An in-depth look at Near Protocol security Why is the technology used by Near Protocol superior to its competitors? In this text we will answer all these questions. NEAR is a first layer blockchain network that has big dreams. Its goal is to make web3 easier to use and transform the digital world, NEAR wants to attract millions of new creators, coders and users to web3. NEAR is a first-layer blockchain network that enables the creation of smart contracts, which is why it compares itself to Ethereum, the most famous network of its kind. But NEAR is not alone, there are other first-layer networks such as Polkadot and Solana that also want to offer faster and cheaper solutions than Ethereum. What makes NEAR special is its impressive speed, which will reach 100,000 tps when fully developed, which means it will be able to far surpass the 7,000 tps Visa has right now. In addition, transactions on NEAR are done in 1–2 seconds and cost less than a penny, which has many creators interested in NEAR. How does it do it? NEAR achieves these numbers through its innovative use of sharding. Fragmentation is the process of dividing the network into shards so that each node has less work to do. Thus, each node only deals with its own part of the network code, instead of having to process everything at once. This allows the network to grow, because the nodes can work together and ease each other’s load. The network gets faster as more nodes are added, so the more nodes there are, the better. To understand this process, we can think of a group of teachers and some tests to be reviewed. In previous systems, each teacher had to review each exam separately, but with a sharding system, the exams are divided into parts and each part is assigned to a group of teachers. When finished, these groups pass the results to each other. This model clearly reduces the time it takes to review the exams, because it greatly reduces the work of each teacher. In addition, if more teachers join the group, the work can be spread out more and be faster. Many blockchain networks have used fragmentation to grow, and NEAR is not the first to do so. What sets NEAR apart is how it uses fragmentation with its revolutionary new technology, which it calls Nightshade. Nightshade works by dividing the blockchain network into chunks-rather than just groups of validators-in what NEAR calls a “fully fragmented network.” This process is called “state fragmentation” and means that not only is the processing power needed by the blockchain network divided, but also its storage. Although this system has many advantages that will be explained in another blog, the important thing to know is that the blockchain network is divided into “chunks” instead of dividing the work among its validators. This makes NEAR able to grow much larger than normal sharding methods because it can do a more complete division of labor between each chunk. Proof of Stake NEAR uses a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism in which nodes that want to be part of the NEAR network have to stake the blockchain network’s native token, NEAR, in order to participate. Validators are the ones in charge of keeping the NEAR network running, and are chosen every 12 hours (that’s called an “epoch”) through an auction. Those who have NEAR tokens can delegate them to other validators if they don’t want to be validators themselves, and those who have more tokens have more power in the network. One of the advantages of using a PoS system is that it does not expend as much power as a PoW chain. PoW chains are very bad for the planet, because they consume a lot of electricity, but they are also very bad for the grid, because they make it slower and more expensive. If we want NEAR to be a global payment network, we have to use a system that is more efficient and cheaper. Some say that PoW chains are more decentralized, because anyone can try to be a validator by competing with others, and it doesn’t depend on how many tokens they have. But the truth is that PoW chains like bitcoin are dominated by a few mining farms that have very expensive and powerful machines, and leave no room for others. In contrast, PoS networks like NEAR are more decentralized, because there are more people who can afford to be validators by staking their tokens, and you don’t need to have a special machine. Stake farming NEAR has a very original way of doing its PoS system, which is stake farming. Before NEAR, projects that were done in PoS networks could not enjoy PoS rewards, and that made there was a conflict of interest between the validators and the projects in the network. As validators and projects are very important for the network to grow and function well, this conflict can cause problems and disagreements between them. NEAR solves this problem with stake farming. With this system, projects in the network can partner with validators to give more than one token to those who delegate their tokens to secure the network. Thus, projects new to the NEAR network can help secure the network, and validators can raise more capital. Thus, stake farming makes validators and network projects work together and benefit from each other, and have the same interests. It also makes the NEAR network more decentralized, because validators can support new and different NEAR projects from across the network. This gives NEAR validators a unique opportunity to raise more capital, and new and growing projects to participate in the security of the network. As NEAR is the first PoS blockchain network to allow stake farming contracts, NEAR is creating a more open and diverse network. Securing the NEAR network with CertiK’s NEAR Smart-Contract audit. NEAR is a web3 network that is going to bring in many developers and programmers of all types. As there are many projects that want to use and enhance the amazing technology that NEAR has, it is very important that they take care of security from start to finish. This starts with doing frequent and thorough NEAR smart contract audits that make your project more secure and resistant to attacks. CertiK’s NEAR smart contract auditing is great because it has worked with many of the top projects in the NEAR network. It has clients from all sectors of the NEAR network, from The Sandbox to Ampleforth to Ontology, and has learned a lot from analyzing so many projects. CertiK’s NEAR smart contract audit reviews every line of code very carefully, finding problems that are hard to see and giving advice on how to fix them. In addition, CertiK is the first to offer KYC verification for project teams as part of its NEAR smart contract audit. This is very helpful for project teams to gain trust and transparency from people in the web world3. Security is one of the things most users and investors care about when looking for projects to participate in, so doing a NEAR smart contract audit and KYC verification before launching is a good way to impress your communities. But, of course, NEAR network security doesn’t stop with the NEAR smart contract audit. Also, CertiK offers a lot of web security tools3, apart from NEAR smart contract auditing, that are made to protect the NEAR network growth from attacks. Most important are blockchain analytics tools, such as CertiK’s Skynet and SkyTrace, which give NEAR projects a very detailed view of what happens on the chain after launching. This saves them a lot of time in preventing and reacting to attacks. Finally, CertiK has recently added a new bug bounty service. This is a collaborative security service through a series of verified white hat hackers, which CertiK has chosen for their expertise and reliability. This extra feature is intended to work in conjunction with the NEAR smart contract audit, to do a more accurate analysis of a project’s code and offer a more varied package of security insights and protections.