Mind Network is the first tokenized startup to bring an FHE product to the market, applying the long-awaited ‘Holy Grail of Encryption’ to Web3. It has announced the launch of its Fully Homomorphic Encryption based Zero Trust Layer testnet.
Mind Network combines Fully Homomorphic Encryption with Stealth Address Protocol (FHE DK-SAP) to achieve private and secure value transfers, solving two problems simultaneously: 1.) the need for privacy with Web3 data and 2.) the security protocol necessary for Web2 and traditional finance to enter web3 while remaining compliant with regulators.
For this innovation, Mind Network received an Ethereum Grant and won the EthSingapore Hackathon. Mind Network’s investors include Binance Labs, Hashkey, Comma3, SevenX and other notable investors. It is incubated through Binance incubation session 5, Chainlink BUILD, Ethereum Fellowship Program and Consensys Startup School.
Data Rights are Human Rights
While decentralized infrastructures excel in maintaining the integrity of each transaction and ensuring the availability of on-chain data, they fall short in offering robust confidentiality protection. Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin has repeatedly emphasized privacy as a critical challenge for Ethereum, predicting its failure if not addressed. Citibank recently cited ‘privacy’ and ‘strong guarantees of security’ as critical features for Web3 to reach mainstream adoption. SWIFT highlighted in a recent whitepaper that data privacy and governance is the number one concern for institutional entities. However, the current privacy and security solutions are facing challenges of fragmentation, compliance risks, and under-developed ecosystems. MindNetwork has built its product with this view; that data rights are human rights and that a new era of privacy and security, beginning with an upgrade of ‘end-to-end encryption’ is needed.
The Evolution of Web3 Security
According to the study from Citibank and SWIFT, on-chain data privacy and security are essential to enable traditional financial institutions and regulated investors to step into Web3. We summarize the evolution of Web3 security and privacy into three phases:
- Phase One: The Wild West. Characterized by minimal regulation, rampant money laundering, and scams.
- Phase Two: Emerging Regulatory Framework. This is the current phase, marked by the entry of large companies and institutions experimenting with tokenization.
- Phase Three: The Full Transition into Web3. The future phase, where privacy layers exist at the infrastructure level, and which allows individual control over all web credentialing and activity, including KYC, AML, transaction logs, messaging logs, and AI interactions. FHE is critical in bringing about this phase.
Mind Network is the first to implement zero trust into production in Web3. It is a critical turning point for the industry. Messari predicted in Crypto Theses of 2024, that FHE could be used for private payments, trustless games, private voting, private machine learning, and creating a private data economy. This is the highest path forward for Web3 and ensures that the industry can deliver on its promise of data privacy and ownership to the masses.
Introducing the Zero Trust Approach
The Zero Trust Layer by Mind Network aims to eliminate the security fragmentation in blockchain, offering untraceable yet verifiable transactions. It introduces quantum-resistant encryption, ensuring that only the data owner has access to their information and allows all information to be verifiable for third parties. The Zero Trust solution is built with two primary features: FHE Dual-Key Stealth Address Protocol (MindSAP) and FHE+ZKP Data Rollup (MindLake). The technology is applicable across multiple blockchain layers (L0, L1, L2, etc.), DApps, wallets, and even traditional financial institutions.
The Innovation FHE-DKSAP Protocol
Mind Network developed the Fully Homomorphic Encryption-based Dual-key Stealth Address Protocol (FHE-DKSAP) through Ethereum Foundation Fellowship Program and received Ethereum Grant support. This protocol employs stealth addresses to enhance transactional privacy and security, a concept recently spotlighted by Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin. Here is a link to a presentation about FHE-DKSAP (link)
Extensive Use Cases of Zero Trust Layer
The applications of Mind Network’s Zero Trust Layer are vast, including:
- CBDC Chain to Public Chain Transfers: More than 110 countries are piloting CBDCs. Mind Network facilitates secure and compliant interactions between CBDC national chains to Web3.
- Bank Chain to Public Chain Transfers: Mind Network’s Zero Trust Layer is set to play a significant role in the burgeoning Real-World Assets (RWA) market, projected to be $5T of assets by as early as 2030 by CitiBank. As the only security and privacy solution partner to Chainlink CCIP, Mind Network is solving this demand by implementing Zero Trust into the transaction layer of these assets.
- Public Chain to Public Chain Transfers: Partnering with Chainlink CCIP, Mind Network is to ensure private and secure transfers across various public networks to make bridge solutions more trustable.
- Single Chain Privacy Enhancements: As the 1st winning solution from MetaMask ETHSG Hackathon, Mind Network offers enhanced transactional privacy for on-chain transfer, swap, staking, etc. It is able to comply with regulation frameworks from different regions
- Cross-Chain Messaging Encryption: Securing cross-chain communication for on-chain games and social apps through Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) techniques.
- Data protection for AI: As a data privacy rollup to DePin solutions, Mind Network encrypts data with user’s private key and allows AI applications to compute over it without decryption. Mind Network has partnered and integrated with Filecoin, Arweave, and Greenfield on various use cases.
Mind Network in Action
Currently, Mind Network’s technology is being used by leading organizations such as Chainlinks CCIP, MetaMask, a central bank, several commercial banks and institutional investors. This adoption reflects the trust and wide-ranging applications of Mind Network’s solutions in both the crypto and traditional financial sectors.
Mind Network’s Zero Trust Layer represents a paradigm shift in data security and a new age of the internet. It has rebuilt ‘end-to-end encryption’ to solve existential challenges for blockchains and smart contracts by enhancing data protection, ensuring transactional safety across chains, and enabling regulatory compliance. As Web3 continues to evolve, Mind Network stands at the forefront, shaping a future where data security and transaction privacy are paramount.
For more insights and updates on Mind Network’s innovations, visit their website and socials:
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