The blockchain development firm COTI announced today that its garbled circuits breakthrough has passed initial development. This is the first time garbled circuits have been successfully deployed on the blockchain, bringing on-chain privacy with a computation speed up to 1000 times faster than other encryption systems like FHE, The launch of garbled circuits on the blockchain promises a Web3 environment that can enjoy on-chain immutability while maintaining complete privacy, which has never been accomplished in a scalable way.
Garbled circuit technology is a form of Multi-Party Computation (MPC), where specialized cryptographic methods allow a group of parties to collaborate, performing a specific computation that requires their private information, but does so without disclosing the input information to any other party. The technology has existed for decades, but was merely theoretical until recently due to the heavy computational expenses required.
This barrier is compounded when placed on the blockchain, as it was never intended to handle computationally expensive processes. However, COTI and its partner Soda Labs have collaborated to create a breakthrough that performs garbled circuit computations using a fraction of the processing power and memory normally required. The result is a way to ensure on-chain, completely private transactions that maintain the benefit of a trustless environment.
Superior Technology to Solve a Specific Problem
Garbled protocols were invented to solve a very particular problem: The Millionaires problem created by Andrew Yao. This is a thought experiment where two millionaires, Alice and Bob, want to decide who is richer without disclosing their actual net worth.
The MPC process is designed to protect the privacy of each participant’s data throughout the process. This involves the multiple participants who contribute their portion of encrypted data into an MPC “black box.” This then processes the inputs and calculates a desired result, which is then shared with the participants. What is especially noteworthy is that MPC can do all this without compromising any confidential data.
This privacy is absolutely critical for many different Web3 use cases. Furthermore, it can handle transactions that affect a private state shared among multiple parties, making it superior to ZK-based solutions. It is also immune to single point of failure weaknesses that have been revealed in TEE solutions. The result is a privacy-protecting solution on-chain that is both scalable and more secure than alternative solutions.
The COTI team looks forward to rolling out their garbled circuits solution as they launch the COTI V2 devnet in April 2024.
About COTI
COTI V2 is a Privacy-Centric Ethereum Layer 2 that utilizes revolutionary technology to facilitate privacy across Web3 applications. Following a breakthrough in the cryptographic protocol known as “Garbled Circuits,” COTI introduces a faster and lighter privacy solution that can be operated on any device, opening up a whole new world of use cases, including privacy wallets, DEXs, governance, and more.