On-chain Timelock Capabilities

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

David Grantham

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Incorporated)

[GENERAL] Co-proposers and additional applicants

Randamu, Inc.

Yolan Romailler

[GENERAL] Requested funds in ada

200000

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

10

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

Timelock encryption allows users to encrypt data that will remain encrypted and secret until a given chosen time has come.

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

Yes

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.”

the League of Entropy (or another threshold network) operating a compatible time-based random beacon network based on the BLS scheme.

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

Yes

[GENERAL] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

Apache 2.0 or MIT

[METADATA] Horizons

Security

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution

Integration of drand beacon verification and timelock encryption scheme will bring unique capabilities to cardano that are presently not available in any other ecosystem. Timelock and committee encryption enables new gaming paradigms, sealed bid auctions, decentralised key management, and MEV-prevention solutions.

Drand’s timelock encryption scheme is unique in that it doesn’t rely on proof of work, and is thus accurate with respect to time and energy-efficient.

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

Our project will engage both existing dApp developers in the Cardano ecosystem and new developers in other ecosystems, to show them that innovation is still happening on Cardano.

We will demonstrate impact through an increased number of dApps being developed on Cardano using the timelock scheme.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

We have extensive documentation and have talked in many conferences about timelock capabilities. We are experts in timelock implementations: we already have existing libraries performing timelock encryption and decryption off-chain in JS, Go and Rust, allowing the production of test vectors, as well as effective integration of timelock in existing dApps UIs.

We are already performing grant based work for other ecosystems, such as the SSV ecosystem.

[PROJECT MILESTONES] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

A: Milestone outputs: 

Documentation and examples of using timelock encryption in Plutus smart contracts

B: Acceptance criteria:

Functioning smart contract which implements timelock encryption, along with documentation and examples for users to deploy their own version.

C: Evidence of milestone completion:

Timelock encrypting data on chain, and proving decryption is possible after the specified time has been reached on chain.

A: Milestone outputs:

HashToCurve for BLS12-381 Plutus implementation compatible with timelock scheme

B: Acceptance criteria:

Passing test vectors for HashToCurve as per RFC9380 for the BLS12-381 curve.

C: Evidence of milestone completion:

Plutus code with tests passing for RFC9380 test vectors

A: Milestone outputs:

drand beacon on-chain Plutus verification and validation

B: Acceptance criteria:

On chain verification of a contemporary drand beacon

C: Evidence of milestone completion:

Reading back an on chain verified drand beacon

A: Milestone outputs:

Plutus smart contract for on-chain timelock decryption

B: Acceptance criteria:

Functioning smart contract which implements timelock encryption + decryption/verification

C: Evidence of milestone completion:

A: Milestone outputs:

End-to-end plutus smart contract example leveraging timelock encryption for 

B: Acceptance criteria:

Timelock encrypting data on chain, and proving decryption is possible after the specified time has been reached on chain.

C: Evidence of milestone completion:

Timelock encrypting data on chain, and proving decryption is possible after the specified time has been reached on chain.

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

• Erick, CEO, handling marketing and project management
• Patrick, CTO, handling technical project management and development
• Yolan, applied cryptographer, handling design, code review and security
• Nematari, smart contract engineer, handling documentation and tests
• Robin, cryptography engineer, handling development and tests
• Laith, DevOps engineer, handling documentation and deployment
• Dave Grantham, DevRel and Community Management

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

200,000 to be used for development effort, testing, and deployment.

[VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

Having timelock capabilities supercharges game developers within the Cardano ecosystem: single-round commit-reveal games are much easier to implement. This notably simplifies the life of game developers implementing games such as rock-paper-scissor, and other such concurrent turn based games.

Timelock capabilities also allow for sealed bid auctions, a powerful tool that can prevent MEV entirely in many financial applications.

Being among the first blockchain ecosystems with support for it would provide a significant edge to the Cardano Ecosystem.