Ethereum layer 2 scaling network Starknet has outlined plans to improve the decentralization of the three core components of its zero-knowledge proof rollup solution (ZK-rollup).
In an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph, Starknet product manager and blockchain researcher Ilia Volokh outlined the company’s intentions to address certain centralized elements of its protocol, aiming to fend off censorship and make its system more robust.
Starknet operates as a validity rollup, using zero-knowledge proof technology to bundle transactions into rollups and submitting cryptographic proofs to Ethereum for layer 2 transaction security and finality.
According to Volokh, Starknet’s protocol still relies on StarkWare to create L2 blocks, compute proofs, and initiate Layer 1 state updates for the Ethereum blockchain.
“In this sense, the operation of the network is centralized. This is not necessarily a bad thing because although Starkware operates the network, it cannot steal funds or perform any invalid state transitions because they need to be on Ethereum. execute the validator on it,” Volokh explained.
While Starkware remains a “centralized gateway” into Starknet, Volokh added that the protocol is “100% honest” and cannot forge transactions or messages because Ethereum’s first-layer blockchain acts as a filter.
The only tangible ways Starknet could “misbehave” is by either doing nothing and not forwarding proofs to Ethereum, or by specifically censoring transactions or proofs provided by certain parties.
“For example, if a sequencer decides to exclude transactions from a specific entity, they are free to do so as long as the other things they are trying to promote are valid.”
For Starknet, the latter consideration is one of the main reasons for decentralizing parts of its protocol in an effort to combat the two main causes of censorship in consensus-based systems.
Intentional censorship is a consideration, and “non-robust” systems with a single point of failure pose another threat to decentralization, because if that central point causes a network or system outage, all network participants will be ” Review”.
“We want to solve both problems, and we think the obvious solution to solving both problems simultaneously is to have as many people running Starknet as possible.”
Dispersing these different components of the Starknet system presents varying degrees of difficulty. This includes decentralizing block production through consensus protocols, decentralizing the proof layer responsible for calculating block proofs, and decentralizing the L1 state update process.
“What I want to emphasize is that it’s critical to decentralize each of them, because as long as one of them is centralized, you’re not accomplishing much,” Warlock said in unraveling how each component is related. added before the challenge.
Given that all blockchains rely on consensus protocols and Sybil-resistant mechanisms, decentralized block production is fairly simple. At the same time, decentralizing Starknet provers requires a more novel approach.
“As far as I know, we are the first to come up with a compilation of fairly complete and concrete solutions,” Volokh said. He also went on to explain how competitive ZK-rollups essentially aggregate transactions into proofs and publish them on Ethereum, thereby moving its own decentralization onto the rollups solution.
However, these systems all rely on their respective central entities to create and certify blocks, meaning these layer 2s are “equally centralized.” For Volokh, whether end users care about the philosophical implications of L2 centralized components is another topic:
“People who appreciate decentralization do so because they understand that decentralization brings more security and we share those values more than we think people would like them for business reasons.”
Volokh added that Starknet is still outlining the process of testing and implementing these decentralized mechanisms into its network. This could be through a series of interconnected testnets to test the simultaneous functionality of different components.
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