In this post:
- Fhenix launches Nitrogen as a major upgrade to its testnet. The upgrade will introduce new decryption capabilities to the company.
- The firm will also launch a Parallel Decryption feature to mitigate the long and computationally expensive operations in FHE schemes.
- Fhenix CEO, Guy Itzhaki, believes the new features will give developers the tools they need to create powerful confidential applications on Ethereum.
Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) Layer 2 Fhenix announced that it will launch Nitrogen on November 20 as a major upgrade to its testnet. The firm revealed that the Nitrogen testnet would introduce powerful new decryption capabilities and move the company closer to its mainnet launch.
According to the firm, Nitrogen will upgrade the level of decentralization of the Fhenix network with the Threshold Network. In particular, Fhenix hopes the new upgrade will boost the decentralization of its network with its decryption mechanism, the Threshold Network.
Fhenix seeks to mitigate its expensive operations with asynchronous decryption
Fhenix also announced the launch of Parallel Decryption as another feature with the Nitrogen upgrade. The firm highlighted that Parallel Decryptions will mitigate FHE schemes’ long and computationally expensive operations. The company admitted that the new feature will utilize asynchronous decryption to provide a fast and seamless user experience.
The firm also addressed the importance of its new feature to aiding developers with dApp security. In particular, Fhenix hoped that developers utilizing the Nitrogen testnet will also benefit from Security Zones which will provide a flexible approach to dApp security. The Layer 2 firm argued that the Nitrogen testnet will enable applications to be optimized for varying requirements in terms of security and performance.
According to Fhenix, the new feature supports two Security Zones, Zone 0 and Zone one. The firm disclosed that Zone 0 is the default setting that emphasizes security and implies less trust for the user. The company also declared that Zone 1 will prioritize performance over security using a single local keyset held by the sequencer to process decryption.
Nitrogen testnet pursues onchain confidentiality and improved decentralization
“The Nitrogen testnet is a major step towards providing a permissionless, censorship-resistant platform for confidentiality with FHE.”
-Fhenix CEO, Guy Itzhaki.
The Fhenix CEO argued that the introduction of the Threshold Network will bring the company one step closer to the Fhenix mainnet launch. Itzaki also added that the introduction of the new features such as Parallel Decryptions and Security Zones will give developers the tools they need to create powerful confidential applications on Ethereum.
The Fhenix testnet also introduced Celestia. The firm revealed that Celestia will be used for data availability and to reduce transaction costs while increasing price stability. The firm acknowledged that the Nitrogen testnet will add the ability to generate random numbers natively and automatically using a simple function called FHE.rand().
Fhenix is confident that Nitrogen represents a significant milestone on its path toward a decentralized platform for on-chain confidentiality. The firm believes the new upgrade will deliver major improvements in network security, performance, cost, and UX. The company also maintains the Nitrogen test network, which will also achieve improvements in decentralization and lay the foundation for confidentiality-enabled applications on Ethereum.
Fhenix declared to address the issue of privacy as an urgent blockchain challenge using Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) as a solution. As a result, the company launched the first FHE layer 2 testnet, Helium, in June with the goal of helping bring confidentiality to Ethereum. The firm said in a post that Ethereum must possess a robust and flexible answer to the question of confidentiality, a fundamental building block of human orchestration.
