3 posts tagged with "TEE"

Recent months have seen an awakening of several large use cases of TEEs, from OpenAI calling for new and improved TEEs and Apple announcing a hardware-based private cloud, to Ethereum transactions being privately processed in TDX and other blockchains leveraging SGX for integrity. Having worked quite closely with several use cases that are at the center of this excitement, we are aware of both the promise which secure hardware holds, and of the current insufficiency of today’s hardware to service these use cases. TEE solutions currently on the market simply do not offer sufficient security guarantees while alternative secure hardware families like TPMs, secure elements and smart cards offer better (although not perfect) security guarantees at the cost of needed performance and functionality. For the first time, there is substantial industry demand for high-power, high-performance hardware that is secure under a comprehensive threat model.

Wallets are the gateway to Web3, serving as essential portals for users to send and receive messages, manage funds, and interact with blockchain applications. As a critical piece of blockchain infrastructure, wallets significantly shape users' Web3 experiences.

The wallet ecosystem is diverse, with providers offering varied products and services through different mechanisms. As wallet providers strive for sustainability and diversification, their operational models are evolving, creating new dynamics between users, applications, and the underlying blockchain infrastructure.

Our report aims to illuminate the current state of wallets on Ethereum, building upon the research conducted by orderflow.art.

This post presents Sirrah, a minimalist demo of extending a blockchain with confidential computing using Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs). We'll cover the development end-to-end: starting from Gramine-SGX and ordinary REVM, and ending with MEV-aware auction application... and a timelock encryption demo that you can try right now.