TIM ICO review - Quantum Secure Blockchain

The following is an ICO review of TIM (talking.im), the world’s first quantum secure blockchain with an elastic DAG architecture that could be able to power up to 100 - 100 Million transactions per second.

Overview

TIM seeks to develop a future-proof blockchain with a high transaction rate, low fees, quantum secure encryption, and minimal mining power consumption that can also be used for micro-payments. The proposed transaction speed of 100 - 100 million TPS are to be accomplished by dynamically sharding transactions into smaller shards, which can be accomplished by combining an architecture that utilizes two layers consisting of a DAG mechanism and a blockchain.

The problem

Decentralized ledger technology is slowly becoming a viable alternative to intermediary-based and centralized financial/commercial systems, thanks to its increasing adoption. However, one central issue that is currently holding back mainstream adoption is the limited applicability of distributed ledger technologies because of its limited bandwidth. A comparatively low transaction rate, in turn, increases the transaction costs thus making it not an attractive option for various business models. The present solutions to this issue focus on increasing centralization or leverage two-layer approaches, while some of the latter solutions have struggled with bottlenecks in the ease-of-usage.

The solution

TIM envisions to develop a high-performance blockchain that is future ready in every aspect – including scalability and speed – while making sure that the strengths of current blockchain technologies are maintained. The project proposes a two-layer solution in which the first layer consists of a graph in which minors collect and verify transactions. The speciality of this first layer is that it uses a DAG mechanism. The second layer consists of a regular blockchain consisting of nodes that monitor the transactions of the first layer.

To describe it in a simplified manner: TIM seeks to combine the scalability and high throughput of DAG technology (for instance used by IOTA) with the stability and decentralization of a regular blockchain. Doing so could enable them to create a lightning-fast network that is still as decentralized and stable as a regular blockchain. Interestingly enough, the architecture that is used by TIM is lighter than most of the existing single or mixed blockchains.

Use cases

• Enterprise blockchain - transaction-based businesses in the area of finance, banking, and logistics.
• Government blockchain - providing electronic currencies for regional unions and governments.
• Personal blockchain - fee free subchains that can, for instance, be used for data storage.

Pros

• Combination of DAG technology with a two-layer approach to utilize the best of both worlds
• Proof of work with 50,000 transactions per second in a testnet
• Mitigation of attack possibility; viable solution to double spending
• Fee-free subchains
• Network cannot be forked
• Minimization of block storage costs to 0.02%
• Detailed roadmap until March 2021

Cons

• Numerous grammatical mistakes in the whitepaper
• 100 million transactions are not yet accomplished, it is based on a projection
• Quantum safe encryption is a key feature of TIM but they chose not to go into detail in the white paper. Instead, details will be released at a later date. One would at least expect a short explanation of the algorithm
• Quantum safe encryption depends on the network size. Therefore, a certain threshold must be reached to ensure encryption. Below this threshold, there's no encryption. TIM state in their whitepaper that more than 800,000 transactions per second are required for quantum safe encryption. In short, the high number of graphs necessary to enable encryption prevent quantum protection when demand is low
• It is questionable if the quantum safe encryption threshold will be reached in the near future
• Use cases are limited to the exchange of money
• 30% of ICO alocation for the TIM foundation
• Team lacks blockchain experience
• No details on partnerships and investors

The verdict

What is most interesting about TIM is its unique combination of DAG technology with a regular blockchain. If successful, this approach could utilize the best of both worlds while effectively minimizing their subsequent drawbacks. The main issue with DAG technology lies in the fact that it needs to accomplish a big network size in order to function properly. This is also one of the major criticisms of IOTA. One major drawback of TIM is the considerable dependence of its quantum safe encryption method on a certain network size. Until this threshold is reached, encryption cannot be guaranteed. As this threshold lies at 800,000 transactions per second, a considerable growth of the network needs to be accomplished before encryption is secured. Even more so, potential investors may wish to learn more about the algorithm that is utilized to ensure encryption.