Best match

Most recent

Costume

University of Lagos

Nollywood fastest-growing actress and YouTuber, Bimbo Ademoye, recently went online to express her sincere appreciation of a lady that channelled one of her most popular characters Bimbo had shared the lady's photo saying what she did almost brought tears ...

"This brought tears to my eyes": Bimbo Ademoye says as lady replicates Iya Barakat look for UNILAG Costume day

legit

Get the most recent info and news about SmartClick on HackerNoon, where 10k+ technologists publish stories for 4M+ monthly readers.

SmartClick

Although Ethereum has firmly established itself as the leading blockchain platform capable of running smart contracts, it isn’t without its defects. It has solved some of its problems, such as enormous energy consumption by switching to a proof-of-stake consensus protocol. However, scaling issues continue to exist. Ethereum has a low transaction throughput (approximately 15 transactions per second), slow transaction finality (around 1 minute), and at times high gas fees when the network is under strain. Avalanche is an independent blockchain platform designed to overcome some of the barriers to scalability mentioned above. In this article, we will explore what Avalanche is and its benefits compared to other blockchain platforms. We will also create an ERC-20 smart contract on Avalanche from scratch using Infura. What Is Avalanche? According to its website, Avalanche is the fastest smart contracts platform in the blockchain industry, as measured by time-to-finality. Unlike Ethereum or Bitcoin, Avalanche consists of several chains, each performing a specific task. The Avalanche network's three most important chains are the C-Chain, the X-Chain, and the P-Chain. The C-Chain is an EVM-compatible blockchain capable of running smart contracts. The X-Chain is responsible for token transactions. And finally, the P-Chain maintains consensus among subnets, arguably the most critical component of Avalanche. Through , Avalanche allows anyone to spin up their own instance of a blockchain within the ecosystem. Additionally, users can customize these blockchains to suit their own needs. These custom blockchains can use different consensus protocols (proof-of-work or proof-of-stake) and offer over 4,500 transactions per second without putting any additional strain on the rest of the network. Each one is a sovereign network that defines its own rules. subnets Subnets are one of the most unique features Avalanche offers. Not only can anyone build their own custom blockchain network as a subnet, each one is completely interoperable with the rest of the Avalanche network. This makes subnets a powerful tool for creating custom solutions, while still being part of a broader network. Benefits of Using Avalanche Through the usage of subnets and novel consensus protocols, Avalanche can provide the following benefits: Since there is no upper cap on the number of subnets that can be created, and subnets operate fairly independently, Avalanche can offer extraordinarily high tps rates. Theoretically Infinite Transactions Per Second Avalanche has the lowest time-to-finality in the industry, with transaction confirmation in under two seconds. Low Transaction Finality Avalanche uses proof-of-stake to secure its network, which makes it extremely energy efficient. It also allows validators without access to high-end GPUs to participate. Energy Efficient Over thousands of validators secure Avalanche. And unlike Ethereum or Bitcoin, a small number of pools do not control the vast majority of the network. Extremely Decentralized Creating an ERC-20 Token with Avalanche As mentioned earlier, the Avalanche C-Chain is entirely EVM-compatible. This means it's simple to port projects from Ethereum and other EVM-based chains onto Avalanche. It also means that the mature tools for Ethereum development like devnet, Truffle, and top API suite, Infura work natively to develop on Avalanche. In this section of the article, we will create an ERC-20 contract that implements a cryptocurrency on Avalanche. We will do so using Solidity, Infura, Truffle, and the Truffle Dashboard. Step 1: Install the MetaMask Extension Install the for your browser in case you haven’t already, and follow the instructions put forward by Metamask to create your wallet. MetaMask extension Step 2: Add Avalanche and Fuji Testnet to MetaMask By default, MetaMask comes configured with only the Ethereum mainnet and Goerli testnet. In order to add the Avalanche C-Chain, and the Fuji testnet, follow the instructions in . this document Step 3: Get AVAX from a Faucet Head over to the on the Avalanche website and request a free test AVAX for your wallet. If all goes well, you should see 2 AVAX in your MetaMask wallet. Fuji faucet page Step 4: Get Infura Avalanche / Fuji URL Before we start building the project, let’s get the endpoint we will use. Go to infura.io and either sign up for an account or login, then perform the following: Click on the button and create a new Web3 API project. Create New Key Navigate to the tab and scroll down to . Endpoints Avalanche C-Chain Switch the endpoint from to . MAINNET FUJI Copy the endpoint for future use in this project. Step 5: Install NPM and Node We will build our project using node and npm. In case you don't have these installed on your local machine, you can do so . here To ensure everything is working correctly, run the following command: $ node -v If all goes well, you should see a version number for node. Step 6: Create a Node Project and Install Dependencies Let's set up an empty project repository by running the following commands: $ mkdir my-crypto && cd my-crypto
$ npm init -y We will be using Truffle, a world-class development environment and testing framework for EVM smart contracts, to build and deploy our smart contract. Install Truffle by running: $ npm install -g truffle We can now create a barebones Truffle project by running the following command: $ npx truffle init To check if everything works properly, run: $ npx truffle test We now have Truffle successfully configured. Let us next install the OpenZeppelin contracts package. This package will give us access to ERC-20 implementations (the standard for fungible tokens and cryptocurrencies), on top of which we will build our contract. $ npm install @openzeppelin/contracts Finally, let us install the package that will allow Infura to sign transactions on our behalf using addresses derived from a 12- or 24-word mnemonic. We will use the mnemonic from our MetaMask wallet in step 1 for this purpose. hdwallet-provider $ npm install @truffle/hdwallet-provider Step 7: Writing the ERC-20 Smart Contract Open the repository in your favorite code editor (e.g. VS Code). In the folder, create a new file called . contracts MyCrypto.sol We are going to write a very simple ERC-20 contract that creates a token with an uncapped supply. We will also mint 100 tokens in our wallet. Add the following code to the file: // SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
pragma solidity ^0.8.4;

import "@openzeppelin/contracts/token/ERC20/ERC20.sol";

contract MyCrypto is ERC20 {

    constructor() ERC20("My Custom Token", "MCT") {
        _mint(msg.sender, 100 * 10 ** ERC20.decimals());
    }
} Step 8: Deploy the Smart Contract to Ganache & Fuji In order to deploy the contract to the Fuji testnet, we will require an RPC endpoint. Fortunately, Infura offers access to free, blazing-fast Avalanche C-Chain endpoints. Here’s where the endpoint URL we obtained in Step 4 will come in. Next, in the file, replace the contents of the file with the following: truffle-config.js const HDWalletProvider = require('@truffle/hdwallet-provider');
const INFURA_API_KEY = "<-- Fuji Infura API Key -->";
const MNEMONIC = "<-- MetaMask Wallet Mnemonic or Private Key -->";

module.exports = {
  networks: {
    development: {
      host: "127.0.0.1",
      port: 8545,
      network_id: "*"
    },
    fuji: {
      provider: () => new HDWalletProvider(MNEMONIC, INFURA_API_KEY),
      network_id: '43113',
      gas: 4465030
    }
  },
  compilers: {
    solc: {
      version: "0.8.13",
    }
  }
}; Replace the placeholders in lines 2 and 3 with your Infura Fuji API key and MetaMask wallet's mnemonic respectively. (The latter is the string of 12 words given to you when you first set up your wallet.) Take care to never share this key or mnemonic publicly. Alternatively, you can use your wallet’s private key instead of the mnemonic. This is found in your MetaMask wallet’s tab when you click on . Account Details Export private key Let us ensure that the contract is compiled correctly by running: npx truffle compile If there are no errors, we are clear to deploy the contract. With our smart contract in place, we can now write a simple deployment script. In the directory, create a file called and add the following code: migrations 1_deploy_contract.js const myCryptoContract = artifacts.require("MyCrypto");

module.exports = function(deployer) {
   deployer.deploy(myCryptoContract);
}; Now, before we deploy to the Fuji network, we should ensure it will deploy without any problems. We can do this by first deploying our contract to a local Ganache blockchain instance. To get Ganache running, open up a new terminal and type the following command: ganache Now we can test deployment to Ganache by typing: npx truffle migrate --network development That should produce output in our console similar to this one: Now that we know our contract will deploy successfully, we are all set to deploy our contract to Fuji. From the terminal, run the following command: npx truffle migrate --network fuji If all goes well, your terminal will display the transaction hash and the address of the deployed contract on the Fuji network. Head over to and search for your contract address to view your contract. https://testnet.snowtrace.io/ Step 9: Add Your Token to MetaMask Now that our token exists on a real blockchain, we can add it to our MetaMask wallet. Switch the network on MetaMask to Fuji, and choose on the Assets tab. Here, you can import a custom token by entering the contract address of your token, the name, and the symbol. Import Token If all goes well, you should be able to see your token and a balance of 100 under the tab. Assets Conclusion In an extremely short amount of time, Avalanche has emerged as one of the most formidable alternatives to Ethereum and its ecosystem. Its network of subnets promises faster transactions and low costs at the same time. As evidenced by the token we created in this article, Avalanche uses the same tools Ethereum uses. Therefore, if you are an Ethereum developer, you are also an Avalanche developer by default. To start building on Avalanche using Infura, . check out the documentation here Have a really great day!

How To Deploy An ERC-20 Smart Contract On Avalanche with Infura

GitHub Repo:- https://github.com/PradhumnaPancholi/Figbot Hey everyone! A little while ago, I was learning as it has fantastic tools for developing and auditing smart contracts. And although I loved the experience, I soon learned that it is in the clandestine development stage. This means that casual/individual users can not depend on maintainers for support and updates. Dapp Tools Then I stumbled upon . It has everything that Dapp Tools offers apart from built-in symbolic execution (which is not a problem for me as I use e by Trail of Bits ). And this is auditing related hence not a hindrance in smart contract development by any stretch of the imagination. Foundry Manticor After working with Foundry for a bit, I enjoyed the experience and wanted to share that with others. Hence, this article. This article will go through the benefits of Foundry, the installation process,  developing an NFT (because everyone is interested in that), testing the contract, and deploying it with . Figment Datahub Foundry is a blazing fast, portable and modular toolkit for Ethereum application development written in Rust. Foundry is made up of three components: Ethereum testing framework (like Truffle, Hardhat, and Dapptools). Forge: Swiss army knife for interacting with EVM smart contracts, sending transactions, and getting chain data. Cast: local Ethereum node, akin to Ganache, Hardhat Network Anvil: Today’s focus is going to be on But I will be posting in-depth articles on Caste and Anvil in the upcoming weeks. Forge. Why Foundry: There are many smart contract development tools like Truffle, Hardhat, and Brownie. But one of my primary reasons for looking into Dapp Tools in  the first place was native Solidity tests. Writing smart contracts is not hard when switching between frameworks like Hardhat and Brownie. And they are incredible tools with plugins, but one needs to be well versed in JavaScript/TypeScript and Python to perform testing. Foundry allows us to write our tests natively in Solidity. This saves a lot of time onboarding new developers and makes the process smoother. In my experience of helping people navigate their way into smart contracts development, I have learned that the best and most efficient way for junior developers to engage with DAO/community-maintained projects is by writing tests and learning about the code-base itself. I remember once mentioned that they used the same approach while developing Alchemix Finance on . Scupy Trooples Bankless In addition to that, built-in fuzzing, cheat codes, Cast, and Anvil make it a solid suite for testing smart contracts. There will be more detailed articles on those components coming soon. [Easy to integrate static analyzer] Let’s dive in and build an NFT project now. Installation: If you are on Mac or Linux, all you need to do is run two commands: curl -L https://foundry.paradigm.xyz | bash foundryup Make sure to close the terminal before running . foundryup And Voila! You are all done. For Windows, you need to have Rust installed and then : cargo install --git https://github.com/foundry-rs/foundry --locked Project Setup: For this article, we will be creating a simple NFT project called Figbots. Start by creating a directory called “Figbots.” And  run once you are inside the directory. This command will create a foundry project for you with initialized. forge init git Let’s take a quick look at the folder structure. You have three primary folders, namely src, lib, and test. Very much self-explanatory here, you write your contracts in , tests in , and contains all the libraries you installed, e.g., OpenZeppelin. In addition to that, you get which contains all the configurations just like and if you have used those frameworks. Another sweet thing is .github, where you can write your Github Actions. I find it really helpful for tests when working in a team. src test lib foundry.toml hardhat.config.js brownie-config.yaml Let’s start building! We will create a simple NFT called Figbot with a limited supply, cost (for minting), and withdrawal. With this approach, we can cover edges for different tests. First of all, rename and to and respectively. Now, we can not write smart contracts without Openzeppelin, can we? Contract.sol test/Contract.t.sol Figbot.sol Figbot.t.sol Installing libraries with Foundry is slightly different than Hardhat and Brownie. We don’t have npm or pip packages. We install libraries directly from the Source (GitHub repo) in Foundry. forge install Openzeppelin/openzeppelin-contracts Now we can import the ERC721URIStorage.sol extension to create our NFT. To check that everything is alright, we can run the command , and it will compile our project. The compiler will yell at you if there is something wrong. Otherwise, you will get a successful compile. forge build Managing dependencies Just like any other package manager, Forge allows you to use , and to manage your dependencies. forge install <lib>, forge remove <lib> forge update <lib> Let’s Complete The NFT Contract: We will be using three contracts from the Openzeppelin. Counters, ERC721URIStorage, and Ownable. Time to upload our to IPFS using . We use the Ownable contract to set deploying address and have access to modifier to allow only the owner to withdraw funds. to help us with token id(s) and to keep the NFT contract simple. asset Pinata owner onlyOwner Counters ERC721URIStorage Setting state variable: to 100 MAX_SUPPLY to 0.69 ether COST to CID, we receive from Pinata TOKEN_URI Using Counter for token id: using Counters for Counters.Counter; Counters.Counter private tokenIds; ERC721 constructor: constructor() ERC721(“Figbot”, “FBT”) {} Mint function: Check if is greater than msg.value COST Check if is greater or equal to tokenIds.current() MAX_SUPPLY Perform and _safeMint _setTokenURI Withdraw function: function withdrawFunds() external onlyOwner {         uint256 balance = address(this).balance;         require(balance > 0, "No ether left to withdraw");         (bool success, ) = (msg.sender).call{value: balance}("");         require(success, "Withdrawal Failed");         emit Withdraw(msg.sender, balance);     } TotalSupply function: function totalSupply() public view returns (uint256) {                                         return _tokenIds.current();        } Testing The Contract: As we all know, testing our smart contracts is really important. In this section, we will be writing some tests to get a solid understanding of and get used to writing tests in native solidity. We will be three (I love them!) to manage account states to fit our test scenario. forge test Foundry cheat codes We will be testing for the following scenarios: Max Supply Successful mint Failed mint due to insufficient balance Withdraw (by owner) Cheatcodes As we can have complex logic in our smart contracts. And they are expected to behave differently depending on the state, the account used to invoke, time, etc. To deal with such scenarios, we can use cheatcodes to manage the state of the blockchain. We can use these cheatcodes using instance, which is a part of  Foundry’s library. vm Test We will be using three cheatcodes in our tests : : Sets for all subsequent calls until is called. startPrank msg.sender stopPrank : stopPrank Stops an active prank started by , resetting and to the values before was called. startPrank msg.sender tx.origin startPrank : Sets the balance of an address provided address to the given balance. deal Setup Foundry comes with a built-in testing library. We start by importing this test library, our contract (the one we want to test), defining the test, setting variables, and function. setUp pragma solidity ^0.8.13;

import"forge-std/Test.sol";
import "../src/Figbot.sol";

contract FigbotTest is Test {

  Figbot figbot;
  address owner = address(0x1223);
  address alice = address(0x1889);
  address bob = address(0x1778);
  
  function setUp() public {
      vm.startPrank(owner);
      figbot = new Figbot();
      vm.stopPrank(); 
  }
} For state variables, we create a variable of type . This is also the place where I like to define user accounts. In Foundry, you can describe an address by using the syntax . you can use any four alphanumeric characters for this. I have created the accounts named owner, Alice, and bob, respectively. figbot Figbot address(0x1243) Now our function. This is a requirement for writing tests in Foundry. This is where we do all the deployments and things of that nature. I used the cheatcode to switch the user to the “owner.” By default, Foundry uses a specific address to deploy test contracts. But that makes it harder to test functions with special privileges like . Hence, we switch to the “owner” account for this deployment. setUp startPrank withdrawFunds Test MaxSupply: Starting with a simple assertion test to learn Foundry convention. By convention, all the test functions must have the prefix . And we use to test if two values are equal. test assertEq We call our function and test if the result value is 100, as we described in our contract. And we use to run our tests. MaxSupply forge test And Voila!!! we have a passed test. Test Mint: Now that we have written a simple test, let’s write one with cheatcodes. The primary function of our contract. Switch user account to Alice. Set Alice’s balance to 1 ether Call the mint function Check if Alice is 1 balanceOf TestFail Mint: We have another testing function used for tests that we expect to fail. The prefix used for such a test is . We will test if the function reverts if the caller has insufficient funds. testFail mint Switch user account to Bob Set Bob’s balance to 0.5 ether (our NFT is 0.69 ether) Call the mint function (it will be reverted due to not having enough funds) Check if Bob is 1 balanceOf Because mint didn’t go through, the balance of Bob is not going to be 1. Hence, it will fail, which is exactly what we are used for. So when you run , it will pass. testFail forge test Test Withdraw: Here we will test a function that only the “owner” can successfully perform. For this test, we will : Switch user to Bob Give Bob’s account the balance of 1 ether Mint a Figbot from Bob’s account ( this will give the contract a balance of 0.69 ether ) Switch the user to the owner account Perform function ( if successful, it should make the owner’s balance 0.69 ether) withdrawFunds To verify, we assert if the owner’s balance is 0.69 ether Deployment: Now that we have tested our contract, it is time to deploy it. We need private keys to a wallet (with some Rinkeby test ETH) and an RPC URL. For our RPC URL, we will use . Figment DataHu Figment DataHub provides us with infrastructure to develop on Web 3. It supports multiple chains like Ethereum, Celo, Solana, Terra, etc. Setting up Figment DataHub: Create an account on . Figment DataHub Click on “Create New App.” Fill in the app name. Choose “Staging” for the environment. Select “Ethereum” from the provided options. You can get your RPC URL for Rinkeby from under the “Protocols” tab. Open your terminal to enter both of these things as environment variables. export FIG_RINKEBY_URL=<Your RPC endpoint>
export PVT_KEY=<Your wallets private key> Once we have the environment variables, we are all set to deploy forge create Figbot --rpc-url=$FIG_RINKEBY_URL --private-key=$PVT_KEY Verification: We are almost done here. So far, we have written, tested, and deployed a smart contract with Foundry and Figment DataHub. But we are not entirely done just yet. We are now going to verify our contract. We will need to set up our API key for that. Etherscan export ETHERSCAN_API=<Your Etherscan API Key> And now we can verify our smart contract. forge verify-contract --chain-id <Chain-Id> --num-of-optimizations 200  --compiler-version <Compiler Version> src/<Contract File>:<Contract>  $ETHERSCAN_API Congratulations! Now you can write, test, and deploy smart contracts using Foundry. I hope you enjoyed and learned from this article. I indeed enjoyed writing this. Feel free to let me know your thoughts about it.

How to Build an NFT Project with Foundry & Figment DataHub

Cómo construir un proyecto NFT con Foundry & Figment DataHub

Comment créer un projet NFT avec Foundry & Figment DataHub

फाउंड्री और फिगमेंट डेटाहब के साथ एनएफटी प्रोजेक्ट कैसे बनाएं?

Foundry & Figment DataHub を使用して NFT プロジェクトを構築する方法

Como construir um projeto NFT com Foundry & Figment DataHub

Cách xây dựng một dự án NFT với Foundry & Figment DataHub

如何使用 Foundry 和 Figment DataHub 构建 NFT 项目

44,000 startups. 4,553 cities. “4 billion votes” It was such a blessing to get to know so many of your ideas and innovations from every corner of the world in 2021. The startup community amazed all of us with your hard work and persistence despite all of the challenges that we faced globally throughout last year. Not gonna lie, the competition got our hearts racing like Eurovision. We won’t let you wait for much longer, below are long-awaited results! ✨✨✨ To see who is a winner in each respective city, visit and pick a city. The name at the top of the list is the winner. (Compromised awards are under review.) startups.hackernoon.com The will announce the winners per region in their respective cities. Startups Winners Announcement Series 🔥 Central Europe Central Europe has always caught our attention with the talented pool of people in tech community. But were they able to get through 2021 despite the pandemic? Let’s cheers to the most outstanding amongst 4,500+ startups who have been working hard this year: Basel, Switzerland An overwhelming vote for ~ in their mission of helping machinery companies drive more service revenues from their installed base MachiQ Software Berlin, Germany We have with a whooping 538 votes! Let’s support Plan A with its mission to help companies to measure, monitor and reduce their environmental footprint. Plan A Düsseldorf, Germany It doesn’t get any easier with Kicking off in helping people organize online schedules more easily. EasyWeek! Geneva, Switzerland Manage code quality? We have to give props to for their startup! SonarSource Hamburg, Germany Taking over Hamburg is , an acoustic device to reduce noises in vehicle cabins. No more annoying sounds on the road 🚗 ReCalm Köln, Germany Small business? Hoping to manage your marketing campaign? is winning the vote! rankingCoach Lausanne, Switzerland is a Swiss-based company focused on cryptocurrency management solutions built for financial institutions. Metaco Leipzig, Germany empowers companies to operate and utilize drones for the most effective industrial data applications. FlyNex Mainz, Germany is growing sustainable digital mobility startups! Next Mobility Labs Munich, Germany wins for top-line, high-security international Identity Management! ORY Stuttgart, Germany Remote desktop application? Ask anywhere. AnyDesk Vienna, Austria , an IT company enabling privacy-preserving big data applications in the digital age. Mostly AI Zug, Switzerland Way to go 1762 votes for the first provably live pure Proof-of-Stake (PoS) CBC-Casper blockchain designed for real-world applications. CasperLabs! Nyon Calling for robust data solutions for impact-driven organizations! Havuta LLC Zürich is revolutionizing small business lending to give easy access to capital to those who need it most: SMEs ✨ Teylor Heidelberg, Germany is an innovative HR startup providing a solution for fast and efficient recruiting of employees with simple job profiles. Talk'n'Job Stuttgart, Germany Congratulations for winning this title! AnyDesk Moving on to our buddies in... 🔥 Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is home to many familiar big names in our start-up world. Trace history for Miro, Telegram, and Grammarly and you know where they are from. Who is the next generation for Eastern European startups? Budapest, Hungary is a platform for mobile app development, enabling tens of thousands of developers to automate integration, testing, and deployment. Bitrise I__ __ stanbul, Turkey Leading here is - a brand new software intelligence platform- helps organizations deliver faster, high-quality products by connecting their DevOps tools. Oobeya Kraków, Poland is a human cloud platform that connects global enterprises with European software houses, offering tech talent as a service. Talent Alpha Kyiv, Ukraine 281 votes for , an AI powered app where people can swap faces in the videos, GIFs and images in just a few seconds. Reface Sofia, Bulgaria 387 votes for __ __378, leading Blockchain and DLT solutions company that specializes in helping enterprises and blockchain startups design, build and scale innovative solutions using Blockchain & DLT! LimeChain Warsaw, Poland is a next-generation blockchain document management software (DMS). DoxyChain Yerevan, Armenia Whoever clicked to vote for was sure a vote, because it ended up winning as a full-service software provider delivering Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning solutions for businesses. SmartClick smart Almaty Just like the name suggested, provides one pass to dozens of gyms and studios. 1FIT Debrecen got all the coders ranked figured out! CodersRank Kharkiv is complete solution digital assets management! Pics.io Minsk, Belarus with 243 votes is the first blockchain-powered sports media platform. Scorum Moscow, Russian Federation 1 e-grocery company in Russia with 26 votes and #1 on our HackerNoon board for Minsk. SberMarket Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation leads this area as a personal finance application that rewards responsible spending and savings. CoinKeeper Kazan, Russian Federation Smelling a sweet victory? 3d App designers for flower bouquets is in the house! Flowito Western Europe 🔥 Brexit? Pandemic? It seems like startups in Western Europe still keep their spirits regardless. Startups in Western Europe that stood out in votes this year go to: Antwerp is on a streak! As a bug bounty platform, it ensures online security through a crowd-sourced platform for computer experts. intigriti Belfast A record-breaking 10,003 votes? is an independent coffee shop. Come grab a coffee! Bobs & Berts Birmingham What’s happening in Birmingham? We have , an innovative UK-based advanced lithium battery developer aiming to accelerate the global shift to cleaner. Aceleron Bordeaux 30 is an open-source web framework for building modern apps and websites with Vue.js. NuxtJS Boulogne-billancourt is a software company that provides an in-store analytics platform to optimize operations. DiGEiZ Brighton In for some jam? offers musical education services. BIMM Bristol Another tasty victory for Western Europe is enabling the strongest digital encryption on the internet. KETS Quantum Security Brussels A fashionable win for , a social fashion network. You scan barcodes in fashion shops and see every influencer wearing those outfits! Share your wishlist with your friends and earn cashback. SCANDALOOK Cardiff is a technology company developing end-to-end digital connectivity for the point-of-care diagnostics market. Bond Digital Health London A whooping number of 1085 vote__ __ offers hardware based cyber-security solution for authentication and encryption in a wired local network. Crypto Quantique Edinburgh Hopping up on the crypto movement, just launched last year but they are already rocking it at making crypto accessible to everyone. Zumo Ghent 5379 votes for ! A Belgian InsurTech startup that helps insurance providers all over the world to better connect with their digital customers. WeGroup Glasgow specializes in single-cell analysis transforming the life sciences. Biomage Paris Show some love in the city of love for , a sports platform that is connected to a mobile sports coaching application. AirFit Aberystwyth enables artificial intelligence, data science & digital innovation solutions for the agriculture, biotech & life sciences industries. Agxio Norwich Congratulations for the amazing win of 1124 votes! WATR Charleroi Congratulations for your amazing win! Hirering Gibraltar Give a round of applause to Fortknoxter! Waltham Abbey is ruling the area with its amazing 72 votes! RPAIR Antwerpen Rocking up Antwerpen area is the rising startup ! Willow Egham What’s happening in Egham? Proudly announcing winning the Noonies this year! ATA.ONE Leicester Leicester is calling the name of as the winner for the region! DeadHappy Macclesfield Who else but ? Congratulations on dominating the award! AeroCloud Northern Europe 🔥 Want to listen to some music? Spotify. Need some games to kill time? Candy Crush. What about a quick call to someone you haven’t seen in a long time? Skype. These are all startups that originated from Northern Europe! Noonies, let’s take a look at the upcoming generation of startups from Northern Europe that hopefully will see an even bigger and brighter future. Gothenburg, Sweden Shipping was never made for small shippers, so took on the mission to built an end-to-end logistics platform to empower small businesses to spend less time and money on shipping and more time on growing their businesses. Sendify The Netherlands provides a virtual platform for many kinds of conferences and events. Let's Get Digital Helsinki, Finland A curated collection of public basketball courts in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area called . Everyone is welcome to submit to their local court. Koripallopaikat Lund, Sweden develops an antibiotic-free, safe and effective treatment of vaginal fungal infections. Gedea Biotech Luxembourg, Luxembourg 🚀 is a job-matching platform that connects developers and tech experts with CTOs and team leads from the best tech companies across Europe. 👾 nexten.io Malmö, Sweden Feeling studious, Noonies? __ __e is a tool for Google Classroom, that enables formative matrix assessment towards course learning objectives directly. StudyBe Oslo, Norway is the platform supports a unified API across all connected device categories, removing significant friction for app developers. Domos Labs Reykjavík, Iceland __ __s is a mobile-first technologically advanced neo-bank. Indo service #S__ __ tockholm, Sweden is the biggest blockchain start-up in Sweden. Double winner of the most prestigious nomination in Nordics 'NyTeknik 33-listan', winner of the Deloitte Fast 50, and now Noonies Award! ChromaWay AB T__ __ allinn, Estonia Passing 1000 votes is a fully digital and decentralized ecosystem for all actors in supply chain. OBORTECH Vilnius, Lithuania is an easy-to-use money app for cards and accounts. Via Genome, users can open a business or a merchant account or a personal one with dedicated IBANs, access transfers, exchange currency, process payments, and manage the funds. Genome Aalborg Digura A legaltech offering tenants fast, digital and reliable legal assistance Aarhus Partisia Market Design provides secure, simple, efficient solutions for auctions and exchanges realizing the potential of the market. Helsingborg is a hi-tech company developing cardiac occlusion devices and other vascular implants. Occlutech Tallinna is an AI-powered system for marketing automation in social networks. POSTOPLAN 🔥 Southern Europe Southern Europe’s economy went through a hard time this year due to a huge reduction in tourism. But our startups are of course always headstrong, from Spain to Italy and all the way through Greece. Who are the heroes rising amidst changes of Southern Europe? Skopje is a versatile software development company that solves the business challenges of SMBs, big brands, and brave hearts with awesome ideas. CodeChem Sliema Sounds like just a relaxing exhale. is a holistic health and wellbeing app built to allow users work on the development of their physical, mental and spiritual health Few Tajonar is a company of experienced business & industry entrepreneurs offering solutions to industries based on cutting-edge technologies. das-Nano Tarragona is a technology-based company focusing on the production of integrated microsystems. IMICROQ Terni is an ICT-based integrated solution that is able to modulate, respond, assist and learn to control most home activities. Mind Tirana is a video content and e-commerce platform for the Balkans built on top of an Albanian language specialized search engine. Gjirafa Torino develops and commercializes algorithms based on Artificial Intelligence to increase the autonomy of small satellite missions. AIKO T__ __ orres Buy online groceries like you would buy offline with personalized picking as fast as in 4 hours with Vedras 360hyper! Trento is a music-based platform built around streaming platforms that allow users to discover new emerging artists and make new friends. Brots 2021, what a YEAR. Congratulations to all of the startups that made it to the top winning list for Europe! Stay tuned for Startup awards in 2022 and let’s cheers to a new year of more innovative ideas, bold innovations, and robust creations from you, Europe 🌷 More Information: If you’re a winner, please answer ! If you’re a reader, participant, just a curious individual, consider answering one of our interviews . this interview here Read the FAQs about or . Startups here here To see all of the winners you may visit , pick any city and view the name that appears at the top. this site If you’re interested in partnering with us, we invite you to look through some of these or reach out to our business department. unique sponsorship options Perhaps creating your very own tickles your fancy or maybe you have a whole new idea for how we can partner! writing contest Thank you to all of our sponsors! We truly appreciate your contribution to the tech world and thus the future! The Startups Awards are sponsored by: , , , , , , , , , , Blockster Brex FreeCodeCamp LaunchDarkly Coil Udacity Udemy Vercel Asia Pacific Transgender Network Bybit Everscale Network This post was written by An Le and edited by Natasha Nel. If you have any questions or concerns or would like to report a discrepancy please email ellen@hackernoon.com.

Meet the Winners of Startups in Europe

The goal of this article is to demonstrate how to create an ERC20 token in as little time as possible. Let’s start with the basics: What is an ERC20 token? In recent years, the ERC20 token specification has become the defacto standard for Ethereum tokens. In other words, most Ethereum contracts out there today are ERC20-compliant. This article will detail how you can create your own Ethereum token, but before we get started, let’s take a closer look at the ERC20 standard. What makes ERC20 tokens so attractive and successful? There are several factors in play: ERC20 tokens are simple and easy to deploy, as you will see in this tutorial. The ERC20 standard solves a significant problem, as blockchain-based marketplaces and crypto-wallets need a single, standardized set of commands to communicate with the range of tokens they manage. This includes interaction rules between different tokens, as well as token purchase rules. It was the first popular specification to offer Ethereum token standardization. It was not by any means , but thanks to its popularity, it quickly became the industry standard. the first Just like other Ethereum tokens, ERC20 tokens are implemented as smart contracts and executed on the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) in a decentralized manner. Solidity: the Smart Contract Programming Language Ethereum smart contracts are written in Solidity. While there are alternative languages, hardly anyone uses them for this purpose. Solidity is similar to JavaScript, so if you have some knowledge of JavaScript, or even Java and other C-like languages, you should have no trouble figuring out that a piece of code in Solidity does, even before you actually master Solidity enough to use it. This is where the fun starts, as you should be able to start creating a simple ERC20 contract in no time. This is a straightforward task, simple enough that this article will demonstrate how you can write and deploy an ERC20 token in under an hour. The token we will be creating in this demonstration will be a bare-bones ERC20 implementation, without too many bells and whistles. However, I have seen many similarly simple tokens in the real world, and they tend to do quite well. Overview of ERC20 Token Standard What is ERC20? Put simply, the ERC20 standard defines a set of functions to be implemented by all ERC20 tokens so as to allow integration with other contracts, wallets, or marketplaces. This set of functions is rather short and basic. function totalSupply() public view returns (uint256); function balanceOf(address tokenOwner) public view returns (uint); function allowance(address tokenOwner, address spender) public view returns (uint); function transfer(address to, uint tokens) public returns (bool); function approve(address spender, uint tokens) public returns (bool); function transferFrom(address from, address to, uint tokens) public returns (bool); ERC20 functions allow an external user, say a crypto-wallet app, to find out a user’s balance and transfer funds from one user to another with proper authorization. The smart contract defines two specifically defined events: event Approval(address indexed tokenOwner, address indexed spender, uint tokens); event Transfer(address indexed from, address indexed to, uint tokens); These events will be invoked or when a user is granted rights to withdraw tokens from an account, and after the tokens are actually transferred. emitted In addition to standard ERC20 functions, many ERC20 tokens also feature additional fields and some have become a de-facto part of the ERC20 standard, if not in writing then in practice. Here are a few examples of such fields. string public constant name; string public constant symbol; uint8 public constant decimals; Here are a few points regarding ERC20 and Solidity nomenclature: A public function can be accessed outside of the contract itself view basically means constant, i.e. the contract’s internal state will not be changed by the function An event is Solidity’s way of allowing clients e.g. your application frontend to be notified on specific occurrences within the contract Most Solidity language constructs should be clear if you already possess essential Java/JavaScript skills. Writing an ERC20 Token in Solidity Now that we’ve outlined the basics and explained what it takes to create an ERC20 token, it is time to start writing some logic. First, we need to define two mapping objects. This is the Solidity notion for an associative or key/value array: mapping(address => uint256) balances; mapping(address => mapping (address => uint256)) allowed; The expression mapping(address => uint256) defines an associative array whose keys are of type address— a number used to denote account addresses, and whose values are of type uint256 — a 256-bit integer typically used to store token balances. The first mapping object, balances, will hold the token balance of each owner account. The second mapping object, allowed, will include all of the accounts approved to withdraw from a given account together with the withdrawal sum allowed for each. As you can see, the value field of the allowed mapping is by itself a mapping plotting account address to its approved withdrawal sum. These mappings together with all other contract fields will be stored in the blockchain and will be resulting in changes being propagated to all network user nodes. mined Blockchain storage is expensive and users of your contract will need to pay for, one way or another. Therefore you should always try to minimize storage size and writes into the blockchain. Now that we have the required data structures in place, we can start to actually write the ERC20 logic into the appropriate functions. Setting the Number of ICO Tokens How do we set the number of ICO tokens? Well, there are a number of ways of setting the maximal number of ICO tokens and this matter might be worth a lengthy discussion by itself. For the needs of our ECR20 tutorial, we shall use the simplest approach: Set the total amount of tokens at contract creation time and initially assign all of them to the “contract owner” i.e. the account that deployed the smart contract: uint256 totalSupply_; constructor(uint256 total) public { totalSupply_ = total; balances[msg.sender] = _totalSupply; } A constructor is a special function automatically called by Ethereum right after the contract is deployed. It is typically used to initialize the token’s state using parameters passed by the contract’s deploying account. msg is a global variable declared and populated by Ethereum itself. It contains important data for performing the contract. The field we are using here: msg.sender contains the Ethereum account executing the current contract function. Only the deploying account can enter a contract’s constructor. When the contract is started up, this function allocates available tokens to the ‘contract owner’ account. Get Total Token Supply function totalSupply() public view returns (uint256) { return totalSupply_; } This function will return the number of all tokens allocated by this contract regardless of owner. Get Token Balance of Owner function balanceOf(address tokenOwner) public view returns (uint) { return balances[tokenOwner]; } balanceOf will return the current token balance of an account, identified by its owner’s address. Transfer Tokens to Another Account function transfer(address receiver, uint numTokens) public returns (bool) { require(numTokens <= balances[msg.sender]); balances[msg.sender] = balances[msg.sender] — numTokens; balances[receiver] = balances[receiver] + numTokens; emit Transfer(msg.sender, receiver, numTokens); return true; } As its name suggests, the transfer function is used to move numTokens amount of tokens from the owner’s balance to that of another user, or receiver. The transferring owner is msg.sender i.e. the one executing the function, which implies that only the owner of the tokens can transfer them to others. Solidity’s way of asserting a predicate is require. In this case that the transferring account has a sufficient balance to execute the transfer. If a require statement fails, the transaction is immediately rolled back with no changes written into the blockchain. Right before exiting, the function fires ERC20 event Transfer allowing registered listeners to react to its completion. Approve Delegate to Withdraw Tokens This function is most often used in a token marketplace scenario. function approve(address delegate, uint numTokens) public returns (bool) { allowed[msg.sender][delegate] = numTokens; emit Approval(msg.sender, delegate, numTokens); return true; } What approve does is to allow an owner i.e. msg.sender to approve a delegate account — possibly the marketplace itself — to withdraw tokens from his account and to transfer them to other accounts. As you can see, this function is used for scenarios where owners are offering tokens on a marketplace. It allows the marketplace to finalize the transaction without waiting for prior approval. At the end of its execution, this function fires an Approval event. Get Number of Tokens Approved for Withdrawal function allowance(address owner, address delegate) public view returns (uint) { return allowed[owner][delegate]; } This function returns the current approved number of tokens by an owner to a specific delegate, as set in the approve function. Transfer Tokens by Delegate The transferFrom function is the peer of the approve function, which we discussed previously. It allows a delegate approved for withdrawal to transfer owner funds to a third-party account. function transferFrom(address owner, address buyer, uint numTokens) public returns (bool) { require(numTokens <= balances[owner]); require(numTokens <= allowed[owner][msg.sender]); balances[owner] = balances[owner] — numTokens; allowed[owner][msg.sender] = allowed[from][msg.sender] — numTokens; balances[buyer] = balances[buyer] + numTokens; Transfer(owner, buyer, numTokens); return true; } The two require statements at function start are to verify that the transaction is legitimate, i.e. that the owner has enough tokens to transfer and that the delegate has approval for (at least) numTokens to withdraw. In addition to transferring the numTokens amount from owner to buyer, this function also subtracts numTokens from the delegate’s allowance. This basically allows a delegate with a given allowance to break it into several separate withdrawals, which is typical marketplace behavior. We could stop here and have a valid ERC20 implementation. However, we want to go a step further, as we want an industrial strength token. This requires us to make our code a bit more secure, though we will still be able to keep the token relatively simple, if not basic. SafeMath Solidity Library is a Solidity library aimed at dealing with one way hackers have been known to break contracts: integer overflow attack. In such an attack, the hacker forces the contract to use incorrect numeric values by passing parameters that will take the relevant integers their maximal values. SafeMath past protects against this by testing for overflow before performing the arithmetic action, thus removing the danger of overflow attack. The library is so small that the impact on contract size is minimal, incurring no performance and little storage cost penalties. SafeMath Let’s add to our code: SafeMath library SafeMath { // Only relevant functions function sub(uint256 a, uint256 b) internal pure returns (uint256) { assert(b <= a); return a — b; } function add(uint256 a, uint256 b) internal pure returns (uint256) { uint256 c = a + b; assert(c >= a); return c; } } uses assert statements to verify the correctness of the passed parameters. Should assert fail, the function execution will be immediately stopped and all blockchain changes shall be rolled back. SafeMath Next, let us add the following statement introducing the library to the Solidity compiler: using SafeMath for uint256; Then, we replace the naive arithmetics we used at the beginning with SafeMath functions: balances[msg.sender] = balances[msg.sender].sub(numTokens); balances[receiver] = balances[receiver].add(numTokens); balances[buyer] = balances[buyer].add(numTokens); balances[owner] = balances[owner].sub(numTokens); Packing it all Together In Solidity, a smart contract’s functions and events are wrapped into an entity called a which you can silently translate to a “blockchain class.” Below is the ERC20-compatible contract we created, including a Gist of our code. The name and symbol fields can be changed at will. Most tokens keep the decimal value at 18, so we will do the same. contract Ethereum Contract Deployment The time has come to . Following deployment, our contract will be transferred to all nodes participating in the network. Any and all changes made to the contract will be propagated to all participating nodes. deploy our contract to the blockchain Ethereum developers usually employ deployment tools such as . Even Truffle is overkill for the limited needs of this article, and a simple online tool called will suffice. Truffle Remix To use it, you will need to install the on your browser and a Rinkeby (Ethereum test network) account with at least some Rinkeby Ether in it. These are relatively simple steps, so we won’t go into detail. MetaMask plugin In case you don’t have either, head over to and for download links and to get clear installation and usage directions. MetaMask Rinkeby Now that we have all the building blocks in place, we will head over to and paste the code above, including the pragma line and the SafeMath library, into the online editor. Remix Then, we will hop over to the second tab to the right called “ ” and click “ .” A MetaMask popup will appear asking us to confirm the transaction. Of course, we’ll approve it. Run Deploy Green box: Make sure you’re on Rinkeby Blue box: Set your total token supply Red box: Deploy! : Gist https://gist.github.com/giladHaimov/8e81dbde10c9aeff69a1d683ed6870be#file-basicerc20-sol You have just deployed your first ERC20 token, like a true . As promised, the token is simple and lightweight, yet fully functional, ERC20 standard compliant, and secured with MathSafe. It is ready to be purchased, paid with, and transferred throughout the Blockchain. Congrats! Ethereum professional Is that all there is to smart contracts? No, not even close, as our brief demonstration barely scratches the surface and deals solely with one aspect of smart contract development. Smart contracts can be much more complex depending on your business logic, your modeling of the user interaction, whether or not you allow token minting and burning, lifecycle changes you introduce into the contract, the need for admin-level capabilities which usually comes with an admin-authorized set of functions, and so on. You get the picture. Still, if you can replicate what we did here, that is a solid foundation to expand your knowledge and move on to more complex contracts when necessary. A smart contract is a piece of code executed on the Ethereum Virtual Machine. An Ethereum smart contract is immutable and can send or receive ether and data. Put simply, ERC20 tokens are contracts that implement the ERC20 standard. Operations handled by these contracts include getting the total supply and balance of tokens, and the methods used to transfer them. Ethereum development is currently conducted in Solidity, a contract-oriented programming language inspired by JavaScript, Python, and C++. ERC stands for Ethereum Request for Comment. The number 20 is assigned to this request, hence the suffix. Originally published at www.toptal.com .

How to Create an ERC20 Token the Simple Way

Founders at Work: 150+ YCombinator Founders’ Stories

341 Stories To Learn About Cloud

This article is coreported with Documented Read on our collaborator's site For many people, an app malfunctioning is scarcely more than an annoyance. But for a Honduran immigrant living in Pennsylvania, a recent glitch elicited fears about the worst-case scenario: that it could hurt her chances of staying in America. As her case works its way through immigration court, the woman, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of negative consequences for speaking with the media, has been required by immigration officials to check in weekly on a smartphone app owned by a subsidiary of the massive private-prison company GEO Group. When she opened it up to diligently take and send a selfie on the designated day, the picture wouldn’t deliver. The app was malfunctioning. And she was terrified. “That whole day, you can’t imagine how I was feeling,” she said in Spanish. She worried officials would incorrectly assume she was dodging them. “If they come knocking on the door, what will I say, what will I do?” Immigration and Customs Enforcement is in the midst of a grand experiment, vastly increasing the number of immigrants it monitors during conditional release, mostly through the use of a smartphone-based application called SmartLINK. In less than three years, ICE has vastly expanded use of the app from , , to more than 230,000 as of June 20, . fewer than 6,000 people in September 2019 according to data kept by TRAC, Syracuse University ICE data shows That’s more than 80 percent of the nearly 280,000 people on monitored conditional release, which ICE calls the Alternatives to Detention program. Many of the others are on ankle monitors. SmartLINK began under President Donald Trump, but the Biden administration has continued to expand it, presenting it as a humane alternative to ankle monitors and detention centers. Its costs aren’t broken out, but overall costs for the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program is about $4.11 per day per immigrant, . according to Department of Homeland Security budget documents As officials trudge through the vast immigration court backlog, many thousands of immigrants could be tethered to the SmartLINK app for years. Both ICE and BI Incorporated, the GEO Group subsidiary that ICE pays to carry out the monitoring, tout the app as a valuable and noninvasive way to keep track of immigrants awaiting court dates on their petitions to stay in the country. “BI SmartLINK provides a secure platform for officers and clients to share information, making remote case management a reality. Mobile communication is immediate, convenient, and timesaving for both officers and clients,” . BI Incorporated says about the technology on its website ICE spokesperson Mike Alvarez said the agency’s Alternatives to Detention program, which is mostly SmartLINK, “increases court appearance rates, compliance with release conditions, and helps the participants meet their basic needs and understand their immigration obligations.” However, there are also other strategies: Studies show that legal counsel is a very effective way of ensuring that immigrants show up to court. The app is certainly more discreet than an ankle monitor and more convenient—it doesn’t require immigrants to be physically tethered to an electrical socket to recharge, for instance. It also does not cause the physical harm that participants have reported with ankle monitors. Another potential benefit: The number of individuals held in detention has also dropped, mostly in step with the increase in people told to report via the app. In , more than 55,500 immigrants were held in detention. July 2019 the detained ICE population fell below 20,000 at four separate points this year—but it’s been rising in recent months. Data kept by TRAC, Syracuse University, shows Alvarez said SmartLINK’s benefits include reminders for upcoming appointments, an in-app database of local community services, and allowing participants to send messages and documents to officers and case specialists through the app. But immigration advocates note that SmartLINK has enabled the government to increase the number of people who are tracked by ICE—and they are concerned about that monitoring. “While ICE has pitched mobile surveillance as a more humane alternative, SmartLink poses heightened surveillance, data collection and human rights threats,” read a released by more than a dozen advocacy organizations who have been closely monitoring the issue, including Just Futures Law and Mijente. recent report In April, three of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California for records about the data SmartLINK gathers. The suit is ongoing. those groups sued Documented conducted interviews with a dozen SmartLINK users, all Spanish-speakers and many of whom characterized the app as an oppressive surveillance system that caused distinct emotional distress. Nearly all requested full or partial anonymity for fear of retribution by government officials. Several immigrants said technical issues with the app made them worry negative consequences for their immigration cases were on the horizon if officials assumed they weren’t following the check-in rules. Some users even said that the psychological toll of living with the SmartLINK app was comparable to that of ankle monitors. “I had an ankle monitor. They took off my ankle monitor and they’re making me use that app. It’s as if I still had it [the ankle monitor] on,” said one Honduran immigrant living in New York City. Many said they were concerned about how the data was used and worried about privacy, particularly about how communication surveillance and location tracking could affect their undocumented family members. Using the to examine the Android version of SmartLINK, Documented and The Markup found that SmartLINK’s permissions are not limited to accessing the device’s camera and location to carry out check-ins, but rather the application also requests permissions to without requiring user permission. Exodus Privacy service record audio and make calls states that the company only collects location information when participants use the app. BI SmartLINK’s privacy policy It also says BI collects app activity, which could include “responses to notifications, in-App search history, web browsing, phone calls, video conferencing, and other actions conducted and information entered within the App.” However, Monica Hook, vice president of communications for GEO Care, said in an email that “regardless of user-approved permissions, BI Incorporated does not record participant audio or video. BI SmartLINK also does not make calls in the application without participant notification and action.” Alvarez, the ICE spokesperson, said that the agency is “committed to protecting privacy rights, and civil rights and liberties of all participants within the Alternatives to Detention Program,” but did not respond to specific questions about what data can be accessed through the app. Documented and The Markup tested how the app worked on the iOS devices of two immigrants who were required to use the app and gave us access to their data using Apple’s privacy reports. recently introduced The reports showed that for these two people over three weeks, SmartLINK accessed the camera and the location information when the app was launched or the person was completing their required check-in. It’s not possible to extrapolate from this small sample to other cases or other operating systems, such as Android or older versions of iOS. Data Security Another issue advocates raised is who else has access to the data the government collects—and who might take it. With an of more than two years for immigration court dates, the app has access to years of information. average recent wait time “There is a concern over what privacy protections BI is implementing for that data, and there’s not a lot of transparency over any conditions ICE has placed onto BI Inc. regarding the storage of that data, how that data gets used,” said Dana Khabbaz, a law fellow focusing on surveillance and immigration issues at the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Experts are also apprehensive about the consumer data industry capitalizing on SmartLINK’s information, Khabbaz said, including location data. “There is a growing trend of law enforcement agencies purchasing that data from data brokers for surveillance purposes,” Khabbaz said. And she wonders who else might be getting access to SmartLINK data. She’s particularly worried about how the photos immigrants sent are being used, given the lack of regulation around facial recognition technology. “It’s concerning that ICE is adopting the use of this technology in an immigration enforcement context,” she said, “including a context where people involved in this program don’t have an option to opt out of it.” The SmartLINK privacy policy says that although BI has not “consented” to the collection of a user’s “personal information by any third parties,” it warns that when participants use the app or its content, “certain third parties may use automatic information collection technologies to collect information” about the users or their device. These third parties can include the mobile device manufacturer, the mobile service provider, or third-party websites, the policy says. A former BI employee who was a case manager in Indiana and worked with dozens of SmartLINK users often questioned what was happening to the data collected through the app, especially with the photos. “No one seemed to want to answer my question,” the former employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said. “What they never told us, and what I always wondered, is where is the data being saved?” , the GEO Group, BI’s parent company, called it a “myth” that BI “abuses” any personal data. On its website The company said ICE owns all the data collected through electronic monitoring, not the GEO Group or BI, and that no biometric data is transmitted from a user’s device. It also that BI follows federal privacy laws and “does not conduct any ‘surveillance’ activities.” states on its website Feeling Surveilled Yet in interviews with Documented, many SmartLINK users said they have received little indication from case managers or other officials about the extent to which officials protect sensitive information in their phones. They were especially concerned about information that could affect their own immigration case, or disclose the whereabouts and legal status of their loved ones. Several SmartLINK users said they go so far as to limit contact with relatives and friends on their devices, especially with those who are undocumented, for fear that ICE could intercept their communications. One Honduran immigrant said she tells people who are undocumented, “No, don’t write to me. I’m going to try and find another phone to call you from.” SmartLINK users say they worry that technical problems with the app—including when it fails to upload a user’s photo or is completely down—could get them in trouble with immigration authorities. Bessy Aguilera, a woman from Honduras living in Illinois, recalls one occasion when she sent in her photo as required, but the app did not register it. Immediately, BI called Aguilera’s brother and told him to ask her to turn on her phone and send the selfie, even though she already had, she said. “It’s something very frustrating that causes a lot of pressure. You really feel awful,” she said. “The app fails, and then they want to know where you are … so then they’re calling and calling and calling to the contact that you gave at the office.” Neither ICE nor GEO answered questions regarding the technical glitches. The GEO Group states that SmartLINK has a “99.9% uptime track record to date.” on its website But the former BI employee who previously worked in Indiana said glitches were not uncommon. “The technology was not good,” the former employee said. “Sometimes it would send a photo, but then the location wouldn’t come on … even if they had location services on.” “ICE Officials Could Come Get Me” And the repercussions for not reporting can be severe. Several users described threatening words from their case managers, who warned them if they did not comply with the rules, they would have an ankle monitor strapped to their bodies. BI and ICE officials didn’t respond to questions about that, but two former employees confirmed it was true in interviews with Documented. Yasmani, an immigrant from Cuba, remembers clearly what officials told him the day they downloaded the app on his phone. “They told me that I had to comply because if not I could get the ankle monitor placed on me again, or ICE officials could come get me.” Alvarez, the ICE spokesperson, said individuals who do not report can be arrested and potentially deported. When Aguilera, the woman from Honduras living in Illinois, once sent her picture without her phone location enabled, she said, she soon received a call from her BI case manager asking her to turn her location on. She immediately thought about how it would affect her immigration status. She lives in fear of making a mistake while monitored through the app, she said. “I was really scared because I imagined that immigration officials could arrive at my house, or the police could,” she said. The Honduran immigrant in Pennsylvania who had trouble with SmartLINK’s camera said she once turned off the GPS location monitoring on her phone to preserve the battery. She soon received a call from officials asking her why she had turned off the GPS, she said. “Every time they call me, I’m scared,” she said. “The truth is … I don’t feel free.” By of Documented Giulia McDonnell Nieto del Rio The Markup’s Surya Mattu contributed to this report. This article was copublished with , a nonprofit news site devoted solely to covering New York City’s immigrants and the policies that affect their lives. Sign up for its newsletter, , which has been an important news source in New York’s immigration community. Documented Early Arrival Also published here Photo by on Oskar Kadaksoo Unsplash

This App Is Tracking 250,000 Immigrants in the U.S.A.

Greetings, dear readers! Today we would like to start a series of articles on what we call the audit methodology. At first, we want to say that in this series we will focus only on those aspects that can be really useful for auditing and bug bounty hacking and that are not anywhere. described We can confidently say that such tips can be read publicly in a few places, and our blog is one of those places! Please right now so you won’t miss the new article, and let’s get started! follow us In their work, auditors use different tools and methods — there are a lot of them. Just look at this and separately at this ultra-specific ; there is no doubt that there are so many of them. According to this , a higher degree of collaboration (e.g., for maintenance efforts) is observed among users in tools than those in the application repos, but there are some tools, that are a kind of gold standard — we will discuss them first — namely about Slither, SmartCheck and separately discuss fuzzing with Echidna. selection tool research First, a few words about our tool, SmartCheck — which can serve as a of what we will talk about next. Even in its raw form, it shows good results, and second place in ToB’s is not bad for a tool we stopped supporting three years ago. We’ll do a separate performance comparison of the two tools in the future. However, let’s move on to Slither. reinforcement article We rely on Slither — a static analysis tool from to maintain the quality of our audits. Considering the ease of use, it’s a good idea to try it out. Trail of Bits Besides its excellent analysis capabilities, it also includes a bunch of printers that summarize different aspects of the contract in a digestible form. One can use them to quickly build a mental contract model before diving deeply into the code. Using printers, one can get a contract summary, check inheritance and contract storage layout, and see utilized modifiers and implemented checks. Besides, some printers can output in *.dot format, so you can see the graph properly. However, multiple printers lose their value for more complex projects since their output becomes unmanageable. Another interesting thing is that it has a Python API that allows the instrumentation of the static analysis engine. This means that the engine to derive specific information from contracts automatically, and in general, can be used to suit the user’s needs. You can also explore machine learning (ML) approaches to automatically improve the performance of Slither via ! can be used Slither-simil https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYDk4K4h8ds&feature=emb_imp_woyt?embedable=true That’s why we get its results on all projects. Going back to what we were talking about — we want to make this article useful primarily for those who want to start a journey into Web3.o security, so below you will see a kind of list of tips with which you can achieve amazing results in your business! ❕ Important: Very few developers strictly follow the safety standards according to this , and it can not help but be alarming. study That’s why you must never forget about when you prepare your workplace — our employees clearly adhere to the and therefore no accidents occur. safety rules (2) (3) Slither does not support some less commonly used Solidity features and may fail even on a high-quality contract. We recommend adjusting the problematic lines until the tool works correctly. Note that it might affect the output if the line numbers change. In our experience, Slither provides enough value to accept these code-style restrictions. I — Slither: Start 1. Make sure there is a python version 3.6+
python3 --version
2. Install Slither via pip:
pip3 install slither-analyzer
3. Make sure you are using the latest version of Slither before you run it. You can check the slither repository on github for release versions.
slither --version github.com/crytic/slither/releases github.com/crytic/slither#how-to-install Sometimes Slither will not update to the correct version or will not install for some reason. In this case, create a new python virtual environment and install Slither there: set up a new environment:  python3 -m venv /path/to/venv
activate the environment:  source /path/to/venv/bin/activate Then install Slither according to the instructions above. Activate the environment each time you use Slither. Typically, we run Slither on all project files (except npm dependencies) and save the results to json, which is then converted to a csv table. To do this at the root of the project, execute: slither . –-filter-path “node_modules” --json result.json

Other examples:

- slither .
- slither path/to/my_contract.sol
- slither . --exclude-informational ❕ Important: Slither does not run on a separate file that has development environment imports (e.g., truffle, hardhat npm module imports, or brownie pm imports). In this case, you need to manually resolve dependencies — you need to fix the imports to absolute or relative paths in the target file. In the case of brownie package dependencies, it is worth installing the same module via npm and resolving dependencies as described above. Do not use the brownie pm clone, as it sometimes does not include some files. You can add a to filter files or exclude certain detectors. See the Slither for a list of detectors or watch good video and tutorial. slither.config.json file documentation this old this II — What to do if there is a problem when starting Slither? Run on each file separately. Most likely, the problem will not be in all files. Find a similar problem in slither issues and apply a solution if there is one. “Upvote” is an issue (you can put an emoji on it) if it’s not solved, to get the developers to pay attention to it. Slither Plugins Plugins are one of the most important aspects of properly setting up and running Slither because they significantly increase the functionality. Also, keep in mind that it is the most convenient way to add your own detectors. Below are the basics of working with them. Try to understand the analogy of the work and further build your own methodology based on this. A) Upgradeability checks plugin guide: B) Check ERC plugin guide: Run if you want to check the contract for compliance with one of the specified EIP: EIP20 EIP223 EIP777 EIP721 EIP165 EIP1155 EIP1820 ❕ Important: If “ ” — you need to rename the contract so that the name in the project is unique. Contract not found: name. You can a slither.config.json file to filter files or exclude certain detectors. See the slither documentation for a of detectors. add list III — Read storage On-chain retrieves storage slots from source code by using information from Slither’s underlying type analysis (e.g., whether an array is fixed or dynamic) to inform slot calculations. The tool can retrieve the storage slot(s) of a single variable or of entire contracts, and storage values can be retrieved by providing an Ethereum RPC. slither-read-storage Check out: blog.trailofbits.com/2022/07/28/shedding-smart-contract-storage-with-slither 0xalpharush.github.io/slithering-through-the-dark-forest Additionally, one can modify storage values using the Ethereum node RPC, , by passing in the storage slot and desired value and simulating how transactions applied to the modified state are affected. Details on how to accomplish this can be found in . eth_call this tutorial Command example: slither-read-storage Privacy.sol 0xFdaF948A66903a0050ed051508c7C26D137E76C4 --variable-name data --rpc-url https://rinkeby.infura.io/v3/{project-id} If the source code is on Etherscan, you can omit the contract name ( ). Privacy.sol IV — Conclusion In conclusion, we would like to say that we hope that this article was informative and useful for you! In future articles, we’ll write about how our favorite SmartCheck and Slither differ-the differences are quite significant! The most important thing we wanted to tell you and show you is that a new instrument does not mean good and an old instrument does not mean bad. It’s all about knowing how to use it and being willing to look for something new. I hope we’ve got you interested in that. What instruments should we review? What would you be interested in reading about? Please leave your comments, we will be happy to answer them, and the best answers and questions may be included in the next article! We are primarily interested in the questions and problems that arise in the present work, and we would like to help the community because during the time of our work, and we have been doing audits since 2016, we have accumulated a lot of valuable data we would like to share! By the way, there are some vacancies now so if your project needs an audit — feel free to write to us, visit our public reports page . here May the force be with you!

Slither: An Essential in the Auditor’s Toolkit

If you have any involvement in the business world, chances are you've at least heard of Ethereum. It is a cryptocurrency that has been making waves lately because of its unique features. But what exactly is Ethereum? And more importantly, what do you need to know about it? In this blog post, we will discuss Ethereum and smart contracts, and explain why they are so important. We will also provide a list of the 7 best Ethereum smart contract audit services so that you can choose the right one for you! What is Ethereum? is a decentralized platform for running smart contracts: applications that execute exactly as planned and are free of fraud and third-party interference. Vitalik Buterin, a cryptocurrency researcher and developer, conceived Ethereum in late 2013. Ethereum What are Ethereum Smart Contracts? Smart contracts are fixable deals with the conditions of the understanding between purchaser and vendor being straightforwardly composed into code. The code and the courses of action contained therein are unchangeable, implying that they can't be changed once conveyed to the blockchain. Why do Ethereum Smart Contracts need to be audited? It's critical to audit a in order to guarantee its security and proper operation. There is always the danger of bugs or flaws in any program. By auditing a smart contract, you can ensure that it is free of errors and runs as intended. smart contract How to choose good Ethereum Smart Contract Audit Services When choosing an audit service for your smart contract, it is crucial to consider the expertise of the team, the size of the project, and the price. You will also want to make sure that the service provides a comprehensive report that includes an analysis of the code, a list of any potential vulnerabilities, and recommendations for improvement. 7 Best Ethereum Smart Contract Audit Services The following is a list of the seven best Ethereum smart contract audit services: Smart Contract Security Alliance The Smart Contract Security Alliance (SCSA) is a consortium of from around the world who have come together to create a set of standards and best practices for smart contract security. The SCSA offers a certification program that allows developers to show that their contracts meet the highest security standards. blockchain security experts Solidified Solidified is a smart contract auditing platform that crowdsources audits to a community of expert auditors. Solidified offers a unique risk scoring system that allows you to see at a glance how risky your contract is. Quantstamp Quantstamp is a blockchain security company that audits smart contracts. Quantstamp’s team of experts has experience auditing some of the largest and most complex contracts on the Ethereum network. Mythril Mythril is a built on Ethereum. Mythril uses symbolic execution to analyze contracts and find vulnerabilities such as gas expenditure issues, integer overflows, and reentrancy attacks. smart contract security testing tool SmartCheck SmartCheck is a smart contract analysis tool that uses static analysis to find vulnerabilities in Ethereum contracts. SmartCheck can be used to audit both Solidity and Vyper contracts. Solgraph Solgraph is a tool that generates a visual representation of a Solidity contract’s control flow. Solgraph can be used to find potential security vulnerabilities, such as inline assembly calls and uninitialized storage variables. Oyente Oyente is an open-source Ethereum smart contract analyzer that uses symbolic execution to find bugs in contracts. Oyente can also generate test cases for use in automated testing frameworks such as Truffle. Consider your needs before choosing one of these services- each has its own individual benefits! Pros and Cons of Smart Contract Auditing There are a few things to keep in mind when deciding whether or not to audit your smart contract. Start by thinking about the size and intricacy of your project. If your contract is large and complex, it will likely take longer to audit and be more expensive. However, the security benefits are worth the investment. Second, consider the sensitivity of the data stored in your contract. If you are handling delicate information, it is even more essential to confirm that your agreement is secure. Although efficient, smart contract auditing does have a few drawbacks. First, it can be expensive, especially for large and complex contracts. Second, it can take some time to complete an audit, which may not be feasible if you are working on a tight deadline. Final Thoughts Overall, smart contract auditing is a necessary part of developing a secure and reliable contract. By choosing the right service and taking the time to understand the pros and cons, you can ensure that your agreement is up to par! This story was submitted to HackerNoon by an independent contributor. Hence the information contained therein has also been researched and compiled independently. Disclosure:

Ethereum, Smart Contracts, and Audit Services

The last few months have been a turbulent time for cryptocurrencies. But that hasn't deterred the relatively nascent industry from continuing to innovate. Since the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETFs launched in October 2021, a flurry of new funds has hit the market. The SEC has been reluctant to approve Bitcoin ETFs, from fund managers for the new asset class.  As recently as last summer, there were as many as 13 applications awaiting approval. despite pressure Since the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETFs launched in October 2021, a flurry of new funds has hit the market. Prior to that, the SEC had been reluctant to approve Bitcoin ETFs, which were a long time coming. As far back as 2013, the Winklevoss twins, the founders of the Gemini cryptocurrency exchange, looked to start a Bitcoin ETF, but they weren't successful at the time. A Crypto ETF? What Is That? An ETF that invests in cryptocurrencies is known as a cryptocurrency exchange-traded fund (ETF). A cryptocurrency ETF measures the price of one or more digital tokens, akin to conventional ETFs that track an index or a basket of assets, and its share price changes based on investor sales and purchases, just like with conventional ETFs. Investing in a cryptocurrency ETF allows investors to diversify their risk in crypto holdings, rather than assume a concentrated risk by going "all in" with one individual crypto investment. The fortunes of crypto ETFs are linked to the success of key cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. ETFs in the crypto space is a buzzy, exciting new technology. In an industry notorious for the volatility and risk involved in investing in cryptocurrencies, EFTs are a less risky way to gain exposure to digital assets.  And in the case of the newly launched , investors can earn a share of the fees simply for holding three of the most popular coins on the market. Tetraguard What Are The Best Crypto ETFs? The most significant advantage of bitcoin ETFs is that they provide exposure to cryptocurrencies without the added cost of ownership. Cryptocurrency ownership comes with a slew of additional costs. Custody fees, for example, are connected with cryptocurrency. An annual fee is also charged by secure digital wallets for storing purchased cryptocurrencies. Here are some of the best crypto EFTs, which get around these fees. The ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BITO): This ETF began trading in October 2021 as the first Bitcoin ETF in the United States. This ETF allows investors to gain exposure to Bitcoin without having to own the cryptocurrency directly. BITO does not invest in Bitcoin directly. The fund's goal is to provide returns by investing in Bitcoin futures contracts. BITO could be used as a substitute for actual assets such as gold and other commodities, as an alternative to regular currency investments, or as an inflation hedge. BITO has $1 billion in net assets and a 0.95% expense ratio, meaning that every $10,000 invested cost $95 per year. Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BTF): Three days after ProShares' Bitcoin futures ETF went public, the Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF launched. Valkyrie, a Tennessee-based alternative asset manager with years of experience in both traditional and digital asset management, already has trusted for Bitcoin, Polkadot, Algorand, and other cryptocurrencies, but BTF is the company's first cryptocurrency ETF. However, despite BITO’s instant success, the actively managed BTF has only a fraction of the assets under its belt. The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC): This is one of the first investment vehicles that derives its value purely from Bitcoin's price. Since its inception in 2013, the fund has returned over 28,000% to investors. GBTC manages $28 billion in assets, making it one of the largest crypto funds on the market. Its benchmark is the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index (XBX). Accredited investors with a minimum investment of $50,000 can invest directly in the trust, but anybody can buy shares in GBTC on the secondary market through several online brokers. Miscellaneous expenses outside of the fund's annual expense ratio of 2% may also be incurred. Tetraguard (TETRA): Tetraguard stands out as the first decentralized ETF in the crypto space. It offers investors easy access to the most popular cryptocurrencies in a token basket, is backed by the liquidity of an Automated Market Maker (AMM), and affords the opportunity to get in on the ground floor, with bonus fee tokens (QUAD) awarded to early investors. This ETF requires no government oversight or bureaucracy to operate. Investors can easily do swaps and exchanges on the platform while holding a diversified basket of the most popular cryptos. The sweet spot is that investors earn a fee while holding these coins. What is Tetraguard? Tetraguard is a network built on the Ethereum blockchain that is "100% run by TETRA's audited smart contracts." This means that no central authority has access to your or anybody else's money. They're all encased in the smart contract, which includes an automatic market maker and specific instructions on dividing the proceeds. Tokens are burned when users choose to discontinue their Tetraguard experience, Wrapped BTC, wrapped ETH, gold hedged stability via PAXG, and the system's QUAD reserve token make up the protocol. The protocol's QUAD token, which gathers staked ETH returns and transaction fees, distributes a decentralized dividend to TETRA token holders. The TETRA is a decentralized smart contract that trades within its own decentralized mechanism, producing transaction fees and staked ETH split on a pro-rata basis with all TETRA holders via its own fee-sharing token, the QUAD, through its own internal algorithm depending on the reserves per token. Should You Invest In Tetraguard? When compared to the other ETFs in the crypto market, Tetraguard stands out as the only ETF that follows the basic principles of cryptocurrencies. It's decentralized (all assets are stored on the Ethereum blockchain and not controlled by any third party) and secured (Consensys tested and checked), censorship-resistant. This ETF advances the cause of DeFi by offering investors a token basket comprised of the most popular cryptocurrencies, with shares returned from staked tokens to its holders. With Tetraguard, there's no need to buy Bitcoin and Ethereum separately. A token basket where they are all wrapped together with the lowest transaction fees and a reward token built-in. Is this the best crypto ETF? Well, if you consider what Tetraguard offers, it seems to be a no-brainer to invest in crypto in any other way. But personal research is still advised. DISCLAIMER: This is not a solicitation to buy or sell, SmartBlocks is a token holder of the Quad token, and Mark Fidelman is a control individual of SmartBlocks, and as such that entity and individual may benefit from any price appreciation, as well as any known or unknown affiliates at this time.

What is the Best Crypto ETF on the Market

Blockchain technology took the world by storm a couple of years ago, promising an unrivaled level of privacy and security to users and businesses. However, smart contracts are still digital products, and they require a thorough blockchain audit to help companies avoid reputational damage and data breaches. Roughly half of existing smart contracts go unaudited for many years, posing the users' data and assets at risk. Such a situation is unacceptable for forward-looking businesses caring for their customers, as the sad lessons of an $80-million theft from Qubit Finance and the most recent Wormhole bridge attack teach people to take security seriously. So, where to find reliable crypto audit companies that will complete a comprehensive review of your smart contract without breaking your bank? Here are the top 10 providers of smart contract auditing to consider in 2022. List of Top Smart Contract Audit Companies There are too many crypto security companies on the market today to give a clear answer to the question of the best provider. Next comes the top dozen providers selected based on the clients' reviews, online reputation, and valuable service benefits they offer. 1. ConsenSys If you need smart contract audits for an Ethereum-based project, it may be reasonable to turn to – one of the proven, famous auditors of Ethereum. With a track record of 100+ audit projects and 200+ discovered smart contract vulnerabilities under their belt, ConsenSys takes a deserved place in the rating of top audit providers. ConsenSys The company has created its custom suite of smart contracts audit tools, thus helping its clients to avoid costly errors and system breaches, scan their smart contracts in an automated way, and enjoy continuous verification of the produced code. The branded audit software package integrates pretty easily in every company's development environment and allows continuous, automated security analysis for top-notch smart contract performance. 2. 4IRE is a leader in the European blockchain development and audit space, a Swedish-European innovative software provider with 12+ years of blockchain expertise. The company's staff is well-versed with: 4IRE DeFi, FinTech projects, green finance, blockchain, NFT. Due to such broad coverage, it gives clients a unique package of services and full reliability of provided solutions. The experienced team of 4IRE blockchain engineers and auditors can cover any popular blockchain platform and technology. They have been working with Near Protocol, Ethereum, Tron, Polkadot, BSC, Avalanche, and a dozen more blockchains since the time of their launch, thus knowing the security requirements behind each. Here, you can get an end-to-end Ethereum or Solidity audit to dispel any security doubts and understand your digital product's potential threats. 3. Kudelski is a company with offices in Europe and the USA dealing with blockchain security at multiple levels and providing its clients with enterprise-level solutions. The company's mission is to contribute to the cyber resilience of innovative businesses and prevent a variety of tech threats. Kudelski's experts have been working with Fortune 500 companies and governmental organizations in several European countries and the USA, giving excellent security services and introducing innovation in the public sector's operation. Kudelski Security At present, the smart contract security audit services of Kudelski experts are available to all businesses around the globe. The organization also offers an in-depth security architecture overview, security solutions' design and implementation, and security training for staff in companies transitioning to blockchain-based infrastructures. 4. Hacken At , blockchain and auditing go hand in hand. At present, the provider allows comprehensive smart contract audits from many angles. Hacken's experts can review the project's smart contract technology, test it for the presence of bugs and critical errors, and expose it to systematic and structured code review. All these efforts are made to model system threats and intercept DDoS attacks on the system. Hacken Besides, Hacken undertakes thorough token audits by applying their in-depth knowledge about smart contract algorithms and the blockchain's encryption technology. After a detailed audit of the smart contract, Hacken guarantees that your project is theft-proof, thus improving user trust and asset security. 5. Immunebytes is an India-based smart contract auditing company specializing exclusively in audits. The provider can already boast a track record of 125+ successfully completed audits spanning various blockchain technologies. Here you can get a top-quality, insightful review of smart contracts based on Ethereum, Solana, BSC, Tron, EOS, PolkaDot, etc. Immunebytes The services of Immunebytes allow taking a bird's eye view at your product's threat profile together with in-depth penetration testing, code review, and a full range of recommendations for security enhancement. Clients manage to optimize their smart contract code, achieve better smart contract performance, and upgrade the product's overall security. 6. Chainsulting is a Germany-based company with high standards of auditing blockchain projects. The provider has completed a series of notable audits for well-known blockchain projects, such as 1inch, Agave, DIA, Swapp protocol, and the like. It approaches every reviewed product with meticulousness and attention to detail, focusing on: Chainsulting The smart contract's functioning and inner logic; Compliance with coding conventions; Exposure to vulnerabilities/ The company's experts issue a certificate of compliance to all successfully audited products and provide a full report with improvement recommendations to those whose security appears flawed. In the course of the audit, the Chainsulting team exposes the product to manual and automated security tests to see what issues it has. 7. CertiK has much to offer to clients of all scales and sizes. Its mission is to contribute to the secure Web3 world. The company was founded in 2018 by renounced professors from Yale and Columbia, thus becoming one of the world's best blockchain security providers. CertiK auditors use a unique auditing algorithm that assesses the code's logic and introduces a mathematical approach to the smart contract's analysis. CertiK The track record of this provider is impressive; it has secured over $300 billion of clients' digital assets and served over 1,800 companies to date. The technologies used by CertiK offer a 360-degree account of the product's vulnerabilities. Thus, using the Formal Verification and AI tools in DeFi audit, CertiK professionals open new security dimensions to dedicated clients. 8. Slowmist It was founded in 2018 and has expanded its service range to cover exchanges, smart contracts, wallets, and blockchains. The smart contract audits are performed with 1,500 known smart contract types, with proper regard to the complexity of high-risk to medium-risk vulnerabilities. is a China-based company with a strong focus on blockchain ecosystem security. Slowmist Slowmist has a distinct audit checklist for every blockchain technology, with different approaches to Solana, EOS, and other technologies. Its algorithm of smart contract review covers detailed audits of: overflow, race conditions, permission vulnerabilities, safety design, denial of service, malicious event logs, etc. Another criterion for choosing Slowmist as your go-to smart contract audit company is its inclusion in the Etherscan recommendation list. 9. SmartDec has been at the forefront of smart contract security for many years. The company offers its branded smart contract security suites (SmartDec Scanner, SmartCheck, and SmartSuite) to allow continuous enterprise-level control over blockchain projects' security. As of 2022, the provider has served 200+ blockchain projects, which makes it one of the top blockchain security companies of modernity. SmartDec The scope of SmartDec's service spans across all types of blockchain products, ranging from simple dApps to large-scale cryptosystems: wallets; exchanges; and entire blockchains. The company also audits the success of integration between smart contracts and third-party apps to ensure the safety of API connections. 10. Audithor is one of the cryptocurrency security companies that know the importance of vulnerability checks before the blockchain product's launch. It assigns several auditors for independent reviews and subsequent comparison of the obtained results. The next stage involves a collaborative test for the smart contract based on which a specific security level is assigned. The A-grade security means that the smart contract works flawlessly, while grades from B to F suggest different degrees of required improvements. Audithor The smart contracts awarded grades from A to C are awarded an Audithor badge that is further embedded into the smart contract in a downloadable format so that every interested user can double-check the safety status of the dApp or platform they use. Conclusion Now that you have the audit companies list, it's time to pick the best provider and conduct an end-to-end review of your blockchain product. Don't forget that digital space is where money and crime often join hands. Thus, any vulnerability left unnoticed in an innovative digital project or product gives hackers additional enrichment opportunities. Never give them such a chance by protecting your customers' assets and trust with rigorous security measures and regular vulnerability audits.

Top 10 Smart Contract Audit Companies

The global payments landscape is rapidly transforming into a digital-first industry, with non-cash transactions expected to reach . 1.1 trillion by 2023 The onset of a global pandemic, the convenience of digital transactions, and the popularity of e-commerce and mobile payments have triggered rapid growth in digital transaction volumes. But higher digital payments adoption comes with a multitude of risks. Fraud posing serious operational challenges to businesses and individuals alike. International trade, for one, between two parties involves the risk of fraud. The standard practice in these trades is to engage a third-party escrow service to mitigate risks, but this adds an overhead expense of between 3% and 5% to the transaction along with additional paperwork and transfer delays. People use escrow commonly to trade domain names, collectibles, cars, real estate, sensitive data, and the list goes on. Individuals are also using third-party apps such as Facebook marketplace, Craiglist, or Paypal to buy and sell a wide array of products and services. Blockchain technology offers a solution, and if you guessed it already, yes, we’re talking about how smart contracts can disrupt yet another industry. How Escrow Smart Contracts Provide an Answer Smart contracts are self-executing contracts containing the terms of the agreement between two parties that execute automatically as the underlying terms are met. The inherent properties of a smart contract make it an ideal replacement for a traditional escrow service. The involved parties can encode the terms of the agreement within a smart contract, including deliverables, payments, and relevant penalties or deductions as applicable. As both parties satisfy the terms, such as shipping the product, inspecting the product, or delivering a service, the smart contract releases the payment automatically. In theory, it’s the perfect solution for carrying out trustless transactions, but at an operational level, there are some challenges. First, not everyone has the technical awareness, know-how of creating a smart contract. Secondly, major blockchains, such as Ethereum, have high transaction charges and limited network throughput. That’s where technology startups, like us from Smartlink, come into the picture. Our Escrow Smart Contract Solution is an escrow smart contract protocol that aims to mitigate the risk in online transactions through smart contracts. Smartlink The platform provides a simple user interface, where the involved parties can select a smart contract template, input their terms with a simple form, and make a deposit to start the transaction. The process doesn’t require any form of coding or technical sophistication. Smartlink provides a platform for businesses as well as retail transactions with its easy-to-implement escrow module. Smartlink is built on , one of the most secure operational blockchain networks, which allows it to lower transaction charges whilst offering institutional-grade, formally verifiable smart contracts. Tezos Smartlink proposes an entire ecosystem of services based on its escrow smart contract module: Decentralized marketplace Launchpad Decentralized exchange built on Tezos. Smartlink concluded the of its token, $SMAK, in May 2021, raising $3 million in private and public rounds, followed by token distribution in June and token-staking in July. Smartlink has also partnered with Pyratzlabs to develop a new DEX on Tezos. public sale The platform is set to roll out its first module, a decentralized launchpad in September/October, with other components being released in the subsequent months. The escrow industry offers huge opportunities for technology startups. Smartlink holds the potential to make its mark in the industry with its blockchain-based platform.

How Escrow Smart Contracts Could Change Online Transactions Forever

Note : Research for this article was made using PreSearch search engine, from Brave Browser, and the links in all hyperlinked texts have been turned into 2key SmartLinks. These active blockchain-enabled products are described below. They were selected as they share two characteristics:  (a)they are fully or partially decentralized, and (b) they enable users to earn a residual income by using them. In today’s world, every time you use a browser, every search you run on major search engines, and every time you share a link, some mega-corporation is capitalizing on your online activity, using your data in complex and mostly opaque ways. The recent draws attention to some of the personalized user data that companies gather online through third-party tracking, but that is only one of the multiple issues born out of the hyper-centralization that characterizes today’s tech mega-platforms, from the GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft) to the emerging sharing economy spearheaded by Airbnb, Uber, and others. Apple-Facebook privacy war The power concentrated in the hands of a few players outside of the democratic process has even prompted Nevada to plan to launch .  In these so-called Innovation Zones, companies owning large land areas will be allowed to form governments carrying the same authority as counties, including the ability to impose taxes, form school districts, and courts, and provide government services. Nevada planned legislation is opening the door to a new political system based on corporations' economic power, opening the door to creating effective dictatorships unbridled by the burdensome (to power-hungry wannabe rulers) dictates of democracy. Innovation Zones This hyper-centralization is the direct result of the time gap between adopting new technologies such as at the turn of the century and the adoption of new legislation curtailing potential abuse, spearheaded by GDPR in 2018. Web 2.0 The emergence of technologies such as distributed ledgers and storage on blockchain paves the way for data decentralization and might create a more transparent and secure environment, overtaking Web 2.0's centralization, surveillance, and exploitative advertising. In time, decentralized infrastructure and application platforms should displace centralized tech giants and allow individuals to own their data rightfully. To better understand the differences between the Internet and the decentralized net and address common misconceptions concerning cryptocurrencies, let's first compare them on accessibility aspects and practical aspects such as cybercrimes and investment soundness. Internet vs Decentralized Net Latency: One of the most annoying aspects of using decentralized applications is their often slow execution or upload speed. At this early stage, the decentralized net is still in infancy, and latency is the price to pay for pushing its development forward. Despite its apparent slowness compared to today’s Internet, it is still much faster than the Internet of the early days. Internet In its early days, , yet users put up with the waiting time in order to benefit from the Internet's immense advantages.- accessing content on the Internet was a slow process Decentralized Web As blockchain-based solutions are still in their infancy, latency is endemic to new products, reminiscent of the slow access to the content of the early Internet days. As the Internet grew and spread, latency gradually diminished to reach today's speed. The upcoming 5G is likely to speed it up even more. As the decentralized network grows, latency is likely also to diminish. Criminal Activities: Now that Bitcoin value is soaring and both Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are increasingly included in reputable asset management funds, less ink is flowing about crypto’s early fame for facilitating a slew of criminal activities. Yet, even then, this focus on the purported dangers of crypto conveniently ignored the criminal activity on the regular Internet. Internet The Internet we all use today still facilitates a number of crimes, from pedophilia and terrorist propaganda to the dissemination of fake news, not to mention the growing business of cybercrimes enabling identity theft, fraudulent use of credit card, and more, not to mention the abusive use of personal data done by mega-corporation, with which the legal system is slowly, slowly catching up. Yet, the Internet is now an integral part of most of our lives. Decentralized Web Bitcoin was the first iteration of a decentralized network. In 2020, the criminal share of all cryptocurrency activity fell to . To put things in context, the UN estimates that between 2% and 5% of global GDP ($1.6 to $4 trillion) annually is connected with money laundering and illicit activity. just 0.34% of $10 billion in transaction volume Investments: Investing is always fraught with risks, and investing in the digital world is no exception. However, though cryptocurrency investment is highly risky, one should not forget the fortunes made and lost in the Internet's early days. Internet The early 2000s saw a flurry of investments in myriads of .com startups, as investors all wanted in this newfangled source of fast high returns. When the , investors’ losses reached an estimated $5 trillion. Yet, the Internet survived, and fortunes were made. As investments in dot.com were typically reserved to VCs and accredited investors, the general public only suffered minor shockwaves. dot.com bubble burst in 2002 Decentralized Web The explosion of valueless crypto-currencies dubbed that characterized 2018 gave cryptocurrencies, in general, a bad name. Crypto-speculation is still a domain reserved to a select few, as people with little knowledge of the ins-and-outs of what makes a cryptocurrency a sound investment are likely to fall prey to scams and pump-and-dump schemes. Crypto-speculation carries risks similar to , famously popularized in the Wolf of Wall Street movie. The main difference is that investing in crypto is open to everyone, not only to accredited investors. shitcoins penny-stocks investments Yet, unlike the Internet, the Decentralized Web offers opportunities for everyone to invest by doing, without risking a cent. The three working applications listed in this article enable users to earn cryptocurrencies by doing what they usually do, using a browser, searching, and sharing links. The rewards earned are in the applications' native token. These tokens' value might "moon," or crash, meaning the cash value earnings from using the solutions reviewed below can either rise dramatically, fall to zero, or remain stable based on the fluctuation of their native token. Let’s have a closer look at the active decentralized solutions meeting the criteria and used to write this article. The criteria are: fully or partially decentralized and redistributing wealth. Brave Browser Mainstream browsers all collect data. Though it is usually possible to limit the amount of data collected, doing so might require adding extensions or other light or heavy tech-savvy manipulations. This data is typically used to generate revenue for the company owning the browser. These revenues are not shared with the user. In an by Pr. Douglas J. Leith,  Dublin Trinity College School of Computer Sciences and Statistics, Brave Browser was by far the most private of the six browsers studied -  Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Brave Browser, Microsoft Edge, and Yandex. independent study of browser privacy : In that study, Brave Browser default settings showed no use of identifiers allowing tracking of IP address overtime and no sharing of the details of web pages visited with backend servers. For users, the only manipulation needed to ensure privacy is to leave the default privacy shields up. Privacy Customizing privacy settings is user-friendly and intuitive from the settings interface and is future-proof to a certain extent as it includes specific settings for Ethereum blockchain compatibility. These settings can be ignored by general users who do not interact with Ethereum. Modifying the settings for specific sites is easily done from the Brave icon displayed in the search bar. : Brave Browser revenue model is partially based on selling advertising space. However, 70% of the advertising revenue is redistributed to the users who have opted in to view ads from the Brave Rewards options. Revenue Sharing These revenues are distributed monthly to opted-in users in BAT tokens, the Brave Browser native crypto-currency. When connecting their Brave account to Uphold wallet, users can opt to have their earnings distributed in another cryptocurrency. : Pros Currently, the best browser to ensure privacy Effective at blocking ads Slick customizable interface Runs extremely well Enables marginal earnings Fully integrates IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) protocol Partially decentralized Cons : Some websites are broken when Brave shields are up, requiring taking all or some of the shields down to access the website’s full content. Payment of ad revenue to users is still buggy, often delayed, and sometimes lost or partial. Connecting to the Uphold wallet is still complex for the non-crypto crowd. Transferring earnings from the Uphold wallet is still complex for the non-crypto crowd. No Maximum Token supply. Still partially centralized. Competing Web 3.0 browsers: Opera Status Competing wealth-redistribution ad-serving browser None found Recent Developments: - India Times Brave just acquired the open search engine Tailcat. - The Verge Brave fully Integrates IPFS Protocol Native token: BAT Pre-Search Mainstream search engines collect users' data and use them in opaque ways. Though improvements in reducing user data collection, such as the recent , are steps in the right direction. Yet, it still fails to provide users with transparency about the use made of their data directly collected by Google itself. Google announcement to remove third-party tracking cookies from Google Chrome Pre Search is an open, decentralized search engine that ensures search privacy and rewards users with PRE tokens. These PRE tokens can be traded on major exchanges or used for Keyword Staking to purchase ad space displayed on top of the search results. The PreSearch interface looks like this, reminiscent of Google's early interface, but with the option to switch to other leading search engines by clicking on their icon in the left vertical menu bar. Currently, search engine options are Google and DuckDuckgo, Crypto-related queries can be redirected to Etherscan and CoinMarketCap, and search on social media platforms are Facebook and Twitter. Clicking on the three dots redirects you to more options: PreSearch top menu bar displays your current earnings and a user icon that redirects you to your account. From your account page, you can access more general information, actions, and data. To better understand how privacy and keywords staking on Pre Search work, (also hyperlinked with a 2key SmartLink described below.) watch this video Pros: Redistributes wealth Privacy Partially decentralized Cons: Still a bit clunky Payment of eligible PRE token earned through searching can only be withdrawn after you earned over 1000 tokens Competing privacy-protecting search engine: Duck Duck G Qwant StartPage Swisscow searX Peekier MetaGer Ecosia Tailcat - Just acquired by Brave Browser Neeva - Just raised $40M Competing wealth-redistribution search engine: None found Recent Developments: Launches ‘keyword staking’ for advertising transparency - SiliconAngle - Launched Presearch Node Rewards Medium PreSearch Native token: PRE 2key SmartLinks A blockchain solution for content distribution and viral marketing, to share links in every SmartLink. When a SmartLink is opened, all the people in the referral chain receive a fraction of the reward upon conversion (the conversion typically is a click, but it can also be, depending on the type of SmartLink used, current options are purchase or donation, with more options in the pipeline.) 2key SmartLinks integrates incentives For default SmartLinks, the entire process is fully automated and is barely more complex than shortening a link with . From the website, copy-paste any URL, click SmartLink, and follow instructions. Once you have an account, creating a SmartLink is done in three clicks. bit.ly There are two kinds of SmartLinks, free and paid. Both are automatically entered into the program that rewards referrers with for sharing links considerately and penalizes spammers. Every week, the epoch reward is divided between referrers in proportion to their reputation points. Reputation Mining Qi Points Advertisers or anyone wanting to boost its content reach can add an extra reward to further incentivize sharing. Both link creators and links sharer earn Qi points yielding 2key tokens as follows: Users can check their earnings at any time from their dashboard. Users can visualize the referral path of the link they shared or created and access detailed statistics. 90% of revenues generated by sponsored SmartLinks is redistributed to 2key.network users. A full description of 2key tokenomics is available . here When sharing a SmartLink, a is displayed to the recipient: preview window Clicking “Open Link” opens the original URL and earns the person who clicks 1 QI point. Clicking Refer & Earn adds the user code to the SmartLink. Downstream clicks benefit the entire referral chain as explained in the QI points table above. Additional rewards added by SmartLink sponsors are also distributed to the entire referral chain in direct proportion to each user’s activity. Creating a 2key SmartLink takes 3 clicks https://youtu.be/tS8K62PhdTc Pros: Privacy Transparency Wealth redistribution Built-in anti-spam Cons: Preview window leads to a small percentage of lost clicks Latency Competing Blockchain content-distribution or blockchain marketing active solutions: None Found Competing Blockchain content-distribution or blockchain marketing redistributing wealth: None found - Recent Developments: First blockchain app listed on Zoom Marketplace Yahoo Finance Native token: 2KEY So, now you know what to do to protect your privacy, be an active part of building a decentralized web-promoting wealth-redistribution, and earn a residual income that might sharply increase in value during the coming decade. Start using decentralized apps that let you earn like the three described above.

Privacy, Decentralization & Investments: What Do They Have in Common?

With the continuing rise of cybercrime and targeting private computers, tablets, and phones, the question is not if but when you will be hacked. So, better safe than sorry, make sure your crypto assets are safe and secure even if your device is breached by sticking to the following tips. 1. Keep your crypto wealth secret! Anonymity is your best ally — If you are not “known” to hold crypto, you probably will be less targeted by hackers specializing in crypto-assets theft. Being a known crypto holder raises the chances to be targeted for spear phishing attacks. Spear phishing, as opposed to regular attacks, is a technique that includes obtaining personal information about the intended target and insert malware in a message of personal nature, even in a PDF, a photo or GIF file, or from a trusted source easier to hack. It can even be a physical attack on your machine if left unsecured for some time. phishing So, don’t brag about how crypto rich you are. People do not need to know how many tokens you own or where you store them :) 2. Keep your mnemonic on paper! Assume that any digital device you use can be hacked, and probably will at some point, so never store your mnemonic digitally. Even encryption is not safe if your device is breached. Your screen and keyboard can be cloned and mirrored. When that happens, glancing once at your mnemonic gives the hacker access to your wallet. The best practice is to make a paper copy divided into two parts and hide a few copies in various locations and with people you trust. No matter how gifted they are, ! It is advisable to check these locations at least twice a year to make sure your mnemonics are still readable — ink fades, and paper crumbles … hackers cannot access paper copies 3. Store the bulk of your crypto assets in a cold wallet Hot storage wallets make life way easier when using Dapps and DeFi, but wallets like Metamask — that uses passwords as their single layer of security — have been reported to experience several successful attacks recently, so it is better to keep limited amounts there and store the bulk of your tokens in a cold wallet such as Ledger or Trezor. This minimizes risks. 2key wallets and Metamask can both be operated in conjunction with Ledger or Trezor cold wallets. 4. Activate the 2FA (two-factor authentication) options offered by digital services you use 2FA increases digital security by a factor of 1000 and keeps hackers at bay. From the 2FA services, SMS is the least efficient, as a Simcard hijacking is enough to bypass it, so always prefer Google or Microsoft Authenticator options that create a time-limited one-time code. Yes, it is annoying to add one manipulation layer to access your destination, but it greatly reduces the risk of mistakenly giving your credentials to a phishing site. 2FA should also be used to protect your non-crypto assets. A popular hacking technique is to redirect your request to access a site or an app to a cloned site or app and use this to steal your credentials. 2FA secured options also verify that the device you use to access the app or site belongs to you or is operated by you. A popular authentication app besides Google authenticator is , which allows you to create a master password enabling you to recover all your 2FA once you switch to a new phone. Keep that master password extra safe! Authy 2key wallet will soon integrate 2FA as an added security layer and will be one of the only non-custodian, decentralized wallets in the world to support that feature. 5. Monitor your devices for signs of a breach Nowadays, the question is not if but when your device will be breached. There are common warning signs that your device has been breached, common or distinct for , , like random downloads, random restarts, mouse movements by itself, warnings for signs of a breach from new devices to products you use, and more. However, stealth spyware aimed at stealing your information or mirroring your activity might be invisible, so always assume your device might have been hacked. computers tablets, and phones , to protect your crypto assets, take any action from the compromised device. Use a secure device to open a new wallet and transfer your assets to that address. In any case, if you followed the above recommendation nr 3. and stored the bulk of your crypto assets in a cold wallet, the crypto amount on the potentially compromised wallet should be minimal. Once you transferred your crypto assets safely from a secure, separate device, it is time to take measures to evaluate the damage on your infected device and take corrective action. In case of a suspected or confirmed hack DO NOT Hackers accessing one of your devices might use the information gathered to access your other devices such as phone, tablet, watch, or other. Avoid using a connected device to transfer your crypto assets to a new wallet. Warning: To summarize, anonymity, off-digital mnemonic storage, cold wallet, and 2FA, and your crypto assets will be 99.99% safe even if your device is hacked! Follow those rules, and sleep soundly. Check the 2key Reputation Mining program that earns you 2KEY tokens for creating or sharing SmartLinks ! Also published at https://medium.com/2key/5-tips-to-secure-your-crypto-assets-against-hackers-9ee4a04b1fad ( : ) Disclaimer The author works at 2Key

5 Tips to Prevent Hackers From Stealing Your Crypto Assets

Back in 2015, the launch of Ethereum heralded a brand new day in the world of cryptocurrencies. It wasn't because people believed that it would displace Bitcoin as the dominant cryptocurrency. It was because of the major advances that the Ethereum blockchain introduced to the industry. The most important among those changes was the introduction of smart contracts that could execute on the blockchain. That made Ethereum a platform with infinite development possibilities. But to date, most developers have tried to use it as a launchpad to create moonshot projects – often with mixed results. But we at have a different mission. We're building a DeFi platform designed to enable some of the most basic – and necessary – crypto transaction types there are. TrustSwap We want to make it simple for crypto holders, businesses, and creators to use cryptocurrencies to their fullest extent. We believe that this is necessary for cryptocurrencies to finally fulfill their potential as the financial instruments of the future. The Origin of TrustSwap The idea that would become TrustSwap has its origins in an earlier crypto venture. It happened when our founder and CEO found himself working on a project that had attracted the attention of a venture capital firm. That firm wanted to invest in the crypto company by purchasing some of the project's tokens, to the tune of $50,000. Jeff Kirdeikis The project's members insisted that the purchase take place in small, measured quantities – so that the investor couldn't harm the project by selling off their new holdings all at once. But when they went looking for a crypto platform that could handle such a transaction, they couldn't find one. According to Kirdeikis, "I figured there had to be something already created that implemented this service in a smart-contract … There wasn't. In fact, there was nothing that allowed for time-based payments at all. No trustless escrow for institutions, no trustless team-token lockups, no automated employee payments... nothing." Instead, the crypto venture had no choice but to engage the services of a lawyer to act as a trusted middleman who could execute the terms of the transaction. Many months and thousands of dollars in fees later, Kirdeikis resolved to make sure that nobody ever had to settle for such an expensive and inefficient transaction process again. And TrustSwap was his solution. What TrustSwap Does True to its origins, one of TrustSwap's flagship services is called TS SmartSwap™. It's a smart contract-powered escrow system built to facilitate high-volume OTC asset swaps between parties. It's the solution to the very problem that led to TrustSwap's founding. Using the service, any of the VCs that push millions of dollars a day into crypto projects could do so with no expensive third-party middleman. All that's required is for both parties to agree on the terms of the exchange, and SmartSwap™ executes those terms with no further intervention for a fraction of the cost of a law firm. If that were all TrustSwap could do, it would still be a quantum leap forward for the world of crypto. But TrustSwap can do more. Much more. The second major service offering from the TrustSwap platform is called TS SmartLock™. It's an asset transfer system that enables payments on a time or event-based schedule. It can accommodate both one-to-one and one-to-many transactions, making it a flexible and efficient solution for a variety of use cases. It can, for example, serve as a payroll system for businesses wishing to pay employees in cryptocurrencies. It can also allow businesses to pay contractors using performance-based metrics that release funds as certain milestones are reached. In short, anytime you need repeating or conditional payments - SmartLock™ can make it happen however you need it to. TrustSwap's third main service – which might be its most important contribution to the cryptocurrency payment ecosystem – is called TS SmartSubscription™. In the simplest terms, it's the crypto equivalent of a traditional service subscription system. It makes it simple for service and content providers to add recurring cryptocurrency-paid subscription services to any website using its built-in API. It's designed to enable a future where users can pay for their favorite services – things like Netflix, Spotify, and countless others – using the cryptocurrency of their choice. It has the potential to open up a multi-billion-dollar market for crypto payments – disrupting the status quo in digital payment processing. But TrustSwap hasn't forgotten its roots, either. It also features several services aimed at crypto-startups and other early-stage businesses. Through the platform's TS SmartLaunch™ services, budding crypto projects can access a variety of useful features including automated pre-sales management, token locks, liquidity locks, and initial marketing support. Also, coming soon, the TS SmartWrap™ service will allow users to wrap non-Ethereum assets to make them usable on Ethereum's blockchain. That will make it possible for developers to merge multi-chain crypto-assets and even traditional financial products into a single, compatible platform. The possibilities are endless. And TrustSwap isn't developing all of these useful services for nothing. It's for the benefit of users and businesses alike. Already, three crypto-projects have used TrustSwap's Launchpad to manage their trusted coin offerings (TCO), all with great results. All three – , , and – have proven that TrustSwap has the power and the feature set to become the premier springboard to DeFi success. Chaingames MobiePay AuBit And the best news of all is that what TrustSwap has built so far is just the beginning. In the coming months, we'll be announcing even more services, integrations, and upgrades to make TrustSwap even more flexible and functional. We're not going to rest on the laurels of our accomplishments so far. We're not going to stop until everyone in the DeFi world and beyond knows that TrustSwap is a force to be reckoned with – and a crucial pillar of the world's financial future. So, come along with us. That future is waiting.

Here's What DeFi-led Future of Crypto Payments And Escrow Will Look Like

I like , and have used them for years. Built by a company with a of making reasonably secure, reliable locks, I’ve used several of their Z-Wave locks over the years, but Z-Wave is…Z-Wave. Proprietary until recently, a PIA to troubleshoot, and while the technology held a lot of promise on paper, in reality it’s been the cause for many a swear word to erupt from my mouth (I realize this is partially due to the controllers I’ve used over the years). Schlage’s smartlocks long history I recently moved to a new home (city, and state!) which gave a chance to consider new home automation choices. Watching trends over the last year or so, WiFi seems to have become the wireless connection of choice for “smart” things in the home, when I saw Schlage now had WiFi-based versions of their locks in the family, I decided to select that product. Encode If you’re relatively handy, they install easily. Setup is performed via an app on your phone via Bluetooth (Which makes it easy to reconnect to WiFi after you change your network and key, forgetting to move the lock first. Ahem.). Once setup, the locks respond pretty quickly to lock/unlock requests from the app, wherever you are. Next step: get them into my ! They’re on WiFi already — should be easy, right? new home automation system of choice Not so much. Googling around, I see just Amazon Key having support. I couldn’t find any signs of a public API or development library, or development/partnership program for the Encode family. But it was on my network dammit, and I was caffeinated late one night while under covid-19 stay-at-home, so I dug further. I’ve quickly become a UniFi convert… I’m pretty anal about how I run my networks, so I already knew the IPs of the locks. And my gateway — a UniFi Dream Machine — is a choke point with a sniffer installed, so let’s see who these things are talking to: OK — so it’s connecting to an IP block that looks familiar. Let’s see if I can verify that: Yep — the lock’s talking to something in . Not a bad thing by itself, but this could quickly lead to a dead end. It’s talking on TCP/8883 from Googling around, it looks like that’s a standard port used to communicate via the . MQTT is a good choice for IoT communication, so this is a positive sign. Amazon’s cloud MQTT protocol over TLS For brevity I’m leaving some steps out here, but if one googles around for “amazon tcp 8883” you’ll get a few more clues, but let’s fast forward. For $reasons I decided to try a https request from my browser. Nothing exciting was in the response itself, but the TLS certificate shed a little more light on things: So we can confirm that the Schlage Encores communicate via secure MQTT to — a managed cloud service run by AWS for IoT devices to connect to the cloud. This is “good” as in they’re doing the Right Thing, but “bad” in that it’s a dead end for this research. An AWS customer can link that IOT Core endpoint to all sorts of different things, that IP address isn’t for a specific customer, so there’s little point in disturbing further. AWS IOT Core But… …the app on my phone can control this thing, somehow. So let’s see what’s going on there! Back on my gateway I ran again. But while the lock wasn’t doing anything besides phoning home, a modern smartphone is one hell of a chatterbox. So instead of trying to make sense of the capture directly, I have tcpdump write the capture to a pcap-format file, and bring it back to my desktop and pull it up in — a sniffer with a graphical UI and some great analytics tools. tcpdump wireshark Patting-head-belly-rub: the trick here is to kill the app, start the sniff, launch the app and toggle a lock unlocked/locked (to whatever state it’s not in), stop the sniff and take a look-see: OK — owns Schlage. Progress! Who’s this yonomi guy, tho? Back to the jazz-hands… Allegion Aaaaah. is a startup that provides a services for others who want to get into this IoT game, where they’ll do all the cloudy/security/etc stuff, and then the company uses their software in their devices. So Schlage doesn’t have to become expert in cloud/IOT stuffs overnight, can focus on what they know how to do and Yonomi will do the rest. Yonomi Connecting a few dots, Yonomi’s hosted on AWS, uses AWS IoT Core, and a few other services that I filtered out. Glad to see they’re not building their own wheels. Now What? Browsing the site, blog, and I don’t see anything yet available for individuals to interact with their service. I did find a way to sign up for API access eventually on the site, identified myself as an individual and not somebody waving Benjamins, and soon got an email saying thanks, but not quite yet: Yonomi GitHub repo Conclusion So hopefully the above is useful and entertaining/educational to some folks. It took me way longer to do this writeup than the actual work, but hopefully there’s enough thought-process and links above to give others ideas on how to do some research like this themselves — and maybe even help me push this further! This isn’t fully solved yet, but I managed to find some useful info that I think is new information to the home-automation community: Schlage went with an experienced partner to get their new WiFi locks to market quickly. It sounds like this project happened really fast with solid success, and now both parties are taking a breath and working on building out the integrations and ecosystems. I’m a little iffy on the “newness” of Yonomi — I’ve avoided other home security startups because a) They’re often pretty sloppy about the security part, and b) I don’t like being stuck with broken hardware when they fold. Yonomi seems to have decent bones — been around about 5 years, Series A funded in part by Allegion (so if something does happen, I’ll put my money on Allegion keeping the service going), and decent list of customers so far. Not rolling things from scratch: This is good on both Schlage and Yonomi’s sides. Yonomi more than likely knows IoT and cloud way better than Schlage, and I’ll guarantee that AWS knows how to securely run cloud services at scale way better than either of them. Hopefully a public API coming later this year. I don’t see any hostility towards open source/individuals from any of the projects, so this looks like if they’re given some time an open source solution will come out, probably following the standard process that a HomeSeer user either grants oAuth access or generates an API key, gives that to a plugin in HomeSeer, and then we have lock control. Once one of these systems are done, the functionality should arrive on the others (Vera’s mios comes to mind, maybe ISY?) soon after. As I hear more I’ll either update this post or write a followup, and if I have the bandwidth whenever access is available, I’m happy to write or help write/test the HomeSeer Encode plugin! Previously published at https://theresnomon.co/the-current-state-of-api-access-to-your-schlage-encode-locks-7e981f404501

Connecting to Schlage's New WiFi Locks Is Not Easy

NEO and Qtum. Yes, that’s it. tl;dr: This post covers the only two viable and live alternatives to Ethereum as a distributed application platform (NEO and Qtum) and explains my confidence in Ethereum’s dominance. Photo by on Dominik Scythe Unsplash I just devoured ’s ongoing series, . It’s a well-argued collection of essays on several high-profile smart contract platforms — at the time of this writing, he’s covered , , , , , , , and . Ed Posnak On The Origin of Smart Contract Platforms Tezos DFINITY NEO EOS Cardano Lisk Qtum Waves As it turns out, there aren’t currently many alternatives to Ethereum when it comes to supporting arbitrarily complex distributed applications. The space holds a lot of promise, and I’m excited to see how projects like EOS and Cardano fare, but most of these aren’t nowhere near production. In this short post, we’ll quickly look into the only two alternatives to Ethereum with a live mainnet: NEO, and Qtum. Note: My focus lies mostly with public utility networks. It’s not that I don’t see value of permissioned networks (I do), but the allure of the impact of properly designed public blockchains is very hard to resist. Neo claims to be a lot faster than Ethereum. From : Neo their website Consensus nodes use Byzantine Fault Tolerance Algorithm to reach consensus and ensure the finality of transactions. It also ensures that the system keeps its finality and availability as long as Byzantine fault occurs on less than 1/3 of the nodes. This allows them to boast some pretty healthy numbers, like 1,000 transactions per second, confirmed within 20 seconds. From : their whitepaper In the NEO dBFT consensus mechanism, taking about 15 to 20 seconds to generate a block, the transaction throughput is measured up to about 1,000TPS, which is excellent performance among the public chains. Through appropriate optimization, there is potential to reach 10,000TPS, allowing it to support large-scale commercial applications. There’s no free lunch, however. This comes at a cost of centralization in validator nodes, since BFT can only function at up to ⅓ of dishonest actors, and sees its performance heavily degraded the closer you get to that number. In practice, this means that NEO keeps a very close eye on who gets to run a validator node on their network. From : their whitepaper the bookkeepers can be a real name of the individual or institution. Thus, it is possible to freeze, revoke, inherit, retrieve, and ownership transfer due to judicial decisons on them. […] The NEO network plans to support such operations when necessary. From : a post on Reddit by the NEO Council NEO is not decentralized enough as of today, and that is fully intentional. […] NEO Council is still holding 50% of the tokens […] the NEO Council want to ensure that all consensus nodes have honest, non-malicious intentions. While there might be great arguments for doing so, I believe this is anathema to the principle of decentralization. If you think NEO is a great choice for you, you might be happy to know that smart contract development can currently and conveniently be done in C#, VB.Net, F#, Java, and Kotlin. From : their docs From the language point of view, the difference between NEO Smart Contract 2.0 and Ethereum is more intuitive: unlike the original Solidity language in Ethereum, the NEO smart contract can be used directly by almost any high-level programming language. The first supported languages ​​are C#, VB.Net, F#, Java, and Kotlin. However, before getting too excited, note that the price of deploying a smart contract is set at (well, 490, since ). At current mart prices ($19.15 at the time of writing), that’s $9,383.5. 500 gas the first 10 are free Qtum promises 60–70 transactions per second, as per with Jordan Earls, Qtum’s Co-Founder. That’s an order of magnitude higher than Ethereum in its current incarnation, and is achieved through the use of a faster mechanism which generates a block every 16 seconds. Qtum this Cointelegraph interview proof of stake further transaction throughput is to be achieved through «a layered network or off-chain channels.» Since Qtum infrastructure is very close to Bitcoin and its UTXO model, this likely hints at their intention to make use of the for scalability improvements. Qtum claims Lightning Network Some well-known projects such as and chose to deploy on Qtum, which lends some additional credibility to the network. This choice might have been informed by Qtum’s SPV ( ) support, which makes interacting with the network lighter and thus more appropriate for mobile devices. While Ethereum’s development of a is underway, it’s not considered production-ready at the moment. DataWallet Luna Simple Payment Verification light client protocol It’s also interesting (and promising) to note that , which is already half the number for Ethereum even though Qtum’s mainnet hasn’t been live for even a year. Qtum claims to have 6000+ nodes As per , Qtum implements the Ethereum virtual machine for smart contract execution, which means Solidity is currently the only language available for deployment. This should make it easy for Ethereum developers to give Qtum’s network a spin. their whitepaper What about Ethereum Classic? resulted from the , where the community split over the decision to revert the DAO hack. Their team is still implementing new facilities, and the platform seems to still see . Ethereum Classic DAO fork hard at work significant interest There’s an argument to be made for using Ethereum Classic as a backup to Ethereum, should the latter become plagued by DDoS attacks, be forked out of existence, or otherwise face any other existential risk. Inevitable Ethereum maximalism Ethereum is currently the go-to smart contract platform. Contender claims abound, but most purported alternatives aren’t even close to being live. Additionally, Ethereum’s hard at work addressing some of the issues these contenders see with its current version. If Ethereum — which is well-funded and has a thriving developer community — finds its way to scalability and better smart contract security before alternatives become popular, I believe it will remain the platform of choice. The Ethereum community is which would bring about massive improvements to the platform. exploring several solutions The adoption of ( ) should dramatically reduce energy consumption and allow for a by decreasing the block time. proof of stake Casper higher throughput should bring about an to transition throughput. Sharding initial 100x improvement (meaning they’re not core to Ethereum, but implemented on top of it) such as , , and will compound the core scalability improvements by securely moving a lot of the heavy lifting off-chain. Layer-2 solutions Plasma Raiden Liquidity Network TrueBit Smart contract security is progressively increasing as the community doubles down on safer languages (like , and ) and formal verification tools (like , , , and ). Bamboo Vyper AxLang Manticore Mythril Oyente Solgraph SmartCheck Additionally, Ethereum’s community is incredibly vibrant, and I believe that ultimately the winning platforms will be the ones which garner the most developer support. This is not only because of the higher speed at which a platform with a lot of contributors evolves, but also because of the applications and use cases built on top of it. Given Ethereum’s relative maturity, the strength of its community, and the amount of research committed to improve it, I don’t see a compelling reason to choose any other platform as of today. At , we offer a hassle-free, user-friendly launchpad solution combined with a comprehensive customer identification service (KYC/AML) to successfully deploy your token launch with ease. Planning an ICO? Fractal

Alternatives to Ethereum in production (May 2018)

How The VeChain Thor Blockchain is Set to Revolutionize Governance, Finance, Logistics, and Agriculture in China Whilst the U.S. Senate ( ) demonstrates a staggering lack of understanding of fundamentals, China is poised to be the first country to roll out large scale adoption of the technology with , China’s Western Guizhou Province. with the exception of Senator Mark Warner Blockchain a new Blockchain Smart-City in Gui’an https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechains-national-level-partnership-b3bc792cb1f1 There are whole baskets of breadcrumbs and signals indicating how and the Thor Blockchain will be the infrastructure on which cities of the future will run, starting with the Gui’an Smart City. VeChain (VEN) To the casual observer it might appear as though China is not in favour of cryptocurrencies, and . This is hardly surprising when cryptos are often touted in mainstream media as being the exclusive domain of , , and . with ICO’s being banned in September 2017 cryptocurrency exchanges shut down shortly afterwards drug dealers assassins money launderers However, depending on how the is structured, it can be set up in such a way that reaps whilst integrating government oversight. architecture of the blockchain network the benefits of blockchain technology In the case of VeChain, the implementation will be truly revolutionary: At its core the VeChain Foundation does not believe in a fully anarchically decentralization, nor does it believe in totalitarian governance. It is for that reason the board members envisioned something in between. Our governance structure is a new breed of a decentralized system through centralized channels. The above extract is taken from , which translates to ‘ . VeChain’s announcement about the VeChain apotheosis re-branding to VeChain Thor the glorification of something to a divine level’ https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechain-apotheosis-part-ii-thor-power-forged-974111a93278 Unthinkable complexity VeChain, once upgraded to the VeChain Thor Blockchain (VET) will operate in a similar way to Ethereum, acting as a network/blockchain upon which other applications can be built. Unlike Ethereum, which is left to developers and companies to think of blockchain uses and develop their own token, VeChain has a long list of BIG partners that it has been working with to develop applications. Whilst VEN is currently an , and will continue to do so when converted into VET at the end of February, it is unlikely to remain on the Ethereum network — for reasons I will discuss in — once the . ERC20 token and runs on the Ethereum network Part 2 mainnet launch takes place in June The core message is that legitimate and near-term business applications, rather than speculation and hype about potential future uses, are the most fertile ground for execution of Blockchain technology. From cursory research on how VeChain plans to operate, it might appear as though they will merely be making use of the Blockchain to improve transparency in logistics. This alone would make a strong use case, with the and incidents such as the , in which 6 babies died and 300,000 were ill, highlighting the need for greater control of the supply chain. fakes industry estimated to be worth close to half a trillion dollars per year baby infant formula scandal https://www.vechain.com/ Along with the logistics applications, VeChain has multiple partnerships with the State Council of the People’s Republic of China. In case you are hard of thinking, that means the Chinese Central Government. Posted by Yicai Global, part of China’s state ran Yicai Media Group What signals are being sent when China bans ICO’s and exchanges and then shortly afterwards mandates a small selection of homegrown teams be government partners? Considering the fate of Facebook, Youtube, Google, Twitter, Amazon and Uber in China, this is hardly surprising. Crypto Gui’an New Area in Western Guizhou province has been given the status of special economic development zone, with the intention of turning it into the National Data Center of western China, . focusing on Big Data, Blockchain, Cloud Computing, and Smart Solutions In case the clear government endorsement (above) on Twitter by the state media wasn’t a big enough clue, VeChain released the following press statement in December 2017: . VeChain is mandated to be the blockchain technology partner of the government of Gui’an to plan, design and implement such processes Below is an overview of the processes alluded to above: National Governance · Providing a blockchain based information system to collect and analyze administrative data and cut red tape. · Offer privacy protection of data and store business registration related documents. · Allow for remote business registration and robust auditing. The potential value in terms of reduced time wasted through centralized bureaucracy is immense. Add to this the ability to instantly account for every penny spent on public projects and tax owed (if all payments are made through the network) and the benefits are abundantly clear. Given that , with mobile payment applications such as WeChat pay and Alipay ubiquitous, implementing blockchain for tax auditing . cash payments are becoming increasingly obsolete in China will save the government billions in lost revenue The First Blockchain Powered Fine Wine/Liquor Exchange Vechain already has a working product through its connection with DIG (Shanghai Waigaoqiao Direct Imported Goods sales Centre Ltd.), also a government owned entity, using their NFC chip (a smart chip that is attached at sources and tracks data on whether the product is authentic, location, temperature, ownership etc.) to enable full and immutable traceability from source. PwC video explaining VeChain used in DIG wine counterfeiting . DIG currently account for 30% of all wine imported into China, which would mean that a forecasted 1.2 billion 70cl bottles of wine will be authenticated using these chips connected to the VeChain Thor network https://www.vechain.com/ VeChain not only intends to use this partnership and technology to power the first ever blockchain liquor exchange, they also plan to use VeChain to power future exchanges around the world, where physical assets will combined with digital assets. SmartBlockchain Agriculture VeChain, along with the Liaoning Academy of Agricultural Sciences (also a government entity), has developed a cloud platform for intelligent agriculture. https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechain-insights-vol-8-c2988c8adcb The is far more detailed than I could hope to give here. overview of this project on the VeChain Medium page I would recommend taking the time to read the . 8 page press release outlining what VeChain will be doing in Gui’an If you are unsure of just how serious the Government of China are about implementing blockchain technology, the following extract from the release seems pretty conclusive: When the technology and implementation process streamlines are well tested, it is expected that this process will be rolled out throughout the entire region of China. Logistics In logistics , a quality assurance and risk management company, and , the . A r gave details of how , guaranteeing accurate and immediate information on source of origin, temperature levels (for frozen food), and whether the product is an original or fake. VEChain has partnered with DNV GL Kuehne & Nagel worlds largest freight company ecent article in the American Journal of Transportation the application of blockchain technology to logistics can help companies boost the transparency and traceability of their products from the factory to the consumer. Data from sensors can be recorded to the blockchain VeChain Thor Finds Its Own Uses For Things I could run on for another 2,000 words detailing the plethora of partnerships. Not to mention their development team, which is nearly as impressive as the number and strength of partnerships — an overview of the team can be found . However, as the point of this article was to demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt the scale of VeChain’s future operations and use cases, links with the relevant details will suffice. here https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechain-bitocean-7f12402e13b0 https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechain-breaks-into-the-financial-services-industry-by-partnering-with-fanghuwang-2a3a42ebe6b Yes, a lot of these are Twitter announcements. Yes, it’s lazy to copy and paste from Twitter. But, I would like to finish Part 1 of this series and move on to Part 2, which will discuss VeChain Thor/mainnet implementation and likely market cap moving into 2018 and beyond. https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/vechain-blockchain-solutions-to-enter-chinas-tobacco-industry-in-force-c92b3729878f https://medium.com/@vechainofficial/https-medium-com-vechainofficial-itaotaoke-8844d73a7699 Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC): https://www.pwccn.com/en/press-room/press-releases/pr-150517.html Breyer Capital : , early 12.5% investor in Facebook https://medium.com/@jimbreyer/announcing-our-vechain-advisory-role-5e37b7722978 Although the use cases above are relatively easy to visualize, . With the and the public chain of VeChain to be launched in June, . how the VeChain Thor Blockchain will actually function is more elusive rebranding of VeChain to VeChain Thor Blockchain due to take place on the 26th February part 2 will explore how the value created by use of the VeChain Thor Blockchain could translate into a market cap for VET in 2018 Sunny Lu — CEO of VeChain I am not your financial advisor. This is not financial advice. I own some VEN/VET but am not affiliated with VeChain in any way. If you enjoyed reading this and would like to read more in depth content on Blockchain use cases in industry then and (twitter: ). smash the claps click follow https://twitter.com/BareShylls . Read part 2 here

SmartClick News on
HackerNoon and Around the Web

Winner for Best Startup in Yerevan, Armenia!

smartclick.ai

-- employees

Since n.d.

SmartClick Story Mentions

Articles Around the Web

Read More Tech Stories Related to #SmartClick

SmartClick News on HackerNoon and Around the Web