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IOTA Creates Payment System Compatible With Any App or Game

A developer has revealed that IOTA, a distributed ledger protocol created by the IOTA Foundation, has been integrated into a payment system, which can be utilized in any app or game.

Expressly, it functions seamlessly on all platforms, cush as Xbox one, WebAbb, Windows, Android, Playstation 4, Linux, and iOS, among others.

IOTA’s Progress

IOTA was developed as a protocol to propel the innovative machine-to-machine economy that involves the internet of things (IoT). It was to offer a highly scalable and royalty-free asset transfer network.

For instance, at the beginning of 2019, it took part in one of the most notable smart city projects in Texas, United States, whereby it was to offer interoperability solutions in the transportation sector.

The payment system presented by IOTA comes at a time when the gaming industry has reached unprecedented heights as it seeks to be a force to reckon with.

It has been stipulated that this initiative can be theoretically utilized as a payment system on fifteen distinctive platforms. Additionally, it does not have any complex functions as it permits users to send and receive IOTA, as well as survey their wallets.

IOTA’s co-founder, Dominik Schiener, praised IOTA developers called Marlon Morales. He acknowledged that the payment system was a reflection of commendable work.

Image via Shutterstock

IOTA Network Increases its Speed by 20x Following its Relaunch a Few Months Prior

The IOTA Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on blockchain and open-source development has announced the latest version of its node software, Hornet together with the IOTA community.

The IOTA community has conducted a stress test that illustrated a stable network of over 150 nodes with over 650 confirmed transactions per second (TPS). This shows an increase in transaction throughput by a factor of 20, while Hornet is able to consume 10 times less memory under normal operations compared to its previous node software.

This new node software is paving the way towards IOTA 1.5, also known as Chrysalis, which includes protocol enhancements that will lead to “a substantial increase in network speed.”

In a release shared with Blockchain.News, Luca Moser, Software Engineer at IOTA Foundation said, “Due to IOTA’s parallel architecture and feeless transaction model, developers can build real-world applications without the constraints imposed by traditional blockchain technology.”

“IOTA’s focus on regulatory compliance, standardization, and industry collaboration are key pillars of its adoption strategy. Many of the upcoming protocol upgrades were developed in partnership with our community and network of partners in industry and academia.”

The IOTA Foundation has been working with partners in academia, government, and business to create develop safe and secure open-source technologies in the digital ecosystem.

Iota Network has seen a massive hack in February, on the platform’s Trinity Wallet software. The network was shut down on the same day to prevent any further security breaches, however, 8.55 million MIOTA, approximately $2 million was stolen from 50 digital wallet users.

The Foundation announced that the network was back online after almost a month after the attack. As the person or persons responsible for the February breach was not found, Iota said it will “continue to work with the FBI, as well as the UK, German, and Maltese police to identify and track the attacker.”

To prevent future additional attacks on the network, the IOTA Foundation has made changes to its software security practices, to improve its security capabilities and resources.

IOTA Foundation Releases Testnet of Fully Decentralized Network Pollen

The IOTA Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on blockchain and open-source development has announced the launch of its testnet of a fully decentralized network, Pollen.

The release of the testnet marks the first time where it enables developers and other parties to test the capabilities of a fully decentralized IOTA network.

IOTA 2.0, starts with its first phase, Pollen, and the next two phases, called Nectar, its second testnet, and Honey, its mainnet.

IOTA’s team of researchers, developers, and academic institutions have spent the last year researching a solution that will replace its current network by H1 2021. The new network has developed a distributed ledger network that can scale to meet the demands of the industry without leaving out the considerations of speed, security, and decentralization.

The IOTA network has developed a new architecture made up of three layers, including the application layer, communication layer, and the network layer. These three layers will enable support for features such as tokenization, scalable smart contracts, feeless Dapps, and sharding in the future.

Phase two, Nectar involves releasing the remaining components on the IOTA 2.0 test network, where rewards will be distributed to node operators or attackers to test the resilience of the protocol. Phase three, Honey will be the official release of IOTA 2.0 and will be the production-ready version of the protocol.

In a press release shared with Blockchain.News, Jakub Cech, Director of Engineering at the IOTA Foundation said:

“The community has always been an important part of IOTA’s development. With this release, we look forward to allowing our research and developer community, along with others to test out and validate the Coordicide components. We look forward to continuing to build the future of the IOTA protocol together with the community and our academic partners towards its production-readiness.”

IOTA increases its speed by 20x following its relaunch

The IOTA Network has seen a massive hack in February, on the platform’s Trinity Wallet software. The network was shut down on the same day to prevent any further security breaches, however, 8.55 million MIOTA, approximately $2 million was stolen from 50 digital wallet users.

Image source: IOTA Foundation

IOTA Foundation Announces Release Date of IOTA 1.5 Network Upgrade Chrysalis

The IOTA Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on blockchain and open-source development announced today that the first phase of its Chrysalis upgrade will be live on August 19.

In the first phase of Chrysalis, IOTA’s 1.5 network upgrade will be live on the IOTA Mainnet next week. IOTA 1.5 is critical for the network’s transition to IOTA 2.0, to enable its enterprise-based full decentralized network.

According to a press release shared with Blockchain.News, IOTA 1.5 features a substantial increase to the current mainnet’s transactions per second (TPS); the network will process over 1,000 TPS during phase one.

The users of the IOTA network will also see improvements including the reduction of milestone insurance rate from the current 80 seconds to 10 seconds, witnessing an 8-fold increase in transaction confirmation times.

The new phase would also be introducing autopeering, a feature that allows nodes to find its peers without the intervention of a node operator, which simplifies the process of setting up new nodes.

Performance and reliability improvements for node software will also be a feature for IOTA 1.5, and the majority of transactions would reach their destination on the first try. Jakub Cech, Director of Engineer at the IOTA Foundation said:

“We are thrilled to announce the completion of our first of two phases of IOTA 1.5. The culmination of these will become the Mainnet’s intermediate stage before the removal of the Coordinator. The substantial TPS increase and speed of the network are clear indications of the progress we’ve made and will continue to make as we move towards Coordicide.”

What to expect after the first phase of Chrysalis

As announced by the IOTA Foundation, the second phase if IOTA 1.5 is expected in the second half of 2020. The second phase plans to introduce the functionality of unspent transaction output (UTXO), atomic transactions, reusable addresses, and a transition to a binary transaction layout.

These features would enable the users on the IOTA network to simplify the building of solutions for the IOTA protocol and would allow users to utilize the protocol on a day-to-day basis and for partners to build custom solutions.

The IOTA Foundation announced the testnet of its IOTA 2.0 network’s first phase Pollen in late June 2020. The release of the testnet marks the first time where it enables developers and other parties to test the capabilities of a fully decentralized IOTA network.

IOTA 2.0, starts with its first phase, Pollen, and the next two phases, called Nectar, its second testnet, and Honey, its mainnet.

IOTA Launches Chrysalis Phase 1, One Step Closer to an Enterprise-Ready Blockchain

IOTA has successfully launched phase 1 of Chrysalis, reaching one of many important milestones in its development. Chrysalis, also known as IOTA 1.5 is designed as an intermediate phase before its transition to IOTA 2.0, Coordicide.

With the completion of the deployment of Chrysalis phase 1, the network is not witnessing 1,000 transactions per second, with an average transaction confirmation time of 10 seconds. Performance and reliability improvements for node software will also be a feature for IOTA 1.5, and the majority of transactions would reach their destination on the first try.

Before the network upgrade, IOTA was only able to handle 5 to 20 transactions per second, struggling to even reach 40. The network has now upgraded to Hornet nodes, allowing the improvements of tip selection and milestone selection algorithms, supporting over 1,000 transactions per second.

With the new improvements seen in the Chrysalis deployment, the network is now capable of serving a significantly larger number of use cases, taking it one step further towards an enterprise-ready network.

The IOTA Chrysalis launch also allows users to run a node “easier than ever,” and the latest IOTA blog said:

“Node set-up and maintenance has never been easier. Running a node can be done with 4 commands via APT, or through Nuriel’s playbook. With autopeering, officially part of Chrysalis but released in Hornet a few months ago, you do not need to look for manual nodes to peer. We still recommend setting up manual peers if you run a node in a production environment.”

As announced by the IOTA Foundation, the second phase if IOTA 1.5 is expected in the second half of 2020. The second phase plans to introduce the functionality of unspent transaction output (UTXO), atomic transactions, reusable addresses, and a transition to a binary transaction layout. Phase 2 of Chrysalis will conclude the development of IOTA 1.5. IOTA outlined its current progress towards Phase 2:

“Work on Chrysalis Phase 2 began several months ago as RFC specifications. And development already began on some of the components, like the new wallet and client libraries.”

IOTA Foundation and Jaguar Land Rover Introduce Open-Source DLT Framework

IOTA Foundation, a distributed-ledger technology developer, and Jaguar Land Rover, a leading British luxury car manufacturer, have introduced IOTA Access, an open-source DLT framework, for decentralized and automated smart device access control capable of managing billions of machines.

The other launch partners include STMicroelectronics, an integrated device manufacturer, BiiLabs, ETO GRUPPE, EDAG, NTT DATA Romania, and RIDDLE&CODE.

“Never trust, always check”

The open-source DLT framework is based on a zero-trust architecture whose core philosophy is the slogan, “Never trust, always check.” Therefore, the network’s foundation is inherently designed so that trustworthy insiders are also viewed as vulnerabilities in the system.

IOTA Access will enable smart device owners and users to request or grant access to their data stream or device in an auditable, contactless, permissionless, and remote manner. This is automatically triggered by embedded access control policies. As per the announcement:

“IOTA Access is designed to bring fine-grained access control to any machine, device, or building without relying on a centralized system or requiring a constant internet connection.”

Thus, the decentralized access control will be availed even without a steady internet connection, and this will be undertaken in an efficient peer-to-peer way.

Balancing decentralized and semi-centralized management procedures

The open-source DLT framework is designed in such a manner that it balances decentralized and semi-centralized management procedures. As a result, key capabilities will be decentralized prompting the betterment of humanity in an open, secure, and trusted fashion. According to the IOTA Foundation:

“Without this balance, trust in technology and how it is used in a global society is eroded. In the case of access control, we would have instances, where car owners get locked out of their own vehicles, and homeowners get locked out of their own homes.”

Pegging devices on IOTA Access

The application scenarios of the open-source DLT framework are diverse and extensive. For instance, any object like a house, car, scooter, and bicycle can be pegged on IOTA Access. As a result, it can be rented out or permission granted to a trusted individual without necessarily handing over a private key. The IOTA team noted:

“If you have a smart door lock, then it can integrate IOTA Access with embedded policies for pay per use rentals, or to simply increase the transparency and security of entering your home and allowing access to others. Signify your home is available on a decentralized marketplace, and anyone can find it and rent it.”

IOTA Access is developed with an embedded first approach in mind because it permits access service or pay-per-use models to be hardware-enforced. In June, The IOTA Foundation announced the launch of its testnet of a fully decentralized network, Pollen. The release of the testnet marked the first time it enabled developers and other parties to test the capabilities of a fully decentralized IOTA network.

IOTA Launches Austria State-Backed Christian Doppler Laboratory for Blockchain Research

The IOTA Foundation, a non-profit distributed ledger technology-focused foundation has announced that it is joining a new research project, which is expected to run for seven years. The IOTA Foundation is joining the new research laboratory for blockchain technologies for the Internet of Things (IoT) as an industrial partner.

The research lab, the Christian Doppler Laboratory (CDL-BOT), will provide “cutting-edge research on DLT interoperability, the intersection of DLT with the Internet of Things and developer support offerings.”

The Federal Minister for Digital Economic Affairs in Austria has officially opened the laboratory in a digital ceremony, joined by the co-founder and co-chair of the IOTA Board of Directors, Dominik Schiener. The IOTA Foundation continues to strive for developing open source technologies and infrastructure for trusted IoT.

For the IOTA Foundation, this project would allow more development and research on the IOTA Tangle as well as applications in the Internet of Things. The project would also look beyond the IOTA protocol to further develop the European DLT ecosystem. In an official press release shared with Blockchain.News, IOTA explained:

“This requires novel mechanisms to enable DLT interoperability ranging from cross-blockchain token transfers or atomic swaps to cross-blockchain smart contract invocation and interaction, as well as providing client-side blockchain interoperability through developer support.”

Pantos, a scientific research project aiming to solve the key technical barriers in the crypto and digital asset space, as well as Bitpanda, a leading European neobroker has also joined the research project. Prof. Stefan Schulte, the lead for the new lab said:

“With the rising number of potential application areas for DLT-based payments and data exchange in the Internet of Things, new DLTs have to be integrated, and interoperability between different DLTs becomes necessary. I am looking forward to doing joint research with the IOTA Foundation and Pantos in order to find novel solutions to this highly topical topic.”

The press release also mentioned that postdoctoral and doctoral students would also be employed for the research project, under the supervision of Prof.Stefan Schulte.

IOTA’s Next Generation Wallet—Firefly: What New Features to Expect

Recently, Charlie Varley, the technical lead at the IOTA Foundation published the details of IOTA’s next-generation wallet—Firefly. This new wallet comes with a range of improvements that will transform IOTA into an enterprise-ready protocol.

Varley explained that for most people, the primary gateway to interact with a blockchain or distributed ledger technology (DLT) protocol is through a wallet. Cryptocurrency wallets allow users to be able to secure their private key when sending and receiving cryptocurrencies. However, many wallets have limited their functionality to making basic payments. Currently, wallets are expanding their use case and have become platforms for more innovations within blockchain and DLT.

IOTA’s primary wallet—Trinity

IOTA’s primary wallet has been Trinity, which has already set a high standard in the DLT industry, which allows for a seamless and simplified user experience. Varley added that although IOTA’s Trinity wallet has made one-time signatures safe for users, it will remain in IOTA 1.0.

What are the new features of the Firefly wallet for IOTA 1.5?

IOTA’s new wallet, Firefly was built with the context of the addition of tokenized assets, chat, and contact management. Although these features are expected to be launched later on, the Firefly wallet “has been built with the future in mind.”

Major steps taken in Firefly’s first version are based on security, core user experience, and expandable architecture. Developers behind the Firefly wallet have focused on perfecting the core of the platform.

1. Profiles and Accounts

The new features of the wallet include profiles and accounts; where profiles enable multiple people to use the platform on the same device without access to each other’s wallets, and accounts meaning that a user is able to separate their funds.

2. New user experience features

For the Firefly wallet, many undesired user experience issues have been resolved, while other minor features have been added. The IOTA Foundation has also added a network indicator to give users information regarding the health of the IOTA network.

3. Expandable and exportable app core

The Trinity wallet faced a limitation where, as Varley explained, a “tight coupling between the logic and application itself.” He added that with Firefly, the developers have followed an approach where all the features are reusable by other developers in other applications.

4. Leveraging on the benefits of Chrysalis

The Firefly wallet is also able to enjoy the benefits of Chrysalis, which includes 24-word recovery phrases, improved network performance, and reusable addresses. IOTA has successfully launched phase 1 of Chrysalis in August this year, reaching one of many important milestones in its development.

What’s next for Firefly?

Varley explained that Firefly will integrate many upcoming features of the IOTA protocol, including tokenized assets and Dapp interaction. He concluded:

“Firefly will also see new features that enhance IOTA’s user experience as a payment protocol, such as a contact system and an accompanying browser extension. Our priority is first on releasing the desktop version, before attention turns to mobile, and later, the contact system and chat.”

Firefly’s desktop version is already in advanced stages of development, and the first alpha is aimed for launch later this month.

Iota Floats Smart Contracts Beta with Zero Execution Fee

The Iota Foundation has launched its smart contract functionality which it said is now available in IOTA 2.0 DevNet.

As unveiled by the blockchain network, the smart contract functionality empowers developers to build decentralized applications (dApps) and other Web3 innovations in one of the industry’s most economic networks.

“Our objectives with IOTA Smart Contracts are to address some of the drawbacks of existing solutions (fees, scalability, interoperability, and limited composability) and to create an ecosystem of new opportunities for builders and early adopters to directly capitalize on the explosive growth of our industry as we go mainstream,” the official announcement reads.

Through the new smart contract function, developers will be able to deploy their smart contract chains without seeking permissions, or undergoing auctions, and it all comes at no additional costs. As revealed by Iota, developers wishing to create applications on the platform will have so much flexibility to determine the operational capabilities of their platform.

“Smart contract chain developers have full flexibility to define their chain and tokenomics. In the future they could even set transaction fees to zero and instead reward validators with their native tokens, thus creating their own economies and massively reducing the entry barriers for their dApp,” the announcement noted.

As the blockchain world is seeing increasing growth in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), the new smart contract capability will also position Iota to compete in both ecosystems.

The capability of the smart contract to power trustless and feeless transactions has been highlighted as a function that “will create unprecedented utility for NFT marketplaces and developers in decentralized finance (DeFi) and decentralized exchanges (DEX).”

With the trajectory that is billed to see more users dive into the DeFi and NFT world, more blockchain networks are needed to help cushion the massive inflows. The Iota blockchain network, through its smart contract functionality, is being fronted as a viable complement to the existing protocols currently dominating the space.