on the crypto
A new survey by Manta Network, a privacy-focused decentralized finance stack built on Substrate, has shed further light on the need for privacy in the rapidly expanding DeFi space. “We believe that one of the biggest problems that need to be addressed is with decentralized exchanges,” said Shumo Chu, CEO and co-founder of Manta Network.
Privacy in DeFi
According to the survey, nearly three quarters of 404 respondents (73,2%) "have hesitated or completely avoided making a transaction in the past because they were concerned about the privacy implications of that transaction."
Additionally, 84% of respondents expressed concern that their wallet addresses are linked to their true identity. Part of this concern is that the nature of blockchains allows address balances to be seen.
In fact, over 90% of respondents said they searched for someone's wallet address to view that person's holdings and / or transactions. The survey adds further weight to the idea that privacy is a central issue in the cryptocurrency space.
Blanket Network
Manta Network aims to enforce privacy in DeFi, in part by hiding wallet addresses, but with the overall goal of allowing users to transact while maintaining privacy. A parachain in the Polkadot ecosystem, Manta Network's first major project is an automated market maker (quotation AMM) DEX that preserves privacy called MantaSwap.
Manta Network is working to implement ZkSNARK at the blockchain level. ZkSNARKs are a cryptographic technique that allows two entities to verify information with each other without having to share the underlying data related to it.
According to Chu, Manta's use of ZkSNARKS can bring privacy to the user's transactions and identity. Chu said that, right now, the team is focusing on improving usability, as their goal is to be a plug-and-play solution. In addition, they are working to ensure the transparency of both the code itself and the process.
Why privacy is important
The implications for transparent transactions aren't limited to someone who knows how much money is in an address. It can have much more significant tangible effects, since information is power. Chu said the lack of privacy leads to a number of other problems that arise in the scalability of blockchain use cases. Automated monitoring and scraping leads to unauthorized data collection, opening up potential blackmail opportunities. In business use cases, trade secrets can be revealed by tracking transactions on the chain.
Future projects
The team is currently finalizing its prototype for delivery to the Web3 Foundation. Before the end of the first quarter, it will deliver the first version of its test network. In future releases, other resources and features will be introduced. "Our goal is to get the mainnet by the end of the year, but we recognize the importance of making sure the security aspects of our network are thoroughly tested and addressed before making the decision to launch the mainnet," said Chu.
