Cryptocurrency
Garbled Circuits 101: What Could They Enable for Blockchain Privacy?
Blockchains were originally designed to be transparent, with every wallet and transaction on public display. Many supporters see this ‘trustlessness’ as a strength, but there are some obvious drawbacks, such as the security risk of having all of your financial activity available on-chain.
We can see this in the rates of illicit activity around blockchain, with bad actors accounting for $39.6bn of transaction volume in 2022.
We are also seeing a growing tactic of frontrunning for personal gain, where users with the technical skills to do so, reorder trades before they are committed to a block. By doing this they can ensure their own trades are always profitable.
These are just two examples of why transparency is often seen as a bug, and it’s also why the search for blockchain privacy is heating up. We are now seeing a flurry of innovation within the ecosystem to push for privacy solutions, arguably the last frontier for blockchain.
Blockchain Privacy Solutions
You may already be familiar with Zero-Knowledge proofs or ZKPs, one of the first blockchain privacy solutions to gain widespread adoption. ZKPs allow data to be shared between two parties without revealing any sensitive information. However, they fall short when handling more complex computations.
In many instances blockchain applications need multiple parties to compute solutions together, known as Multi Party Computation (MPC). This is where Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) came into play. About four years ago, FHE emerged as an elegant solution to solve the MPC problem. FHE enables multiple parties to carry out computations on encrypted data without needing to disclose or know the underlying data points in order to retrieve the end result. However, FHE faces significant scaling issues given its high computing costs.
Garbled Circuits, High-speed, Lightweight Blockchain Privacy
Garbled Circuits – a technology developed by Soda Labs and implemented exclusive by COTI – aims to solve the MPC problem with much lower costs to run and far better performance.
In essence Garbled Circuits can be used to make confidential multi-party computations of varying complexity with any number of participants providing inputs. This makes it suitable for complex applications on blockchain protocols including private smart contracts. However, tweaks to the technology today mean that it is less computationally intensive, giving it the ability to scale.
How do Garbled Circuits work?
The concept of Garbled Circuits actually dates back to the late 80s, when it was proposed as a solution to Yao’s Millionaires’ Problem by famous cryptographer Andrew Yao. Imagine that there are two millionaires, Alice and Bob, who want to know who between the two of them has more money. The problem is that no one wants to reveal how much they have exactly. Instead of revealing the amount of money each of them has, they can solve their dispute with the help of Garbled Circuits.
Alice and Bob each write down their net worth in encrypted text, as a string of letters and numbers. Both of them put this piece of paper into a black box, and after a split second, a piece of paper is ejected with the name of the richer person. In this example, the black box is the Garbled Circuit, a powerful computer program that can perform complex calculations on encrypted data without leaking any information.
Garbled Circuits introduce new levels of confidentiality to Web3, protecting data and metadata to enable confidential payments, private/blind auctions and the secure management of sensitive information on-chain without sacrificing performance. COTI has demonstrated the technology’s effectiveness ahead of its integration with Ethereum-based Layer-2 network, COTI V2, which launched in April.
Web3 Use Cases for Garbled Circuits
As blockchain applications grow more complex, a privacy solution is needed that can handle secure MPC without any limit to the number of inputs. In these instances, Garbled Circuits have huge potential.
Confidential DeFI: Garbled Circuits enable confidential transactions, allowing Decentralized Finance (DeFi) apps to maintain regulatory requirements while solving losses from MEV by encrypting transaction data, shielding them from sandwich bots. Just some of the DeFi use cases of GC include private Automated Market Makers (AMMs), undercollateralized lending, dark pools and hybrid exchanges. These can leverage both centralized and decentralized elements while keeping trade details confidential.
Dynamic Decentralized Identification (DID): Garbled Circuits facilitate identity verification and personal information sharing, calculation, and storage without revealing actual data to other parties, ensuring KYC compliance while maintaining user privacy. For instance, decentralized lenders can now establish someone’s suitability for a loan without the individual exposing their wallet address or personal information. The GC breakthrough preserves privacy whilst fulfilling regulatory requirements.
On-Chain Sensitive Data Management: Garbled Circuits allow for encrypted data storage on-chain, enabling analysis of sensitive information without compromising privacy. Data can be safely shared across sites, preventing companies from scraping and selling it. Some of the applications that become possible include confidential on-chain voting systems and healthcare services. By storing encrypted data on-chain, GC satisfies stringent data protection standards whilst still providing the benefits of blockchain data storage and analysis.
One of the main characteristics of Garbled Circuits is their efficiency. Benchmark tests have shown that Garbled Circuits are much faster, lighter and cost-effective than any other privacy-preserving technology available today. This makes GC highly scalable, ensuring that the technology can grow alongside expanding markets such as Real World Assets (RWA) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Confidential Transactions for Payments, Stablecoins and RWA. Garbled Circuits maintains fund flow transparency while encrypting transaction details, ensuring regulatory compliance for payments, stablecoins, and real-world assets (RWA). RWAs include assets like real estate, commodities and securities that require high levels of privacy. GCs ability to ensure privacy, meet regulatory requirements, enhance security, and scale efficiently makes them an ideal choice.
Confidential Machine Learning & AI. Garbled Circuits also enables secure, private interactions with AI and large language models (LLMs), safeguarding data model confidentiality and data source privacy as required by law. GC can be used to enable decentralized and democratic ML model development and opens up new possibilities for privacy-focussed data marketplaces allowing researchers and businesses to work with datasets without exposing sensitive information.
Summary
To summarize, Garbled Circuits are revolutionizing privacy in blockchain applications, offering solutions that cater to various sectors, including DeFi, identity management, sensitive data handling, and AI. With their increased performance and scalability over other privacy solutions like FHE, Garbled Circuits are set to play a pivotal role in the future of Web3.
Authored by: Shafah Ban-Geffen, CEO and CO-Founder of COTI
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Cryptocurrency
PENGU and SPX6900 Prices Pump Despite Market Dip as New Meme Coin Wall Street Pepe Raises $35M
Christmas seems to have come early for Bitcoin and Ethereum bears, as both leading crypto assets have dipped over the last several days. BTC has fallen by almost -13% since December 17, while ETH has dropped by a similar amount at approximately -15%.
Most altcoins have suffered more challenging fates, with many tokens dropping by -30% or more in recent days.
However, as the saying goes, it’s time to buy when there’s blood in the streets – and this is also a key time to find strongly-performing cryptos that continue thriving, even while the market panics. PENGU (the official token of the Pudgy Penguins NFT project) and SPX6900 (a meme coin that satirises the S&P 500) are two such examples.
Both meme coins have seen strong rises on the daily charts, while another new token called Wall Street Pepe is turning heads having just hit the $35 million mark in its ongoing presale.
More Success Incoming for PENGU?
Building on the incredible global success of the Pudgy Penguins NFT collection (a crypto-native project that’s turned into a mainstream entertainment brand), the PENGU token has been subject to some controversy. As soon as the token launched on December 17, the floor price of the Pudgy Penguins NFT collection plummeted by over 50%, wiping out the huge price gains the collection had made since the early days of this month:
As the value of NFT collections is partly dependent on exclusive access to a brand, and the introduction of the PENGU token now means that anyone can invest in Pudgy Penguins at a more accessible price level, this precipitous dip is understandable.
However, the PENGU token is making significant moves in the right direction, breaking out of a descending triangle chart pattern. PENGU is up over 30% in the past 24 hours alone.
As we’ll see in the price chart below, the key resistance level for PENGU ($0.07) is approximately double the token’s current price:
This looks like the start of a potential rally for PENGU, which is already a fantastic achievement under current market conditions. Time will tell exactly where the price action goes from here, but at least PENGU holders haven’t been left out in the cold.
The $PENGU prophecy roadmap
I don’t make the rules ♂️
GCR does pic.twitter.com/3O3lttbXHB
— Lord Durden (@LordDurden) December 23, 2024
SPX6900 Also on the Up
While PENGU does its best to take off, SPX6900 is continuing to consolidate while bullish signals begin to emerge. The token is up over 20% in the past 24 hours, but the big picture is best indicated by the chart below:
Symmetrical triangle chart patterns are usually considered ambiguous rather than bullish – but in this instance, we can see a recent deviation below the green diagonal support line. This indicates a bullish resurgence, which catapulted the price into its biggest pump since late November.
Buy and Hold #SPX6900
It still has 200x in the tank
Yes I am serious
Put 3-5% of your portfolio in it and Hold for 1 Year
Will outperform 99% of your gambles with Way less Stress
Thank me later pic.twitter.com/1hvMYOUKVe
— Murad (@MustStopMurad) November 27, 2024
Since that deviation point, the SPX6900 price has remained volatile, undergoing yet another dip, followed by another pump. This is definitely not a token for the faint of heart, but many investors and traders will still find it preferable to the bearish price action currently afflicting most of the crypto market. $1 remains the most vital resistance point for SPX6900 investors to target – and if we zoom into a lower time frame, we’ll find another interesting insight:
Even on the one-hour chart, SPX6900 has formed another symmetrical triangle that indicates bullish strength. The price is also consolidating below a potential breakout level – and the current chart pattern has a deadline to resolve itself by exactly the point where 2024 ends and 2025 begins, right down to the hour of midnight.
While SPX6900 remains volatile, an interesting meme coin presale has emerged in recent weeks that some investors have been quick to pour into.
Wall Street Pepe Presale Hits $35M – Next Breakout Meme Coin?
While so many crypto traders and investors have been struggling against the market in the past couple of weeks, Wall Street Pepe ($WEPE) has been breaking records. Its recently launched presale has hit $35m in around just 3 weeks, making it one of the fastest-growing ICOs right now.
This unique new meme coin project will give token holders access to special trading insights, strategies, and alpha calls that could increase their chances of making better investment and trading decisions.
By joining the WEPE community, everyday traders – usually considered the “fish” at the mercy of large whales and major institutions – can become empowered and equipped with everything they need to get ahead and win.
Token holders will also be able to enter weekly trading competitions, join the WEPE Army (a private group of insiders), and stake their WEPE tokens to generate passive income with impressive APY rates (currently 37%).
Frog meme coin projects like Pepe and Turbo have already achieved explosive success, and many investors seem to believe WEPE might be next.
Visit Wall Street Pepe Presale
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Cryptocurrency
Litecoin Network Activity Surges, Reaching 401,000 Daily Active Addresses
Litecoin has had an impressive rally this year, surging by almost 50%. The latest market crash, however, briefly dragged the altcoin below $87. The selling pressure has since subsided as Litecoin currently trades above $107.
Underpinning its price trajectory is the strong network growth.
Litecoin Network Engagement Soars
Litecoin’s network activity has witnessed a notable surge. In fact, data compiled by IntoTheBlock revealed that the average daily active addresses rose to 401,000 compared to 366,000 in 2023. Meanwhile, network activity peaked in early January, reaching an impressive 1.37 million active addresses in a single day – surpassing the daily activity of both Bitcoin and Ethereum at the time.
This spike demonstrated the protocol’s growing utility and user engagement amidst a bull season in the crypto industry.
Litecoin has also exhibited long-term investor confidence, as evidenced by data revealing that 53.9% of all LTC ever mined has been held without moving for more than a year, indicating that a large portion of its supply remains off the market.
Furthermore, 85.8% of all LTC has been held for over a month which highlighted a preference for sustained ownership among investors. The average hold time per LTC stands at 2.4 years, suggesting that many holders are not only committed but also view it as a long-term investment.
What’s Next For Litecoin?
One crypto analyst predicted that Litecoin could break its previously established ATH and reach $500 in the ongoing bull market.
While acknowledging that its growth trajectory may appear slow compared to other crypto assets, he highlighted its strong fundamentals and historical resilience as key drivers for upward momentum
Another one drew comparisons between Litecoin’s current market behavior and its performance during the 2017 bull run and suggested that history could be on the brink of repeating itself. The cryptocurrency appears to be showing promising signs of breaking out from its ongoing consolidation phase, with both the Relative Strength Index (RSI) and the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) indicators signaling bullish momentum.
These technical signals indicate that the crypto asset could be gearing up for a surge, positioning it as a potential “dark horse” in the next crypto rally.
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Cryptocurrency
Altcoins Pumping With Bitget, Hedera Among Top Gainers as Best Wallet Raises $5.5M in Token ICO
The broader crypto market is slightly recovering after its market cap dropped from $3.77 trillion to $3.13 trillion between December 17th and 20th.
Today, the crypto market cap stands at $3.31 trillion, but Hedera (HBAR) and Bitget (BGB) are some of the few tokens that stand out in a sea of red. Both are up over 20% in the last day.
However, established coins lack the explosive potential of tokens that are gearing up for launch, and Best Token (BEST) is grabbing attention as its presale gains momentum. With over $5.5 million raised and a unique role in Best Wallet’s ecosystem, it stands a solid shot at making significant gains on launch.
Bitget Secures a Strategic Partnership With TRON, Hedera Seeks to Transform Consumer Engagement
Bitget is already a top-tier exchange with a customer base of more than 45 million users and a daily volume that exceeds $10 billion. Its native token, BGB, is now recording new highs following a strategic partnership with TRON, which revolves around TRON’s meme coin launchpad, SunPump.
The partnership will see Bitget’s support for projects launched on SunPump, such as expedited listings and post-listing marketing, which can increase the visibility of these coins and allow Bitget’s users to invest in them.
The news led to an explosion in BGB’s price, which had a rough week that saw it plummet from $4.87 to $3.66 amidst the market-wide downturn. Today, BGB reached a new ATH at $4.97, and its technical indicators signal it could keep the momentum.
BGB is up 22% in the past day and over 214% in the last month.
With its 50-day Simple Moving Average (SMA) at $2.09 and 200-day SMA at $1.31, Bitget seems ready to make further short-term gains.
We have partnered with SunPump @sunpumpmeme, the memecoin fair launch and trading platform on the TRON network @trondao.
The collaboration aims to foster a plethora of opportunities for groundbreaking projects and community-centric initiatives.
Detailhttps://t.co/om4KdEbe4w
— Bitget (@bitgetglobal) December 20, 2024
HBAR was one of the few altcoins that missed the market-wide rally in November following the US Election Day, but it saw its price skyrocket in early December when it reached a one-year high at $0.3891.
Although its price dropped since, entering this week at $0.2898, HBAR is now priced at $0.3112, following a presentation by Xiang Xu, Mondelez’s leader for digital strategy and blockchain, which outlined the company’s goal to leverage Hedera as they take a step toward a digital transformation.
HBAR is now up 131% over the past month.
Mondelez Internation is a company that owns brands like Oreo, Cadbury, and Tang and is a member of the Hedera Council.
Xiang Xu, Global COE Leader, Digital Strategy Blockchain @MDLZ explores the motivations behind Mondelēz joining the Hedera Council and how they are leveraging #Hedera to transform consumer engagement and build decentralized solutions for tomorrow’s digital economy. #HelloFuture pic.twitter.com/5AhlxyF0eZ
— Hedera (@hedera) December 23, 2024
HBAR’s sudden soar that defies the bearish market can be attributed to its increased visibility following the interview, which is likely drawing retail investors to the ambitious project.
Best Wallet Token a Smart Play for 2025 Altcoin Season?
As BGB soars, another platform utility token that’s catching eyes is BEST token, the native coin for Best Wallet.
Best Wallet is a rapidly growing Web3 wallet that’s leveraging its cutting-edge security and interesting features to achieve its goal of capturing 40% of the non-custodial wallet market by the end of 2026. The wallet already has over 100,000 monthly users despite being relatively new, and has now launched its BEST token presale and already raised over $5.5 million.
Join the $BEST Token Presale!
Stack your $BEST today and lock in the lowest price before it’s gone. Available now on our official website and Best Wallet app.
Every moment counts – don’t miss out!
Download now! https://t.co/AALEwrMCmn pic.twitter.com/975cKh0jLr
— Best Wallet (@BestWalletHQ) November 25, 2024
Currently, the wallet lets its users swap tokens across 50+ chains using its Best DEX feature, access presales in their early stages with Upcoming Tokens, use multiple wallets, and more. The project’s roadmap reveals Best Wallet’s intentions to add derivatives trading, a crypto debit card, an NFT library, a staking aggregator, and numerous other features as it expands.
Those holding BEST will enjoy various benefits, including lower transaction fees on Best DEX and Best Card, and exclusive alpha access to upcoming presales/
To maximize their returns, investors can earn additional BEST by staking their tokens and participating in Best Wallet’s airdrop campaign. The project’s staking APY currently stands at 405%, and participating in the airdrop campaign requires investors to interact with Best Wallet’s X (Twitter) page and complete daily and seasonal quests.
According to an audit by Coinsult, there are no critical threats to investor funds, and with 10% of its total token supply allocated to liquidity, BEST is reducing the risk of market manipulation, fostering a safe trading environment.
Investors don’t have long to secure BEST at its current price of $0.23325, as it is scheduled to increase tomorrow.
Disclaimer: The above article is sponsored content; it’s written by a third party. CryptoPotato doesn’t endorse or assume responsibility for the content, advertising, products, quality, accuracy, or other materials on this page. Nothing in it should be construed as financial advice. Readers are strongly advised to verify the information independently and carefully before engaging with any company or project mentioned and do their own research. Investing in cryptocurrencies carries a risk of capital loss, and readers are also advised to consult a professional before making any decisions that may or may not be based on the above-sponsored content.
Readers are also advised to read CryptoPotato’s full disclaimer.
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