Infrastructure provider Infura will offer decentralized RPC network DIN

Consensys' well-known RPC service provider Infura announced at the developer conference DevConnect that it will collaborate with 18 technology companies including Microsoft and Tencent Cloud to build a decentralized RPC network called DIN, aiming to reduce the risk of single point of failure caused by centralization. Will there be no more risk in using Infura RPC in the future?

What is Infura

Established in 2016, Infura is a well-known RPC provider in the blockchain industry, offering RPC API services to general users, protocol developers, and related enterprises. According to official statistics provided by Infura, the Infura community currently has 400,000 developers, demonstrating a significant influence in the market.

However, to understand Infura's business, one must first have a basic understanding of the operational logic behind blockchain and RPC.

Introduction to RPC

As information on the blockchain is stored in full nodes, including transaction records, contract code content, and token ownership, anyone interacting with the blockchain network, whether a general user, protocol developer, or enterprise, needs to communicate with the full node. This interface is referred to as an RPC API.

RPC, short for Remote Procedure Call, allows callers to use specific data and functions from a remote server. In the context of blockchain, users read network information or submit transactions through RPC, making RPC and related infrastructure crucial in the Web3 industry.

RPC Service Providers

Public nodes are often congested, which is insufficient for professional users, especially for protocols and enterprises that require a large number of calls, such as Etherscan, which almost always needs to access on-chain data.

The most direct way is for project teams or enterprises to set up a full node themselves, but this means providing additional resources to maintain the full node, which is usually not the expertise of most developers. In the era of multiple chains, self-hosting a full node is not very efficient.

Therefore, a service that specifically provides protocol-grade RPC services has appeared on the market early on, including Alchemy, Ankr, QuickNode, and Pocket Network, with Infura being one of the most well-known companies in the industry.

Decentralized RPC Network DIN

Despite Infura's success, why is there a need to decentralize this service and create a new RPC network called DIN?

Why is it Needed

As mentioned earlier, due to Infura's high market share and being the default RPC provider for Metamask and many Layer2 solutions, most users default to using Infura's RPC for interacting with the blockchain. This centralization raises concerns about a single point of failure and potential information censorship, contradicting the decentralized nature of blockchain.

In fact, Infura has experienced multiple instances of downtime, resulting in most users and protocols being unable to interact with the blockchain.

Therefore, the community has long proposed decentralizing such infrastructure and has already implemented usable services like Pocket Network. Infura's current initiative aims to address single point of failure issues using similar methods.

Operation of DIN

To address these issues, Consensys and Infura have proposed a new solution — the Decentralized Infrastructure Network (DIN), which transforms their RPC service into a decentralized architecture.

According to the official press release, DIN will be led by Infura and will collaborate with 18 tech companies including Microsoft, Tencent, and Bloq, with these partners serving as nodes in the permissioned network of DIN. In case of host failures, users will be able to connect to nodes provided by other operators, reducing the risk of a single point of failure.

In the DIN network, partners not only act as high-throughput RPC providers but also handle resource proxy sales and jointly monitor network status to enhance the overall efficiency and stability of the RPC network.

List of Collaborating Partners

The detailed list of collaborating partners includes: Microsoft, Tencent, 0xFury, Bloq, Chainstack, Covalent, Ellipfra, Everstake, Gateway.fm, Grove, Laconic Network, Linkpool, LinkRiver, Luscent, Mantle, MatrixedLink, Pokt, Rivet.

The RPC Industry Still Has a Long Way to Go

Although the stability and security issues of RPC seem to be resolved, the scrutiny related to RPC has not improved.

RPC has long been associated with concerns about centralized censorship, with Infura having records of blocking specific regions or protocols, indicating that using blockchain services today is still subject to scrutiny. For example, Infura has blocked user access to and transactions related to the Tornado contract to comply with the U.S. government, or blocked usage in regions like Iran and Cuba.

Yet, in the new project, a consortium chain, a solution to this issue is not yet apparent, as nodes will continue to scrutinize transaction content. Fully decentralized RPC networks like Pocket Network or BlockPI are constrained by economic model designs and still lack strong consensus, making them not mainstream.