Author: Martin Young, CoinTelegraph; Compiler: Wuzhu, Golden Finance
Ethereum Layer-2 scaling platform Starknet has reached the decentralization milestone set by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and has now become a zero-knowledge proof-based Rollup network (calculated by total locked value).
Starknet said in a press release that it has entered the "first phase" of decentralization according to the framework developed by Buterin in 2022, which means that the network operates with limited supervision or "assistance."
Starknet added that the framework is the "gold standard on-chain tool for analyzing Ethereum scaling solutions" and said it achieved this milestone through changes such as the creation of a security committee and a censorship circumvention mechanism.
While the system still allows for intervention by the security committee, it has implemented a fully functional validity proof system managed by smart contracts.
Starknet is currently the only Layer-2 ZK-rollup network to reach Phase 1, and has grown to become the largest ZK-rollup blockchain, with a total locked value of $629 million, slightly ahead of ZKsync’s $610 million, according to L2beat.
Starknet is the fifth largest Layer-2 network by locked value, with the top four Layer-2 networks all based on Optimistic Rollup and having achieved Phase 1 decentralization through proofs of fraud.
Layer-2 networks ranked by total value locked. Source: L2beat
Fraud proofs assume that a transaction is invalid until it is proven valid, while validity proofs assume that a transaction is valid only if it is proven valid through cryptographic evidence.
“Our goal is to completely get rid of the training wheels and achieve phase 2 decentralization on Ethereum, while also fully advancing our work on Bitcoin,” said Eli Ben-Sasson, co-founder and CEO of StarkWare (the developers of Starknet).
“Phase 2” decentralization refers to the stage when the network is fully autonomous and governed by the community. According to L2beat, only three small Layer-2 scaling platforms have reached this stage so far.
Buterin proposed the concept of “training wheels” in 2022, which are three stages of Ethereum scaling Rollup projects at different stages of development.
Coinbase Layer-2 network Base is the industry leader in locked value, with $14.7 billion locked in value and a market share of 33%. In comparison, Starknet has a market share of 1.4%.
The total value of on-chain assets in the Layer-2 ecosystem is $44.2 billion. This number has risen recently as the value of ETH has risen, but it is down 20% so far this year.
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