NFT Weekly: Ethereum Founder Pitches Stealth NFTs

Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin joined the proposal to create a privacy-focused non-fungible token (NFT) technology that would allow users to easily create untraceable NFTs.

The proposal itself is highly technical, but the basic idea is an NFT that can generate “stealth addresses” and is a “low-tech approach to adding a fair amount of privacy to the NFT ecosystem.” He said.

Idea: ERC721 stealth address.

A low-tech approach to adding tons of privacy to the NFT ecosystem.

So for example you can. Sending her NFT to Vitalik.eth so that no one but me (the new owner) can find out who the new owner is. https://t.co/UdqK6NAYjn

—vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) August 8, 2022

With this technology, Buterin said, “For example, anyone but me (the new owner) will be able to send NFTs to Vitalik.eth without knowing the new owner.” .

He says he can’t even confirm that the NFT was sent to his Ethereum Name Service address (which is basically the Web3 blockchain address of his crypto wallet) and that someone received it. said.

One of the challenges of privacy-focused ideas is how to pay. Buterin said all he could come up with was overpaying the estimated fee “5 to 50 times”.

The timing of his comment, early in the morning of August 8th, is interesting and indicated a potential problem with stealth NFTs.

In a comment linked to by Buterin, he suggests using the Tornado Cash mixing service to transfer fees — hours before the Treasury Department announced sanctions on DeFi services, North Korean hackers stole the money. It was used extensively to launder stolen cryptocurrencies to fund bad actors. the country’s nuclear program.

See also With Tornado Cash Sanctions, The Fed Is About To Lift The Veil Of Crypto Anonymity

The mixture of services and privacy coins is under increasing political and legal pressure as opponents claim it is frequently used by criminals and makes money laundering much easier.

Instagram increases flow

Meta-owned social network Instagram announced this week that it is expanding its capabilities to allow NFT owners to display their digital artwork and collectibles in “100 countries across Africa, Asia Pacific, the Middle East and the Americas.” . Supports the ability to connect with Coinbase Wallet and Dapper Wallet, and the ability to post digital collections created on the Flow blockchain.

read more: Instagram trial NFT sharing with curated creators, collectors

With 1 billion users, Instagram is three times the size of Twitter, the first major social media company to adopt NFTs. However, Instagram appears much larger than Twitter, which focused on using his NFTs for thumbnail-sized portraits of its users.

Meta described Instagram’s move as a way to support creators’ ability to have more control over their work, build relationships with fans, and monetize their work.

“Blockchain technology’s incredible opportunities allow them to leverage new tools to generate income, allowing fans to sell their digital collectibles (art, images, videos, music, or trading cards). You can support your favorite creators by purchasing as a Non-Fungible Token (NFT).”

spread wealth

Sure, people are buying. Blockchain data firm Nansen said this week that analysis showed he spent $2.7 billion to create his new NFT on Ethereum in the first half of this year.

NFTs are one of the biggest prizes that the Ethereum killer blockchain will try to pull away from the secondary blockchains that dominate the NFT business.

Flow, the 27th largest blockchain by market capitalization, is in that position mainly because Instagram has added support for NFTs made on its blockchain. The blockchain’s native FLOW token surged over 40% on the day of the announcement, August 4th, and continues to do so.

The reason behind it is not only that Flow has captured a huge new market for NFTs, but that NFT developers and buyers need to get off Ethereum. This results in very high fees for creating and purchasing NFTs.

Subscribe Daily For All PYMNTS Crypto Coverage crypto newsletter.