Ethereum’s rollups are ‘gold standard’ but Plasma needs a revisit: Buterin

November 15, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Vitalik Buterin called the early Ethereum scaling solution Plasma “underrated” and a “significant security upgrade” for chains that would otherwise be validiums.

Plasma, a once-prominent Ethereum layer 2 scaling solution, should be revisited by teams currently working on zero-knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machines (EVMs), says Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

Invented in 2017, Plasma diverts data and computation — except deposits, withdrawals and Merkle roots — to an off-chain environment.

It was superseded by optimistic and zero-knowledge (ZK)-rollups as the two solutions offered cheaper client-side data storage costs and security properties that “cannot be matched,” Buterin explained in a Nov. 14 X (Twitter) post.

Exit games for EVM validiums: the return of Plasmahttps://t.co/QgyzXAl0wv
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) November 14, 2023

Buterin said rollups remain the “gold standard,” but Plasma is an “underrated design space” that shouldn’t be forgotten.

“Plasma can be a significant security upgrade for chains that would otherwise be validiums.” Buterin added.

“The fact that ZK-EVMs are finally coming to fruition this year makes it an excellent opportunity to re-explore this design space, and come up with even more effective constructions to simplify the developer experience and protect users' funds.”

Like Plasma, validums move data and computation off-chain but implement ZK-proofs to validate transactions. Plasma, on the other hand, uses fraud proofs — which are much slower.

Buterin argued improvements in ZK-proofs, such as validity proofs, address the past limitations of Plasma, making it more viable as a scaling solution.

Adapting Plasma for applications beyond payments has also proven to be an Achilles heel for Plasma before ZK-proofs entered the mainstream, Buterin acknowledged.

Buterin expects the Ethereum layer 2 ecosystem to evolve with diverse technological approaches.

Babe wake up Vitalik just revived Plasma
— sassal.eth (@sassal0x) November 14, 2023

Minimal Viable Plasma, Plasma Cash and Plasma Cashflow are among the iterations that have stemmed from Plasma.

Ethereum layer 2 scaling-focused firm Polygon Labs implemented Plasma in 2019 but has implemented several other solutions since.

The movement away from Plasma was partially attributed to Plasma Group, a nonprofit research firm announcing that they would cease working on Ethereum-based scalability in January 2020.

OMG, the token of OMG Network — which uses Plasma — spiked 28.6% to $0.78 in a three-hour window following Buterin’s post, according to CoinGecko. However, it has since fallen 14.3% to $0.67.

Magazine: ZK-rollups are ‘the endgame’ for scaling blockchains: Polygon Miden founder

Vitalik Buterin: Ethereum ‘fails’ without these 3 important ‘transitions’

June 12, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Layer-2 scaling, wallet security and privacy-preserving features are all necessary to secure Ethereum’s future, according to the Ethereum co-founder.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin believes the success of Ethereum will come down to three major technical “transitions” that need to happen almost simultaneously — layer-2 scaling, wallet security and privacy-preserving features.

In a June 9 post via his personal blog, Buterin explained that the Ethereum blockchain outright “fails” without sufficient scaling infrastructure to make transactions cheap.

“Ethereum fails because each transaction costs $3.75 ($82.48 if we have another bull run), and every product aiming for the mass market inevitably forgets about the chain and adopts centralized workarounds for everything,” he said.

The Three Transitions:https://t.co/rtewRnm2wK
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) June 9, 2023

Another point of failure, according to Buterin, is around wallet security as it relates to smart contract wallets.

He explained that a move to smart contract wallets has added more complexity for users wishing to obtain the same address across Ethereum and various layer-2s.

Buterin said this issue stands for both Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-equivalent and non-equivalent layer-2s:

“Even when you can have hash equivalence, the possibility of wallets changing ownership through key changes creates other unintuitive consequences.”

*Ethereum needs to improve its layer-2 scalability, wallet security and privacy features, according to Buterin. Source: Vitalik Buterin’s website*

In addition to wallets securing crypto assets, Buterin explained that wallets would need to secure data in order to truly transition into an on-chain world with zero-knowledge rollups:

“In a ZK world, however, this is no longer true: the wallet is not just protecting authentication credentials, it's also holding your data.”

The last of Buterin’s three transitions — privacy — will need to come in the form of improved identity, reputation and social recovery systems.

“Without the third, Ethereum fails because having all transactions (and POAPs, etc) available publicly for literally anyone to see is far too high a privacy sacrifice for many users, and everyone moves onto centralized solutions that at least somewhat hide your data,” he said.

The Ethereum co-founder suggested that stealth addresses could be implemented to resolve this issue.

Buterin said that achieving all three will be “challenging” because of the “intense coordination” involved between them.

He admitted that each of the three transitions “weaken” the “one user — one address” model, which, in turn, may complicate the way transactions are executed.

“If you want to pay someone, how will you get the information on how to pay them?”

“If users have many assets stored in different places across different chains, how do they do key changes and social recovery?" he added.

Buterin concluded by stressing the need to build infrastructure that ultimately improvers user experience:

“Despite the challenges, achieving scalability, wallet security, and privacy for regular users is crucial for Ethereum's future. It is not just about technical feasibility but about actual accessibility for regular users. We need to rise to meet this challenge.”

Magazine: ZK-rollups are ‘the endgame’ for scaling blockchains, Polygon Miden founder

Polygon tests zero-knowledge rollups, mainnet integration inbound

January 14, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Polygon takes zero-knowledge rollups to the final testnet to gauge the performance of its zkEVM ahead of eventual mainnet integration.

Ethereum layer-2 scaling protocol Polygon (MATIC) is carrying out performance testing of zero-knowledge rollup (zk rollups) technology ahead of full integration with its mainnet.

The development of the technology, called Polygon zkEVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine), has been ongoing for over three years by the Polygon Hermez team. The team has already confirmed that zero-knowledge proofs are possible on Ethereum, by generating over 12,000 zk-proofs in a primary version of the zkEVM testnet.

David Schwartz, project lead of Polygon zkEVM and PolygonID, unpacked the development of the functionality in correspondence with Cointelegraph. Layer-2 platforms have continued to evolve and improve functionality which has played a key role in driving Ethereum's scalability.

As he explained, zero-knowledge rollups have increased the speed at which layer-2 platforms can achieve finality while ensuring secure validation of transactions with zero-knowledge technology. In blockchain terms, finality is the point at which a block of transactions is considered to have been permanently and irreversibly added to the blockchain:

“Finally, we have zkEVMs, such as Polygon zkEVM, that offer all the above in addition to the equivalence to Ethereum Virtual Machine with its advanced methods of zk-STARKs and zk-SNARKs.”

According to Schwartz, Polygon zkEVM includes the first complete source code available EVM-equivalent zkProver, which passes all Ethereum vector tests at over 99%. He described the completion of validity proofs for conventional user transactions as "the most challenging and rewarding effort" since his team began developing its native zkEVM.

Two years ago, the Polygon team estimated that developing zk rollups with EVM compatibility would take up to ten years. Given the strides made, the team describes zkEVM as the end game, combining advances with layer 2 scalability and fast finality. This offers a myriad of benefits to users when adding greater throughput and lower fees.

Cointelegraph also queried the difference between Polygon zkEVM and fellow Ethereum layer-2 scaling network StarkNet’s proprietary ZK-SNARK and ZK-STARK technology. As previously reported, ZK-STARKS (Zero-Knowledge Scalable Transparent Argument of Knowledge) primarily increases scalability by batching thousands of transactions with a single proof to confirm validity on chain.

Schwartz said the main difference between the projects is that zkEVM focuses on natively scaling the Ethereum ecosystem instead of other zk-rollups just scaling transactions and enhancing performance in a different VM format.

Polygon’s approach purports to meet the classification of a type 2 zkEVM described by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin in August 2022. As per Buterin’s summary, type 2 zkEVMs aim to be fully compatible with existing applications, but make minor modifications to Ethereum for easier development and faster proof generation. Schwartz added:

“In contrast, StarkNet is positioned as a Type 4, introducing a new high-level language and requiring transpilers to translate solidity code into their language.”

At the same time, Schwartz welcomed the opportunity to have more benchmarks and source code available from other projects in order to learn from different approaches. Activity on Ethereum layer-2 solutions continues to grow, with blockchain data showing that transaction volume Arbitrum and Optimism overshadowed transactions on the Ethereum mainnet going into 2023.

zero-knowledge rollups