Dialogue with Nym: How to build a new ecosystem of privacy infrastructure?

As Web3 gradually comes into public view, privacy protection, as an important commitment of Web3, has also attracted much attention. A rising star on the privacy circuitNymHow did you emerge in the Web3 privacy field? Today, Odaily is honored to invite Jacky, head of Nym Asia, to participate in the Chaohua Community AMA. With the theme of Nym: Protecting Metadata Privacy and Building a New Ecology of Privacy Infrastructure, we will discuss the current situation and future of the privacy track.

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Odaily: Everyone is talking about Web3 privacy, but compared with other features in Web3, such as the degree of decentralization, interoperability, performance, etc., privacy always has a lower priority. Do you think this statement is correct?

Jacky：This statement is biased. In the world of Web3, the openness and transparency of blockchain technology allows anyone to view the transaction transfer records and activity records of all users on the chain, and the data of users can be read and utilized at any time. As the density of activities on the chain increases, privacy protection is equally important as decentralization, interoperability, and security. After all, no user is willing to run naked with their data in the Web3 world.

Odaily: At present, there are many privacy protection projects in Web3. They belong to different fields, such as privacy coins, privacy computing, etc., which subdivision field does Nym belong to, and how is it different from other projects in the same track?

Jacky：Nym is in the subdivision track of the privacy transaction network in Web3 privacy. However, what Nym does is quite different from the well-known privacy projects. What Nym wants to solve is not just simple on-chain transactions. Private issues.

Although the current privacy track has produced many well-known projects, such as Tornado Cash, Secret Network, Findora and Oasis. However, the essence of all these projects is to solve the users on-chain privacy issues. To explain it in a more popular way, these projects can only provide users with currency mixing services, by putting the encrypted assets of different users in the same fund pool and disrupting them, so as to hide the real transaction source.

What Nym wants to solve is not only the privacy protection of data on the chain, but also the Internet infrastructure that all blockchain and traditional Internet applications rely on, that is, adding privacy protection functions to the information transmission layer of the Internet. . In other words, what Nym wants to transform is not a certain public chain, but the entire Internet.

Nym uses a mixed network (mix-net) technology, which can realize that the traffic on the entire Internet cannot be tracked and analyzed, and adds traffic noise from the data source to prevent metadata from being tracked and analyzed, so as to protect user metadata. Purpose.

All data transmitted through Nyms hybrid network will be packaged by the system into Sphinx format data blocks of exactly the same size. At the same time, in order to prevent the onion network from being attacked by end-to-end analysis, Nym will also scramble the time order of all these data blocks and rearrange them randomly.

In addition, in order to further conceal information such as the specific traffic volume used by users, Nym will also add additional empty data packets to the mixed traffic in the network, making the users information sending time, size and source more difficult to detect and analyze, completely preventing outsiders from detecting and analyzing the information. Reduction efforts for traffic in hybrid networks.

Odaily: As Nym is a privacy project that protects metadata, who are the main user groups? Is it geared towards a specific industry or field?

Jacky：Nym is committed to protecting the metadata privacy of all users on the Internet, and there is still a lot of room for imagination.

Nym provides privacy protection services to all available service users who choose to communicate privately. End users are divided into two categories. On the one hand, we provide ordinary users with hybrid traffic tools such as Nym Connect, so that they can protect the metadata on the APP used on the Internet and achieve large-scale user adoption.

On the other hand, in 2024 we will focus on launching tools to protect metadata privacy for enterprise-level users to achieve privacy at the institutional and enterprise levels. Enterprise and institutional use cases are critical to integrating privacy at the infrastructure level, with key partners including the fintech, healthcare and personal data sectors. These industries are extremely prone to privacy leaks, which have a serious impact on ordinary people. Additionally, Nym will drive browser and operating system integration with popular everyday programs like Signal, Google, and Brave, a natural extension of Nym Connects need for successful adoption.

Our ultimate goal is to scale the Nym hybrid network to millions of users and make privacy tools the norm. As digitization increases, the attack surface continues to expand, undermining the privacy and security of individuals and organizations. In the future, our basic infrastructure must respect and protect basic privacy rights, and Nym is here to make this happen.

Odaily: From a developers perspective, how can we use Nym to provide privacy protection for our own projects?

Jacky：Nym is an open source, decentralized, permissionless and incentive-free system, a full-stack privacy system. Developers can bind applications to the Nym system through the Nym hybrid network, protect users through Nym private credentials at the application layer, and provide protection for users of their own projects at the network traffic level (hybrid network) and application level (credentials) Strong guarantees for metadata monitoring.

Odaily: For ordinary users, besides purchasing NYM tokens, is there any other way to participate in the construction of Nym and obtain more rewards?

Jacky：Nym enables users to create private Web3 application development programs based on the Mixnet privacy protocol by enabling privacy blockchains. Nym has 5 types of network participants: end users, hybrid nodes, gateways, validators, and service providers.

• End User: All available service users who choose to communicate privately;

• Hybrid node: Hybrid node provides community privacy to end users through anonymous data packaging;

• Gateway: The gateway keeps Nym Mixnet non-free. Participants may choose to use the same gateway to run data, disperse into various gateways to run, or choose different gateways every day;

• Verifier: maintains the Nym cross-chain network, distributes and notifies all information within the network;

• Service Providers: Send and receive information through private communications between the Nym network and users.

In addition to the above technical participation methods, in order to encourage everyone to participate more, the Nym community is launching various types of activities with lower thresholds every week.

Odaily: At the end of June this year, we saw the cooperation between Nym and Aztec. Aztec is a privacy project in the second layer of Ethereum. What effect will the cooperation with Nym have on the entire Ethereum ecosystem? Is there competition between privacy technologies in the zk department and Nym?

Jacky： 1、Nyms partnership with AztecIt solves a major problem of the privacy stack for Aztec, provides a more complete infrastructure privacy protection for the Ethereum chain, and makes it easier for Ethereum developers to obtain the functions of Nym mixnet.

To become a private blockchain, all state must be end-to-end encrypted, which includes a large commitment pool and cryptographic ticket pre-images. Users need information such as asset, value, and sender data to use tickets. The state belonging to the user needs to be obtained in unencrypted form, and the global public state needs to be obtained to prove the ownership of the selective part.

Aztec Connect previously addressed this issue using experimental decryption, which involved downloading global private and public chain data. But this approach has scaling issues that make trial decryption inefficient, and there is no single solution yet. And as the transport layer of the privacy stack, the Nym mixnet is an integral part of the developers building kit.

Nym CEO Harry Halpin said:"From preventing MEV to DDoS attacks, you need network-level privacy, and Nym is pleased to provide Aztec with these cutting-edge capabilities. Using a zero-knowledge system to protect privacy is meaningless without Nym’s online privacy protection features, it’s like wearing a mask but forgetting to put on pants.

2. Not only is there no direct competition between the privacy technology in the zk system and Nym, but Nym technology also complements the field that the current zk system privacy project cannot involve - the hybrid traffic network, providing global data privacy protection. With the joint efforts of zk privacy technology and Nym mixnet network, the data privacy protection service of the entire Internet will be more comprehensive and efficient.

Odaily: Does Nym consider integration or cooperation with other blockchain projects in its future development plan?

Jacky：The Nym team has always attached great importance to actively cooperating with various Web3 projects to achieve a win-win situation. The image below shows the many well-known Web3 projects we have collaborated with. A strategic focus of Nym this year is the integration with major Web3 wallets, and we are discussing Nym mixnet integration with some major Web3 wallets. We hope to start real work on wallet integration by the end of this year to protect network layer privacy for various cryptocurrency transactions.

At present, the Web3 projects that Nym has cooperated with include Aztec, Monero, Alephium, Keybase, Metamask, Blockstream Green Wallet, etc. In addition, Nym has reached cooperation intentions with many well-known projects, and everyone looks forward to the official announcement of cooperation.

Odaily: Compared with Web2, the user base of Web3 is still smaller. Does Nym cooperate with traditional Internet platforms to promote broader privacy protection?

Jacky：What Nym is doing is not only applicable to various projects of Web3, but also applicable to all traffic applications of the entire Internet, with a larger space for imagination. Cooperation with major blockchains and applications is key to Nyms strategy. By integrating mixnet into applications and services that people are already using (both inside and outside of Web3), mass adoption by millions of people will be successfully achieved.

At present, we have also achieved a lot of results in this area. For example, Nym Connect can already be integrated with Web2 applications Element and Telegram. Simply put, when you use Telegram, you open Nym Connect and start mixing traffic, then all your data information on Relegram is protected by privacy. The various projects we currently cooperate and integrate are shown in the figure below.

Odaily: Knowing Nym’s financing experience, there are many top institutions in the Web3 field, such as a16z, Binance Labs, PolyChain, DCG, etc. Is there any expectation of listing on Binance in the future?

Jacky：Nym has been widely recognized by top investment institutions and Internet users in the European and American markets. a16z, Binance Labs, and PolyChain have always supported our development and marketing activities. In May last year, Nym also received support from a16z and Polychain. We have a US$300 million ecological fund commitment, and Binance Labs has also participated in several rounds of investment. I believe that with the joint efforts of the community, our token economy will run better and better.

Odaily: In addition to the hybrid network, Nym also has a Nym blockchain built through the Cosmos SDK. In addition to providing rewards to nodes, will this blockchain create a new ecology? Does Nym have any policies to motivate developers in this regard? ?

Jacky：Solving the incentive problem of large networks is the strength of blockchain technology, so Nym built the Nyx blockchain on top of the Cosmos SDK. If you run a Nym hybrid network node, you will receive corresponding NYM token incentives based on your contribution and operating performance. At the same time, the increase in new user usage will further increase the incentive level of hybrid nodes. The increase in node incentives will also cause new nodes to continue to be added to Nyms hybrid network.

The hybrid network is essentially built on Nyx, which allows anyone to write smart contracts in our blockchain, so developers can directly develop dapps on Nyx to achieve metadata privacy protection. The Nyx chain has plans to launch the governance token NYX in the future. Once Nym’s PoS governance token NYX is launched, our verification program interface (API) will be decentralized, and our verification program set will be open to the public. The public can run their own Validation program, validator rewards will be possible.

Odaily: Most of Nym’s founders come from PANORAMIX, a privacy project funded by the European Commission. Has Nym established any specific cooperation with the European Commission?

Jacky：The EUs NGI program focuses on protecting user privacy and putting people first. Perhaps in the future, the EUs NGI will combine Nym privacy technology to form an EU Internet standard, so that their leaders and people can truly be protected from US surveillance and eavesdropping.

Odaily: I would like to introduce to you what new developments Nym needs to pay attention to recently.

Jacky：There are three big news in Nym recently that are worth paying attention to:

• Nym will soon launch the decentralized Nym virtual network service with its partners to create the worlds most powerful censorship-resistant and privacy-protecting virtual network.

• Nym annualShipyard Academy ProgramThe second phase is about to start, and it provides a complete learning plan and development bonus funding for all developers.

• Nym community grant The funding plan has also started, and everyone can actively apply. We provide all-round support in technology, teamwork, and funding for followers and developers of the Nym ecosystem.

Free QA session

1. How does Nym ensure the security of transactions under the premise of privacy? What related work has the team done?

Nym：The essence of Nym is to solve the users metadata privacy protection problem by using hybrid network technology. The hybrid network is equivalent to adding several layers of noise to the Internet traffic end, making it impossible for any service provider or hacker to track your data. Therefore, This also protects the user’s data security. Regarding NYM tokens, the team combined blockchain technology to build an entire decentralized pledge network to run the Nym hybrid network. Therefore, the role of NYM tokens is to operate nodes, pledge nodes, and pay hybrid network fees.

2. What is the difference between Nym’s encryption privacy on the Internet and virtual networks and other projects, and what are its advantages in terms of technical performance?

Nym: Traditional virtual networks will cause potential virtual network service providers to sell user data information due to incentive problems, and NYM directly solves the problem of insufficient incentives by combining blockchain technology.

The proxy access service provided by the virtual network provider has a fatal flaw, that is, its stable operation and privacy protection are all based on the assumption of trust in a certain centralized node. Users not only need to trust that this centralized node can provide continuous and stable services, but also believe that this node will not wantonly collect user information like Internet companies.

Therefore, for an ordinary Internet user, the virtual network service just transfers the power of information collection from the original Internet giant to another centralized service provider. At the same time, we have no way of knowing whether this service provider has provided user access logs and other information to the government under tremendous pressure.

Compared with centralized virtual network services, The Onion Router greatly improves the centralization problem of proxy services. The Onion Router ensures the security of user information by selecting multiple nodes to forward user traffic and switching new forwarding paths within a fixed period.

However, The Onion Router still has important flaws: it currently relies entirely on volunteers to contribute computing power, which leads to a lack of incentives in its operation process, and there is a growing gap between the services that the entire network can provide and the ever-growing user needs. Many contradictions.

The working principle of the Nym hybrid network is: all data transmitted through the Nym hybrid network will be packaged by the system into Sphinx format data blocks of exactly the same size. At the same time, in order to prevent The Onion Router from being attacked by end-to-end analysis, Nym will also scramble the time order of all these data blocks and rearrange them randomly.

In addition, in order to further conceal information such as the specific traffic volume used by users, Nym will also add additional empty data packets to the mixed traffic in the network, making the users information sending time, size and source more difficult to detect and analyze, completely preventing outsiders from detecting and analyzing the information. Reduction efforts for traffic in hybrid networks.

3. As a member of the privacy track, does Nym have any big plans for the future?

Nym:  2023: Nyms strategic focus is to cooperate extensively with various Web3 wallets and applications to achieve large-scale adoption by more users; 2024: Nyms strategic focus is to achieve institutional and enterprise-level privacy protection adoption.

4. Can NYM and Nyx cross-chain each other?

Nym：NYM is the ecological token, Nyx is our chain, built on cosmos, the NYM tokens on ETH and the NYM tokens on Nyx can be cross-chained with each other.

5. At present, large-scale censorship and equipment vendors have carried out a lot of operations in client scanning. Nym’s current content is mainly in the direction of metadata. Will Nym have targeted privacy protection measures to deal with client scanning in the future?

Nym：The main technical advantage of NYM mixnet is to mix Internet traffic so that neither hackers nor service providers can collect and analyze user metadata. It can be considered that data privacy protection has been achieved relatively upstream. Currently, no very targeted measures have been introduced for client scanning.