Trillion Dollar Security - Phase 2

Trillion Dollar Security: Phase 2

The Ethereum ecosystem has been abuzz with excitement as the Trillion Dollar Security project enters its second phase. Building on the research and insights gathered from the first phase, the Ethereum Foundation (EF) is now taking concrete steps to address the highest priority issues facing the Ethereum stack and community. In this article, we'll delve into the key initiatives and projects that will shape the future of Ethereum security.

Coordinating a "Minimum Security Standard" for Ethereum Wallets

Wallet UX is where security begins for all users of Ethereum. If users cannot safely manage keys, sign transactions, and interact with on-chain applications, then they cannot use Ethereum safely. To address this, the EF is working towards developing and adopting a minimum security standard for wallets. This standard will serve as a trusted and legitimate reference point for which wallets are safe for ordinary users of Ethereum.

The proposed standard will require features such as:

• Transparent transactions
• Compromise-resistant interfaces
• Privacy-supporting architecture
• Standards for wallet behavior, e.g., approval management, key handling, frontend verification

The EF is inspired by the success of L2BEAT in educating users and making the security and decentralization properties of L2s transparent to the ecosystem. A minimum security standard for wallets could help address two different sides of this problem:

1. Giving ordinary users a reliable guide to choosing only those wallets that meet this standard means that a greater share of Ethereum users will have access to the features they need to have a secure on-chain experience.
2. The standard will encourage wallet teams to prioritize important features to remain compliant.

To help develop and promote such a standard, the EF is excited to be providing a grant to Walletbeat, who have been working towards a similar vision. Walletbeat will be both a contributor to this community standard and an organization that can help do the hard work of measuring wallets against the standard and making information easily accessible to users.

Unblocking the "Tech Tree" to Solve Blind Signing

One of the most significant issues facing UX security is blind signing. Users are often expected to sign transactions without the ability to understand what those transactions will do. Through discussions with ecosystem advisors and stewards, the EF has identified a few ways to help unblock the "tech tree" that will enable more wallets to deploy features to address this problem.

One solution to the blind signing problem is for wallets to decode the raw transaction data, and translate it into a human-readable description of what the transaction will do. Instead of seeing a long string of code, a user might see information like "Transferring 1,000 of token ABC to recipient 0x123."

To achieve this, the EF is:

1. outfitting wallet teams with access to comprehensive datasets of function signatures, which requires access to databases of verified contracts, many of which are closed source and require expensive licenses to use.
2. promoting the work of the Verifier Alliance (VERA), which has built a database of more than eight million contracts.
3. beginning R&D projects that might unlock new methods for transaction transparency in wallets, such as:
   • Standards that would encourage applications to add code to their contracts which makes it easier for wallets to interpret transactions.
   • Revisiting past proposals to address this problem which were not prioritized by the ecosystem at the time, like ERC 4430, EIP 7730, EIP 719, and exploring how to continue the work of the Human Readable Transactions Group.

Wallets can even go a step further and actually simulate the results of a transaction in an EVM environment against Ethereum's current state. This simulation would then return a message like "this X will result in you sending 1 ETH from X to Y, and receiving 1 NFT from collection Y."

If wallets could reliably categorize the level of trust in contracts with which users are interacting, this would go even further towards solving this problem.

Making it Easier for Developers to Avoid Deploying Vulnerable Code

Having an open-source database of smart contract vulnerabilities, which can be used as a reference by IDEs and other developer tooling, is something the EF believes could help reduce compromised contracts. These tools could scan pre-deployed contracts against the open-source database before deploying the code on-chain, allowing developers to more easily detect vulnerabilities in their application before they deploy it.

The EF invites anyone who would like to help, such as audit competition platforms, auditors, white hats, or others, to contribute their findings to this database. Once the database is large enough, the next step is to advocate for tool developers to build features that take advantage of this.

Ultra Simple Non-Tech Wallet

A very common piece of feedback during the survey phase has been that the existing wallets are targeting the tech crowd. There appears to be a high demand for wallets for non-technical users across the world which provide features that practically ensure a secure environment by building guardrails that still allow users to have the on-chain experience. Survey respondents mentioned things such as easy transactions to friends and businesses (not having to type a public key), easy payments for goods and services, built-in basic swapping, and the ability to restore your wallet. If you have ideas on how to address these issues, please reach out.

Enterprise Focused Wallets

Enterprises have mentioned the importance of privacy, censorship resistance (including external services being used by the wallet to interact with the network), and compliance requirements for key management. If you have ideas on how to address this, please reach out.

The Trillion Dollar Security project is a significant undertaking that requires the collaboration and participation of the entire Ethereum ecosystem. By working together, we can create a more secure, user-friendly, and decentralized platform that benefits everyone.

Source: https://blog.ethereum.org/en/2025/08/20/trillion-dollar-sec-2