Near and EigenLayer collaborate to build a fast settlement layer SFFL to achieve Layer2 fast communication.
NEAR Foundation team member Altan Tutar attempted to introduce in plain language the future collaboration between Near and EigenLayer, which will launch a faster settlement layer for the Ethereum ecosystem - the Super Fast Finality Layer (SFFL) for quick cross Layer2 network communication. Introduction
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Challenges in the Existing Layer2 Ecosystem
There are significant obstacles to the interaction between existing Rollups ecosystems. Due to the need for Rollups to settle transactions on the Ethereum mainnet, in addition to waiting for the on-chain time of the mainnet, Rollups also need to wait for the generation of transaction finality proofs. Zero-knowledge proofs require a 12-minute wait, while fraud proofs require 7 days.
Therefore, if users want to perform cross-chain transactions between Rollups, such as transferring USDC from Arbitrum to smart contracts on the OP Mainnet, they may have to wait up to seven days, which is very unfriendly for user experience.
Introduction to Super Fast Finality Layer (SFFL)
In response to the above issues, Near collaborates with EigenLayer to introduce a new network layer to replace Ethereum, aiming to accelerate cross-network communication efficiency.
Background: EigenLayer
EigenLayer provides security for Web3 infrastructure by staking liquidity assets such as stETH as LSD in the protocol to extend Ethereum's security to the infrastructure layer.
Previous infrastructures include oracles, cross-chain bridges, data availability layers (DA), sidechains, DePIN, and other projects. Besides the infrastructure itself, these projects typically need to build an incentive layer from scratch to encourage market participants to become nodes. These project teams are known as actively validated services (AVS). However, due to the difficulty of constructing network consensus, the security of the resulting network in such projects is often insufficient.
Through EigenLayer, AVS in the future will no longer need to establish consensus networks on their own, and may even have the opportunity not to issue tokens themselves, significantly reducing the entrepreneurial threshold for infrastructure projects.
Background: Near
The Near network is a native protocol layer that adopts sharding technology for public chains, considering each account and smart contract as a separate shard, enabling almost all transactions to be in the form of cross-contract transactions.
Near can quickly transmit and interact with transaction information between different shards, a design architecture that can be applied to communication between Rollups.
How SFFL Operates
To address the efficiency issue of interaction between multiple Rollups, Near and EigenLayer are collaborating to build a new network, SFFL.
If we assume that Ethereum's performance and architecture remain the same, the compromise is to reconstruct a fast-finality network, SFFL, which provides a certain guarantee before Ethereum's final confirmation. This allows Rollups based on this fast network to settle transactions more quickly and complete cross-network communication.
However, who would be willing to give up Ethereum's security and trust a new network's consensus? This is where EigenLayer comes in. EigenLayer excels in assisting projects that need to build consensus from scratch for decentralized networks, rapidly constructing a new consensus network extending Ethereum's security.
If a node in the SFFL network behaves maliciously or fails to verify information correctly, anyone can submit a fraud proof to EigenLayer's contract on Ethereum. As a result, the tokens staked by the node in EigenLayer's contract will be confiscated, indirectly ensuring the effectiveness of the SFFL network's finality.
On the other hand, once the finality issue is resolved, the expertise of Near in quickly communicating and transmitting transaction information between different networks comes into play. Therefore, the client-side of the SFFL network will be built using Near's technical architecture, with all Near nodes serving as validators AVS for settlement and data availability layers to achieve fast cross-Rollups transactions.
Therefore, SFFL leverages EigenLayer to establish security and utilizes Near to achieve fast cross-network interactions.
Future Prospects and Potential Issues
SFFL Enables Fast Communication Between Layer2
SFFL can complete cross-network asset transfers in 3 to 4 seconds, opening up new applications, with the most significant advantage being easy integration of liquidity.
Ideally, SFFL can use fast cross-Rollups communication to integrate liquidity from different Layer2 networks. For example, whether it's Arbitrum or zkSync, USDT within them can be quickly transferred to maximize liquidity. This will be more convenient in a future multi-network ecosystem.
Increased Security Concerns
The failure points and complexity of the above mechanism increase potential security concerns. In addition to Ethereum's security, SFFL, EigenLayer, Near, and other components are new failure points, with most contracts or client code having a short and more complex history, which adds to the security concerns of the project.
In reality, the liquidity staked on EigenLayer is inevitably incomparable to that of Ethereum.
While providing fast final confirmation for cross-chain transactions, security is actually sacrificed. Balancing and compromising the future of SFFL will be a common challenge for both teams.