Enigma = Ethereum+Golem+iExec all in one

dana-edwards (74)in #crypto-news • 7 years ago

Note: This is not investment advice. This is the personal opinion of a blogger who holds no qualifications in finance. It is my opinion that playing with crypto tokens or getting involved in ICOs is the equivalent of gambling on open source projects and is not the same as investing in companies with business plans and clear profit motives.

Enigma is a big big deal

I've finally digested the whitepaper, looked at the concepts, studied the game theory behind the incentives, and it looks like they are taking the best ideas from Ethereum, (Golem probably borrowed from Enigma), and now they are developing a dragon slayer.

Enigma is special because it can do incentive compatible secure multiparty computation. Just as the Nakamoto consensus mechanism uses incentives to encourage honest behavior so too does Enigma. Enigma also uses disincentives in the form of security deposits to discourage bad behavior which is an even greater guarantee than offered by current Ethereum or Bitcoin.

Enigma offers privacy and can store data in a distributed hash table (DHT). Interestingly and perhaps the big breakthrough is they at least theoretically can compute this data using a somewhat homomorphic encryption scheme in a way which separates the results which as far as I understand are public from the data which is kept private. No other technology in this space either in development or even in theory is capable of computing private data in a distributed way.

Storj can store data as can IPFS and they both have their tokens. Golem and iExec can compute public data but it is totally open for everyone to see and for the service providers to see. SAFE Network can store encrypted data but again cannot compute it or do much more with it. Only Enigma offers a token ENG which allows it to store data in a secure encrypted way and then compute that data without anyone but the owner knowing the data being computed.

Currently ENG goes for 40 cents. 40 cents for a token which could possibly have more practical utility than all the other tokens in crypto space? Even Steem as good as it is, does not have an underlying capability to compute encrypted data and doesn't even attempt privacy which means ENG has an advantage over Steem.

Questions do remain whether or not Enigma can scale. I honestly remain skeptical on the performance and scalability. I'm a person who will look at the fancy math, projections, theoretical results, and ultimately demand benchmark results as proof of scalability.