Week in Ethereum News, August 20, 2022 - sponsored by SpeedRunEthereum
Eth News and Links
PoW switch off (the Merge)
Mainnet Merge TTD: 58750000000000000000000 confirmed
TTD estimator predicts merge around September 15
Merge mainnet readiness checklist is complete
mainnet-shadow-fork-11 merged successfully, nicest shadow fork so far
Flashbots MEV-boost relay open sourced, AGPL license, alpha, OFAC compliant
MEV redistribution [PDF] improves PoS economic security
Proposal to remove trusted relays in MEV-boost using threshold encryption
Execution layer
Latest core devs call video. Notes from Tim Beiko and Christine Kim:
MEV-boost relay discussion: transactions will be included as long as some validators don’t censor
Ethereum censorship resistance discussion: defense is user activated fork
Sepolia testnet post-merge upgrade now expected August 21
Kiln testnet to be shutdown September 6
Merge EIPs moved to last call: EIP3675 (upgrade to PoS) & EIP4399 (PREVRANDAO)
Erigon v2022.08.02-alpha: mainnet Merge TTD & fixes
EIP4844 (proto-danksharding) call video and notes: upcoming public devnet, fee market design, sync architecture and KZG ceremony
KZG ceremony call video: audit started, contributing users will be included in final transcript and UI wireframes being reviewed
Geth team first AMA on Reddit
Proof of Stake consensus layer
Consensus layer specs v1.2.0-rc.3: Bellatrix epoch and the Merge TTD
Client diversity improved: Prysm 35% and Lighthouse 33%
Dappnode multiclient support: single click to change consensus layer client
Script to download beacon chain blocks on a fork
Layer2
Miden VM v0.2 (zk-rollup): new VM architecture
EIPs/Standards
EIP5298: ENS as token holder
EIP5299: Storage scaling pattern
EIP5334: ERC721 user and expires & level extension
EIP5450: EOF - stack validation
EIP5453: Contract crypto endorsement
EIP5478: Reducing the gas cost of contract creation with existing code
EIP5484: Consensual soulbound tokens
EIP5485: Legitimacy, jurisdiction and sovereignty
EIP5489: NFT hyperlink extension
EIP5496: Multi-privilege management extension for ERC721
EIP5501: Rental & delegation NFT - ERC721 extension
EIP5503: Refundable token
EIP5507: Refundable NFTs
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Stuff for developers
Foundry verification adds Sourcify support
Chainlink’s Huff starter kit: develop Huff contracts using Foundry
ERC721K: dynamic on-chain SVG NFTs using data streams
Music NFT IPFS metadata: on-chain music metadata
Lanyard: Merkle root generator for NFT allow lists
Seaport order validator: single RPC call for opinionated safety checks
Deploy contracts using a burner address or OpenZeppelin Defender relay client
Contract automation solutions compared: Gelato Ops, Keep3r Network, Chainlink Keepers and Open Zeppelin Defender
ethers.js v5.7.0: fixes and improvements
Etherface: signature database with source links, crawls GitHub/Etherscan/4Byte
RainbowKit adds Sign-In with Ethereum + NextAuth.js support
Using mutants to improve static analysis: comparing Slither with Securify & SmartCheck
Ethernaut DAO CTF switch solution
Security
Sherlock cross-protocol reentrancy disclosed, $250k bounty paid
Celer’s cBridge front end DNS cache poisoning
Ecosystem
Run DeFi front end (Aave) locally on Windows, Mac and DAppNode
Snitchy: check an RPC endpoint for US OFAC compliance
Wallet devs call video and notes
Yuga Labs will only recognize NFTs on Ethereum PoS
NFT marketplace replay protection against forks
Application layer
Dai bridge live on Arbitrum Nova
ENS: two million names created, one million in 3.5 months
Nimi beta v0.2: profile page, default for eth.limo, gasless updates via IPNS
dm3: encrypted messaging for ENS users, beta
Safe (formerly Gnosis Safe) proposed token distribution to users
Karma Discourse plugin shows DAO reputation data of users [Disclosure: Starbloom portfolio]
Job Listings
ØVIX + GOGO Protocol: VP of Engineering
Gnosis Chain looking for Head of Bridges, Head of Validators & DevRel Eng.
Ethereum Foundation seek a generalist ecosystem developer
Job listings: $600 for four issues (75 character limit), payable in ETH/DAI/USDC to abcoathup.eth on mainnet or Layer 2. Pay with one click using 3cities. Questions? abcoathup at-gmail
Regulation/business/tokens
Coin Center: US OFAC overstepped authority in sanctioning Tornado Cash contract addresses, potentially violates constitutional rights to due process & free speech
TRM Labs data used by DeFi front ends to check addresses for sanctions risk
Reasons for financial privacy; privacy should be the default
US Fed supervised banks have to notify the Fed before engaging in crypto related activities
US SEC sued Dragonchain for selling an alleged unregistered security
Canadian exchanges impose $30k annual cap on token purchases in some provinces
US FDIC sends cease & desist letters for statements about deposit insurance
General
CryptoStats.fyi: visualize data available from Crypto Stats
Plonky2 (Polygon Zero's zk proving system) open-sourced
tlock: time based encryption/decryption using a drand threshold network
Apple fixed two zero-day vulnerabilities under active attack, out-of-bounds write in the Kernel and WebKit
Chrome fixed zero-day vulnerability, insufficient validation of untrusted input in Intents
Signal users targeted after Twilio compromised
Follow @WeekinEthNews to find out what the most clicked links are. Follow @evan_van_ness and @abcoathup to get most of the week’s news in real time.
Permalink for this week’s issue: https://weekinethereumnews.com/week-in-ethereum-news-august-20-2022
Upcoming Dates of Note
(new/changes in bold)
Aug 23 – Devcon wave 09 + 10 tickets
Aug 27-28 – DeFi Security Summit (Stanford)
Aug 28 – Ethereum a New Era (San Francisco)
Aug 29-31 – Science of Blockchain Conference (Stanford)
Sep 1-4 – ETHWarsaw (hackathon & conference)
Sep 2-28 – ETHOnline (ETH Global)
Sep 6 – Bellatrix upgrade (epoch: 144896)
Sep 6-9 – MCON 2 (Denver)
Sep 7-22 – Gitcoin Grants round 15
Sep 9 – Merge Community Call #7
Sep 9-11 – Ethereum SP (São Paulo)
Sep 12-14 – DappCon (Berlin)
Sep ~15 – the Merge (TTD: 58750000000000000000000)
Sep 16-18 - EthBerlin
Sep 23 - ETH HCMC summit (Ho Chi Minh)
Sep 23-24 - ETHSantiago
Oct 7-16 – Devcon week (Bogotá)
Oct 7-9 – ETHBogotá (ETH Global)
Oct 7-9 – Infinite hackathon (Bogotá)
Oct 11-14 – Devcon 6 (Bogotá)
Nov 4-6 – ETHSanFrancisco (ETH Global)
Nov 18-20 – Web3 Weekend (ETH Global)
Dec 1-4 – ETHDownUnder (Sydney)
Dec 2-4 – ETHIndia (ETH Global)
Mar 2-5 – ETHDenver
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