Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has put forth a new standard for Ethereum wallets. Among others, he stresses in a blog post on December 3 the importance of improving wallets for enhancing user experience, security, and privacy within the Ethereum ecosystem.
He explains that wallets form a crucial link between the user and Ethereum. The decentralization and privacy features of an ecosystem are valid only to the extent that the wallets users are using have such features.
Vitalik Buterin outlined Key Features of Ideal Wallet
Vitalik Buterin has outlined many features for an “ideal wallet” centered on:
Cross-layer 2 transactions: Wallets should let tokens be sent or received across various Ethereum layer 2 networks easily, through the use of chain-specific addresses and integrated sending capability.
Improved Security: He suggests a two-key model, one for basic transactions and another for high-value operations. With this, there will be some protection against hacks and errors that users might sometimes make.
It sustains Privateness: The wallets can maintain their funds in a centralized privacy pool and employ stealth addresses to transfer them. All these would imply more difficulty in tracing transactions and would be protective of users’ activities against association with certain applications.
To this end, Vitalik Buterin has employed notable members of the Ethereum community, including Liraz Siri and Yoav Weiss to polish the concepts that he eventually settled with. Though an enhanced user experience might go a long way, he opined that deploying and testing new features would be a far better long-term enhancement method.
This proposition builds on Buterin’s previous advocacy for better Ethereum wallets and reflects his vision for a more cohesively united Ethereum ecosystem.
