A Lasting Solution to the Blockchain trilemma with Oasis Protocol.
Tags: beginners, developers, cryptocurrency, news
Published: 2023-06-24 15:13:50

Creating a complete and functional technology, easy to use by developers and users.


![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/axtxij27gvod1xp9516f.png)

Before this groundbreaking Blockchain technology, it was just the "web". 

Blockchain's birth was primarily to address and eliminate the risks related to having 3rd parties or middlemen in transaction verification. 
Blockchain Networks run via a trustless mechanism - where interacting parties don't have to trust each other because "they don't need to". 
The prequel features of this innovation are - enhanced security, transparency, and instant traceability of transactions. 

The emergence of blockchain Networks, especially Ethereum has been nothing short of brilliant. Ethereum has risen through the ranks of the crypto, and finance worlds, becoming the second most popular blockchain after Bitcoin with a [market capitalization of 227 billion dollars.](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/ethereum/) (2023‑06‑24' , '04:00:00' )

It has transcended from a blockchain used to only confirm transactions for cryptocurrencies like bitcoin to a "decentralized computer network" and has created multiple use cases in the ecosystem:

- self-executing contracts, known as smart contracts, 

- decentralized finance, that eliminates the need for any financial institution to execute payments

- and the most recent Non-fungible tokens(NFTs).

**Ethereum as a Decentralized Computer…**

Ethereum is called decentralized - because the network can be used to run decentralized Apps (dApps) - Apps hosted on a public blockchain network with no central authority. They are open-source, free from central control, and are a direct replacement for Web 2.0 centralized applications. 

The unending request for personal data from prominent giant-tech institutions e.g. Meta (f.k.a Facebook) and Google makes users uncomfortable owing to the risk of data exploitation. 
On the opposite, dApps are more user-focused giving users control simply and easily.

## But there are still challenges within the Ethereum Network…



- 
Lack of scalability is an age-long disadvantage of most blockchain networks, Ethereum inclusive, despite its wide adoption. Other problematic areas are its environmental impact, and high transaction fees especially when there's network congestion.

A proposal termed ["The Merger" was implemented](https://ethereum.org/en/roadmap/merge/) - on September 15, 2022, which had Ethereum migrate fully from its former Proof-of-work consensus (POW) to a Proof-of-stake consensus (POS).
This helped resolve the challenge of environmental impact favoring an impressive 99.95% reduction in Ethereum's energy consumption and the ability to further scale the Ethereum ecosystem making it a green blockchain (in terms of environmental friendliness).

Notwithstanding the success of the merger, other Ethereum challenges are yet to be reconciled most important being - 

## The Blockchain Trilemma


To ensure maximum user satisfaction, all blockchains aspire to have 3 basic features: Decentralization, Security, and Scalability.

However, it is extremely challenging to achieve all three features in one frame, usually, one quality suffers for others to be achieved. This is technically referred to as the blockchain trilemma. Most blockchains are truly decentralized even though there's no perfect system, but the downside is that they suffer more from scalability and security.

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/otmi7apblzbwkzsazcrj.png)


**The Solution…**

This blog post covers a fantastic way that Oasis Protocol solves the recurring problems in the blockchain ecosystem including the Blockchain trilemma with its consistent and sustainable technology features.


**1. Scalability**

In simple terms, scalability is the capability of a system to expand and grow under new workloads. Solving this problem is essential for creating a fair and well-run network, but this should not be done at the expense of the other features - security, and decentralization. 

At the moment, the Ethereum network is capable of only handling about [15 transactions per second](https://collectiveshift.io/layer-2/ethereum-layer-2-solutions/#:~:text=Ethereum%20is%20restricted%20by%20how,than%2045%2C000%20transactions%20per%20second.) which are still relatively slow.

The solution to the scalability problem is a modular design employed by the Oasis protocol where there's a separation of Network computation into Consensus and ParaTime layers. 

**The Consensus Layer** - the layer which verifies and creates new blocks on the Oasis network. A Network consensus refers to the agreement between nodes in a blockchain network on the current state of the ledger achieved through a consensus algorithm.

This layer is important because, without it, a blockchain would be vulnerable to attacks and manipulation breaching the feature of security, and undermining the usefulness of such a network as a transparent ledger.
Oasis Network's unique scalability mechanism ensures that the network is not only fast but also versatile and secure enough to support a wide range of real-world workloads. 

Although the consensus layer promotes scalability there's still a need for a flexible **ParaTime Layer**. Within the ParaTime Layer, Oasis Network expands and grows to address a broad set of new and exciting use cases, while still maintaining the same core ledger and consensus layer. The Paratime layer is the smart contract execution layer, it has a unique feature of customizability and flexibility providing new and dynamic computing environments for developers to work in. Different runtimes can be crafted, within the Oasis network, ranging from the latest confidential EVM-Sapphire to WASM-compatible ones in the Emerald and Cipher ParaTimes. Oasis scalable features will grow DeFi, and fix the high-transaction fees and slow throughput currently plaguing other Layer 1 networks.

**2. Security and privacy**

Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) on Oasis Protocol guarantees security, backed by high performance and are better in terms of flexibility and usability over other privacy-preserving computation techniques.
They are engineered such that they yield high performance regardless of the computational workload from web3 dApps. They use an isolated environment to run sensitive code that is optimized for efficiency whilst bypassing expensive computing.

Despite the vulnerabilities of the Trusted Execution Environment, Oasis Protocol adopts it because of its advantages of providing developers with the most practical approach to incorporate privacy in web3 and enabling them to develop fully public or fully confidential smart contracts thus reducing the friction between developers and the users.

In light of its vulnerabilities, Oasis Protocol protects developers while making sure they enjoy all the features of TEEs by ensuring non-dependence on TEEs the ensuring data integrity, so TEEs vulnerabilities do not affect data integrity on Oasis Network.

And through its unique, state-of-the-art defense-in-depth design that minimizes privacy risks from TEE vulnerabilities.
[Read more about TEEs here…](https://oasisprotocol.org/blog/how-oasis-protects-privacy-despite-tee-vulnerabilities)

[User privacy features](https://oasisprotocol.org/blog/demystify-the-blockchain-privacy-paradox-how-oasis-solves-this) are enforced [by the latest ParaTime - Sapphire.](https://oasisprotocol.org/blog/get-to-know-sapphire-the-industry-first-confidential-evm-paratime) Oasis Protocol has identified privacy as the reason for blockchain's inclusion in Web3 and is working to incorporate it. This is because Web3 is decentralized and privacy is the backbone of its functioning. 

Sapphire - a confidential EVM developed and deployed by Oasis Protocol offers developers in web3 all it takes to build privacy-enabled dApps by utilizing confidential smart contracts.
When executed, developers will enjoy integrity, power, and of course, privacy features offered by these types of smart contracts. 

Oasis Protocol has moved a step ahead from conventional smart contracts where developers are at risk because all their on-chain state and transactions are public to confidential smart contracts where important aspects of transactions can be kept private. 

Sapphire is easily integrable with EVM-based dApps, such as metaverse, NFTs, and crypto gaming - to provide privacy features to all developers across all chains. 
It is possible to port any dApp in a matter of minutes and start using privacy technology features like encryption. 

This ParaTime also has other cool features including;

- instant finality,

- low gas fees about 99% less than Ethereum,

- high throughput, privacy protection, and defense against MEV; and the use of the solidity language entirely to easily build DApps and write smart contracts.

**Conclusion - A functional Blockchain Ecosystem with Oasis Protocol.**

The Oasis Network is not out to be another siloed Layer 1 chain that sets yet another blockchain standard, fracturing the ecosystem further. The goal here is clear - to propel Web3 to a point where it can solve real-world problems like User Privacy. Through its privacy-enabled Paratime - Sapphire, developers will create a new generation of applications in an Ethereum-familiar environment with the added advantage of up to 99%+ lower fees than Ethereum.

Get started with building on Oasis Protocol, [check this out…](https://docs.oasis.io/)


## ABOUT OASIS PROTOCOL


Oasis is a privacy-focused Proof-of-Stake Layer-1 smart contract platform with a multi-layer modular architecture that enables scalability, and the flexibility to deploy low-cost privacy-focused smart contracts.

In the meantime, chat more with the Oasis team by joining us [on Discord](https://discord.gg/oasisprotocol) or on the [Oasis Forum! ](https://forum.oasis.io/)Also, learn more about the Oasis Privacy Layer [here](https://oasisprotocol.org/opl) and register for the [Oasis Privacy4Web3 Hackathon.](https://oasisprotocol.org/p4w3-hackathon)