as Andreesen Horowitz at a valuation of $4bn to $5bn. NFTs from the platform have been bought by celebrities such as Gwyneth Paltrow and Snoop Dog, which gave the platform some publicity. In other news: Buzz Feed revealed the identities of the founders. Interesting to read. A key motivation of the investigators was that you can’t hold a company accountable if you don’t know who founded it.
Meta (the former Facebook) reported a slight decline in the number of users for the first time. As a result, the stock price dropped by almost 25% overnight, wiping out roughly $200 billion of book value. Casey Newton has a post reflecting on the company’s long, long growth period and what comes next.
Pecan gets $66M funding for predictive analytics software
Predicting the future is considered the next level in the analytics industry, and the field is called “predictive analytics”. The core idea is that if you can understand many variables, you might be able to tell what is next. Reliable predictions would enable business planning into the future, which is why there are high hopes for significant revenues once there is a solution. Last week, Pecan, a company based in Israel, received a funding of $66 million after already getting $35 million in May last year.
Blockchain Bridge Wormhole loses Ether worth $320 but manages to get it back
Sometimes stories are like a rollercoaster. Example: This week, Wormhole, a popular blockchain bridge, reported losing access to $325 million worth of Ether.
The Verge has insights how a vulnerability made this possible:
“To carry out the attack, the attacker managed to forge a valid signature for a transaction that allowed them to freely mint 120,000 wETH — a “wrapped” Ethereum equivalent on the Solana blockchain, with value equivalent to $325 million at the time of the theft — without first inputting an equivalent amount. This was then exchanged for around $250 million in Ethereumthat was sent from Wormhole to the hackers’ account, effectively liquidating a large amount of the platform’s Ethereum funds that were being held as collateral for transactions on the Solana blockchain.”
Later the Wormhole team sent an offer of $10 million if assets were returned. The message was embedded in an transaction sent to the Ether wallet where the funds were now stored. In between the platform announced that is had replenished the lost Ether, out of funds from their investor.
Dune Analytics, a blockchain analytics platform, raises $69.4 million in funding
With only 16 employees, Dune Analytics has achieved unicorn status, based on the new investment of $69,4 million by Coatue, an investment company. In a Coindesk article, Dune CEO Fredrik Haga is quoted saying:
“We had not made a single slide or Excel sheet – they simply came to us, had extreme conviction in what we were doing, and had done a lot of outside-in research, and gave us an offer we couldn’t refuse” (Source: Coindesk).
The company has an exciting model: To make crypto data accessible, Dune Analytics enables community-based analysis. The analysts are external experts or enthusiasts who provide interested users with data insights. For their work, they get payments in crypto.
El Salvador Rejects IMF Call to Abandon Bitcoin as Legal TenderLINK
China designates 15 blockchain pilot zones, including Shanghai and Beijing. The goal is to carry out projects in “various fields of manufacturing, energy, government” LINK
South Africa urges users to be more careful with crypto exchanges LINK
Software-Update: With iOS 15.4 beta Apple will introduce and update face recognition while users wear a COVID mask. LINK
While we wait for the real thing: Over 500 apps already use the term metaverse to attract users. LINK
There is a government plan to raise a 30 per cent tax on crypto income in India LINK
82% of all Indians would invest in crypto if the government allows it LINK
Thank You for reading. Please forward this newsletter to colleagues: Click here to subscribe.
Please join on February 8, 202, 11-12 am, for an info session on how to apply for TruBlo open call. TruBlo offers an opportunity to fund your early-stage idea for trustable content on future blockchains. The event is organized by Berlin Partner, in collaboration with Cluster ICT|Media|Creative Industries and the Enterprise Europe Network.
Up to €175.000 of equity-free funding per project
Target groups are researchers, innovators, developers from academia, startups, high tech companies or natural persons. Selected participants can get up to 175.000 euros for their project. The total available amount of funding is 4,2 million euros. The call will be openedJanuary 27 and closed March 30, 2022.
TruBlo has defined two topics for selectable ideas:
Trust and reputation models on blockchains
Proof-of-validity and proof-of-location
25 examples
To see examples of projects which already got funding, please check the “funded projects” section on the TruBlo website. In total 25 projects have already received funding. Examples are a project called TrustCad, aiming to build a digital version of a land registry. Or take Moncon, who want to provide a trustable system to enable micropayments for content.
Besides the introduction to the project and the open call, you will get the chance to get some insides from a successful applicant from one of the previous calls (Mirko Ross, ASVIN GmbH). In TruBlo the company got funding for a project called D-SBOM, which will explore a digital bill of materials for IoT devices.
Even if it is a digital event we would like to have some interaction between the participants. Thus, we do offer up to seven participants the possibility to present themselves and your company within two minutes in front of the audience. If you would like to pitch your idea/project, please get in contact with the organizer February 4, 2022 the latest (first come – first serve).
You heard about Bitcoin, Ethereum, maybe Dogecoin. But are you familiar with Litecoin, Cardano or Polkadot? Because there are so many different coins, the entire field of cryptocurrency is quite confusing. As of November 2021, a total of 7,000 crypto coins exist. If you want, go to Coinmarketcap, the website keeps track of them.
Why so many? Do they all need a lot of energy, like Bitcoin? Who creates them? Who might be using them? And: Why are some coins rising in value? Why are others worth nothing?
Essential points covered in this article:
First, we define what a crypto coin is. Then we talk briefly about technological basics like an overview of coin creation.
Secondly, we look briefly introduce some coins to show different features. On our list are Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, Polkadot, Bitcoin Cash, Stellar, Binance Coin and finally, two “meme coins” called Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.
First, the basics:
What is a cryptocurrency, a crypto coin or a token?
A cryptocurrency is a form of digital money. One unit is described as a “token” or a “coin”. In this article, we will stick to the word “coin” for simplicity. It is possible to exchange a coin for services or goods. Every coin has a value. Most coins, even Bitcoin and Ethereum, started with very low values. The information about transactions with the coins is kept on a blockchain. A good comparison of a blockchain is the ledger of a bank account. The information is encrypted, the data is decentralised. There is no single authority.
Why do you need a coin? A simplified example: You may want to buy an item in a game. The game only accepts a particular coin. You would then have to either earn this particular currency or change real money into such coins. The process of making coins is often called mining.
What is a protocol?
Every cryptocurrency is based on software. For every coin, there is a protocol. The protocol is the underlying software, and it defines the rules for the blockchain and the coins. For example: How to add a new coin or what the value is. Further, the protocol can define how many coins can be created and the creation mechanism. Here is an initial, partial answer to why there are so many coins: Every protocol has different rules, every protocol can have a new coin. The features of a protocol are an essential factor in whether it will become popular and used by developers.
But besides these fundamentals, there are some universal reasons for the boom in crypto coins since 2013: These are (a) speculation, (b) ICOS or Initial Coin Offerings and (c) innovation.
Speculation: Bitcoin and Ether were worth almost nothing for several years. But since 2017, the value of both has risen, creating several thousand millionaires and even billionaires among early adopters. As of 2021, many new users are drawn into crypto because coins promise to rise in value over time. There is huge volatility, though. And the whole development might result in the boom-and-bust cycle in the next few years.
ICOs: The word ICO is short for “Initial Coin Offering”. Between 2013 and 2018, there was a boom of blockchain projects with a specific pattern: For example, one project would propose to create a new social network, such as a decentralised competitor to Facebook. To start such a software platform, they needed funding, of course. In an ICO, a project would offer “coins” to people who would buy them just like investors in a more common IPO (Initial Public Offering). While you would have to grow a company for many years to be ready for an IPO, an ICO is similar, but at the very start of a project. Many such ICOs collected money this way, but they did not reach their goals in terms of software development. Often early investors lost their stakes. The ICO boom lasted for about two years, from 2016 to 2018, followed by a bust. But during this period, a lot of people learned how to do this.
Innovation: Innovation is a significant driver. Blockchain is still a new technology. Many people in this field hope for a better world through decentralised finance. When Tim Berners-Lee invented the web, it offered the new option to link one bit of information to another. A future blockchain-enabled web might have “links” that are even more powerful, which can be verified and used for all kinds of transactions instantly and at low costs.
In the final part of this article, we detail some popular coins and how they are different:
Bitcoin
Bitcoin was invented as a way for people to send a payment across a network, securely and semi-anonymous, without interference or control of a central authority. Bitcoin is the oldest and best-known cryptocurrency and the biggest by market value.
“Bitcoin is a digital currency which operates free of any central control or the oversight of banks or governments. Instead, it relies on peer-to-peer software and cryptography. A public ledger records all bitcoin transactions and copies are held on servers around the world.” (New Scientist)
Bitcoin started in 2009. From the start, the total supply was limited to 21 million coins. So far, about 18 million are already mined. But not all of those are used because a certain amount of Bitcoins is considered lost. The owners have forgotten about them or have no access anymore because they lost the passwords to open them.
Because of the limited number of coins, Bitcoin is labelled as “digital gold”. There is a speculative expectation that demand will keep the value stable. After a slow start, it started to rise. Since 2009 the value of one bitcoin has risen from barely above zero to over $65,000. https://www.coindesk.com/price/bitcoin/.
There is no real-world value backing Bitcoin or the other cryptocurrencies real-world value. A government does not back them. Instead, the value is determined mainly by supply and demand. Regularly some experts warn about a financial bubble caused by the current speculation in these coins. On the other side, many common currencies are not backed by real value, too – it is a matter of trust that we all agree that one Dollar or one Euro is worth a certain amount of goods or services.
The process of finding new coins is called mining. A miner must find a specific number to do that. Getting the number means having to use high-performance computers. If the solution is found and verified, the miner can add a new Bitcoin to the chain. This process is called Proof-of-Work (PoW). Miners get paid for their work. For Bitcoin, the process of mining automatically becomes harder. One effect of this is the rising use of energy by miners. The University of Oxford tracks the energy consumption of Bitcoin and has a global mining map.
Ether (ETH)
Ether is the coin used by Ethereum and is considered a Bitcoin alternative. The creators introduced the option to create “smart contracts”. This one feature is the main reason why Ethereum is very popular. Not all, but many decentralised finance projects use Ethereum.
A “smart contract” is simply a piece of code that is running on Ethereum. It’s called a “contract” because code that runs on Ethereum can control valuable things like ETH or other digital assets. A smart contract will define specific rules. If the rules are fulfilled, the “contract” will execute automatically. This way, all participants can be sure that a given transaction will be completed, even if the participants do not know each other or cannot trust each other.
Ether is the second most popular cryptocurrency, but total market capitalisation is less than Bitcoin. Trust is created through the blockchain and the smart contract; the participants trust the network, even if they do not trust the other party in exchange. Like Bitcoin, a new Ether coin is mined. https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/consensus-mechanisms/pow/mining/ To reduce the energy needed to create a new block, Ethereum has been working on an update to the software, which will change the approach to mining. The principle will change from Proof-of-Work (the process used by Bitcoin) to Proof-of-Stake (which strongly reduces the energy needs).
Litecoin (LTC)
Litecoin was launched in 2011 by a former Google engineer. Litecoin is in some ways comparable to Bitcoin. Some people describe it as the “silver to Bitcoin’s gold”. Key differences are: It is easier and faster to generate a new block in comparison to Bitcoin. On the Litecoin homepage, the approach is positioned as “the cryptocurrency for payments”. https://litecoin.org
So here is another partial answer as to why there are so many crypto coins: Firstly, it is not overly difficult to create a new one. Secondly, the creators might have a good reason to do so. Litecoin, as the name implies, aims to simplify things that are more complex with older coins. The value of any crypto coin depends on two main factors: Whether developers are using them in their applications and whether any merchants are accepting them as payment. As of November 2021, Litecoin has a market capitalisation of $14 billion and a per-coin value of $200. https://litecoin.org
Cardano (ADA)
This alternative coin was started by a co-founder of Ethereum, who left the former project because of different views on how the technology should evolve into the future. Today the project is further developed by a group of scientists and developers. Members of the group have published multiple scientific articles to secure users’ trust and make the right decisions on how to structure Cardano.
Cardano uses a so-called “Ouroboros proof-of-stake”. (Yes, all these words and concepts are not easy to understand. ) Ouroboros is the name of a family of consensus protocols, enabling the creation of permissioned and permissionless blockchains. The Cardano project states: “A proof-of-stake protocol that provides and improves the security guarantees of proof-of-work at a fraction of the energy cost. Ouroboros applies cryptography, combinatorics, and mathematical game theory to guarantee the protocol’s integrity, longevity, and performance and that of the distributed networks that depend upon it.
Polkadot has a great (easy to remember) name. It is a protocol designed to enable interoperability between different blockchains. Differences between blockchains can be whether the process is permissioned or permission-less. Because there are differences, Polkadot can act as a translator.
A second reason to use Polkadot is the concept of “shared security”. New blockchains are, in general, more accessible to attack than older, larger chains. The larger a chain gets, the more complex it would be to “overtake” it and forge transactions. Here Polkadot helps new projects by allowing them to start while “sharing” the security of the older network. Like with Cardano, the creator of Polkadot was an early member of the Ethereum team. The Polkadot project homepage is here.
Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
We already saw that the early team members of Ethereum left that project to start with new approaches. Something similar happened between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash. Because the whole concept is relatively new, debates on letting the underlying software evolve are common and valuable. If there is no agreement, there are two options: Start a new project. Or, as in the case of Bitcoin Cash, perform a “hard fork”. The old chainstays, a new chain starts. Bitcoin cash came into being this way in 2017, primarily based on some changes designed to make it more scalable. Bitcoin cash currently has a market capitalisation of $10,5 billion, considerably less than Bitcoin.
Stellar (XLM)
Stellar is a specialised blockchain designed for use by large banks. “Stellar is an open network for storing and moving money”, is the description on the project’s homepage. The main goal is to simplify huge transactions of (traditional) money and make them cheaper. The coin of the Stellar network is called Lumens. The software is specialised but can be used by everyone—more about Stellar.
Tether (USDT)
Tether is a stable coin. The market value is tied to a currency or another fixed reference point. By its definition is described like this: “Tether is a blockchain-enabled platform launched in 2014 to make it easier to use fiat currency digitally. Every USD-pegged TETHER token (USD₮) is pegged to the dollar one-to-one; therefore, 1 USD₮ is always valued at 1 USD by Tether.”
By “pegging” the price for one token to the value of a currency, people who are using or holding Tether do not experience sudden value changes due to speculation. These price changes happen with Bitcoin and Ethereum. Note that there are other Tether tokens connected to other currencies, such as the Euro. More about Tether here.
Binance Coin (BNB)
Binance is one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges. Binance Coin is their self-created currency to let users pay for transaction fees. The BNB was based on Ethereum but has since gained independence by launching its blockchain and infrastructure. Read more about BNB here.
Meme coins
Finally, let us look at two coins which only recently have become popular. These two might be the most confusing. Meme coins are often pushed forward through social media. “They tend to be highly volatile compared to major cryptocurrencies like bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH). This is likely because meme coins are heavily community-driven tokens. Social media and online community sentiments usually influence their prices. This often brings a lot of hype but also FOMO (Fear of missing out) and financial risk. While it’s true that some traders became rich with meme coins, many lost money due to market volatility.” (Source: Binance Academy)
Dogecoin (Doge)
This coin was created as a joke; the two creators wanted to comment on the wild speculations of other coins on the market. Surprisingly though, Dogecoin itself became a subject of speculation and had a spectacular rise in value. But although the concept behind the coin is not as sophisticated as the others, it became widely known. The next step then was that more exchanges opened the option to buy and sell them. Similarly, real-world businesses started to accept Dogecoin as payment. Welcome to the wild west of current cryptocurrencies. More about Dogecoin.
Shiba Inu Coin (Shib)
Even more recently, the whole story was more or less repeated, with a coin called “Shiba Inu”, which to some extend was a copy of Dogecoin. By now, though, there is a particular pattern: Because a few thousand people got very rich being early owners of some coins, they can buy and sell vast quantities of such new coins. At times this triggers wild fluctuations. Shiba Inu managed to overtake Dogecoin in value, at least briefly, in 2021. Why and how it rose is worth reading about but would make this particular story too long.
Coins other than Bitcoin are often called “Altcoins” for “alternative”. But because some of the 7,000 coins in existence do not have a clear purpose or might be used just for speculation, they are sometimes labelled as “shitcoins“. But, specifically for the last two, a more negative term is in use because they are used for speculation and might result in significant losses for people investing in them.
Outlook
It is difficult to say which coin and which blockchain concept will ultimately become the standard. There is a lot of potential for innovation in blockchain and coins. At the same time, the speculation injects a considerable risk.
Key points about Bluesky: As of January 2021 the project has not officially started, nor does it have a dedicated project manager or a team. But based on initiative by Twitter a group of experts investigated what it would mean for Twitter to be decentralised. The findings were published in a report on January 21, 2021.
In this brief article we collected all currently known information about the – potential – project. Further we look at key findings of a report published by a group of experts, initiated by Twitter.
Chronology: On December 19, 2019 Jack Dorsey anounced in a tweet that a small team of five experts would be funded to explore a decentralised standard for social media in general. In other words: Twitter started an exploration how the architecture of social media in general could be changed. Dorsey said that Twitter could “ultimately” become a client of the standard. After this though there was more or less silence about Bluesky.
Update January 2021
Bluesky was mentioned again after quite dramatic events, when Twitter indefinetly blocked the popular account of Ex-US president Donald Trump. In a threat discussing the decision Dorsey mentioned his hope that cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin be the basis for new, decentralised networks and new models for privacy, moderation and monetisation.
What the experts found
A week later an open report got published, based on the findings of a group of experts. The report has 59 pages and provides an overview about existing protocols and applications. At the core it aims to describe the pro’s and con’s of technologies which are already available.
To that end existing applications like Aether, Diaspora and Mastodon and others are discussed. In a dedicated called “Topics” the examination goes into more detail which components could help to create the next generation of social networks. Here aspects such as data, discovery, identity, moderation and business models are discussed.
To provide an example of the content, here is what the authors say about the options to handle privacy using the various components: A big challenge for the shift from todays centralised networks to the future would be monetisation. The report looks at three layers applicable for business models: The application level, provider level and protocol level.
Charging on the application level is what is done mostly in todays centralised social offerings and, in theory, this could be done for decentralised platforms too. This would include advertising or – in reverse – charging a fee from users who want to get an ad-free experience. Another way to monetise would be charges for promoted tweets, charging for custom curation or moderation. In addition a platform could receive a cut of monetised services offered by third parties.
Next comes the provider level. Here charging a commission from applications would be an option. Further members could be charged a fee or for premium features like storage.
As a third option the document discusses something new: How to to create business models at the protocol level, by utilising tokens based on an existing or newly created cryptocurrency.
Brave Browser as an example
As an example the authors talk about the Brave Browser. This alternative browser, created by people who formerly worked on the Firefox browser, uses “Basic Attention Tokens” (BAT) as a currency. An ad must be paid in BAT, for placement. Users of the Brave browser can earn BAT, by looking at ads. They can later donate the BAT to publishers of their choice.
Instead of a newly created currency it would be possible to use existing cryptocurrencies, too.
Summary
It is exciting to see a major platform rethink how it could re-invent itself for a decentralised future. However, project Bluesky is in very early stages. What the building blocks for decentralised platforms are evolving there is no killer-application at the moment and the market for alternative offerings to the main social networks is quite fragmented.
Latest status of project Bluesky, according to a tweet by Jack Dorsey, January 2021
