DAO-NET: Sybil Defense DAO

Create a DAO to develop secure, open source Sybil-resistant anonymous authentication solutions for DAO Net and other DAOs.

An experienced team of Blockchain developers, Plutus pioneers, SPO operators, Community Advisors and Solutions Analysts.

Goals

1. Create a zero-knowledge proof of identity solution that will verify that a user is alive and that the user only has a single instance within a member pool while maintaining anonymity.
2. Create a DAO which will maintain and improve the solution going forward and offer the solution as a service to other DAOs.

Cardano Ecosystem Value

By offering a tool or service that solves the Sybil attack issue for DAOs, the Cardano ecosystem will be better positioned as the go-to choice for DAOs which will increase the number of members and transaction volumes in the ecosystem.

Details

The eventual objective is a smartphone app capable of multiple biometric scans (fingerprint, facial recognition, and iris scans) that are converted into hash codes without any biometric data storage however implementation of such a product will take longer than the required time frame to deliver a minimum viable product for DAO-NET. The eventual solution will be funded by the DAO-NET funding process.

The temporary interim minimum viable product will create a modified version of the open source Proof of Humanity for Ethereum that will be migrated to Cardano.  This temporary solution is not anonymous however it will be combined with a zero-knowledge proof, such as Traceable Ring Signature, that will allow each member to create a single anonymous identity.

The Sybil Defense DAO can be referenced by other DAOs to prove that an identity is a valid member of the Sybil Defense DAO, which will be the initial membership requirement for DAO-NET and its sub-DAOs.

The Proof of Humanity process will require members to stake DAO tokens to sponsor new members. If a member's active status expires or another subsequent Sybil-resistant solution is deployed then the staked DAO tokens will be returned to the sponsor. A member can also withdraw their sponsorship in which case the recipient member cannot recertify their active status until they receive another sponsor. An initial cohort of manually verified members are required to bootstrap the sponsorship status however these individuals will require sponsors before they can recertify.

Scalability

Proof of Humanity is highly scalable as long as the hosting platform is scaled up accordingly, which DAO-NET funding would allow.

Market

The ability to provide a sybil-proof list of humans is useful for all DAOs and many other applications in the Cardano ecosystem beyond DAO-NET, potentially including Atala Prism which currently does not have an inherent sybil resistant feature. Given the cheaper transaction fees on Cardano compared to Ethereum, a Cardano native Proof of Humanity could be very appealing to existing PoH members. A conservative estimate of the initial market is 200,000 users.

Acquisition Plan

The requirement of all initial DAOs within DAO-NET to use the sybil-proof registry will drive membership. The sybil-proof registry will also be made available to other DAOs or applications outside of DAO-NET which will drive additional membership. A word of mouth campaign to be used to lure existing PoH members from the Ethereum to the Cardano platform based upon lower transaction fees.

Skills Required

Product Manager

• have a holistic understanding of the DAO-NET suite of proposals
• experienced in managing multidisciplinary teams in up to a dozen projects simultaneously
• ability to articulate and fluently translate between business and technical requirements
• able to manage large complex budgets
• experienced in hiring consultants and third party contract negotiations

Lead Developer

• Full stack developer experience
• Plutus development, especially algorithmic DAO smart contract primitive
• Define technical requirements
• Integrate multiple software components into a larger solution

Cryptography Developer

• zero knowledge proof experience, especially Traceable Ring Signature
• Full stack developer experience
• Identity proof experience, especially Proof of Humanity

Plutus Developer

• Full stack developer experience
• Plutus development, Plutus pioneer preferred
• Identity proof experience, especially Proof of Humanity

Frontend Designer/Developer

• Full stack developer experience
• Frontend design and development experience
• Identity proof experience, especially Proof of Humanity

Team

Product Manager: Dwayne Collard - 20 years+ IT Consultant, Solutions Analyst, IT Manager, Community Advisor https://www.linkedin.com/in/dwayne-collard/

Lead Developer: Jude Ben - 9 years+ Software Development , Plutus Smart Contract Development , Cloud and Infrastructure Engineer https://www.linkedin.com/in/judeebene/

Cryptography Developer: Contractor to be determined

Plutus Developer: Contractor to be determined

Frontend Designer/Developer: Contractor to be determined

Roadmap

February 2022

• Prototype algorithmic DAO smart contract (only required if DAO Deployment Platform proposal not funded in which case cost is shared among funded DAO-NET proposals)

March 2022

• Prototype Backend API
• Migrate Proof of Humanity open source code to Cardano

 April 2022

• Web interface for voting development (only required if DAO Deployment Platform and Voting DApp proposals are not funded in which case cost is shared among funded DAO-NET proposals)
• Prototype zero-knowledge proof, such as Traceable Ring Signature, that will allow each member to create a single anonymous identity.

May 2022

• Third Party Smart Contract Audits

June 2022

• Test algorithmic DAO smart contract on Testnet
• Test Proof of Humanity with anonymous identity on Testnet

July 2022

• Launch Sybil Defense DAO (an instance of the algorithmic DAO smart contract) on Mainnet
• Launch Proof of Humanity with anonymous identity on Mainnet

Key Performance Indicators

• number of DAOs using algorithmic DAO smart contract framework
• number of DAO members
• Total DAO transaction fees in ADA

Success Definition

3 months

• Prototype algorithmic DAO smart contract with voting interface created
• Sybil-resistant, anonymous, zero-knowledge proof membership list generator created

6 months

• Sybil Defense DAO launched
• At least 6 DAOs using Sybil Defense solution for membership verification
• At least 1,000 DAO members using Sybil Defense solution for membership verification

12 months

• At least 30 DAOs using Sybil Defense solution for membership verification
• At least 20,000 DAO members using Sybil Defense solution for membership verification
• At least 1/4 of ADA budget received from this challenge, earned in DAO transaction fees (full repayment in 18 months)

Budget

Zero Knowledge/Proof of Identity/Cryptography Developer ($4000/month): $24,000

Plutus Developer ($4000/month):$24,000

Frontend Designer/Developer ($2000/month): $12,000

Hosting Services (1 year): $2,400

Smart Contract Audits: $10,000

Product Manager ($2,000/month): $12,000

Algorithmic DAO Smart Contract*: $10,000

Total: $94,400

* Algorithmic DAO Smart Contract budget is for a very scaled down unaudited DAO solution, including hosting services, which is required to make this proposal deliverable in a stand-alone funding scenario however if the DAO Deployment Platform proposal is funded then this budget will be used to cover additional contractor expenses if required including for smart contract audits otherwise it will be added to the DAO Token / ADA reserve pool mentioned in the DAO Token Market proposal. If the DAO Deployment Platform is not funded however 4 other DAO-NET proposals are funded then the DAO Deployment Platform will be fully implemented with the combined funds of the 4 DAO-NET proposals.

Future Funding

Subject to legal review, DAO-NET intends to have a Bootstrap Funding contingency as further incentives to contractors, in which a small percentage of the DAO-NET Treasury can be set aside in a smart contract to retroactively fund contractors.

Proposals for additional enhancements to the DAO-NET ecosystem and new DAOs will be submitted in future Project Catalyst funding rounds.

If the CryptoFusion Funder proposal is funded then DAO-NET is expected to be self-funding when launched on the mainnet including the ability to fund other DAO proposals.

IP

All intellectual property is intended to be freely shared with the world so that any insights can be duplicated in other experiments to rapidly advance decentralized governance therefore:

All software developed as part of this proposal will be Open Source under Apache License, version 2.0

All documentation will be licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License

Challenges/Risks

1 ) Likely regulations hostile to DAOs and decentralized blockchain applications

• Factions within the global elite publicly seek to thwart decentralization, as seen in recent and proposed legislation that is overtly hostile to decentralized blockchain ecosystems
• Most likely lawfare attacks against DAOs will be tax evasion and know your client requirements to comply with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing regulations
• Typical member managed DAOs use a herd defense strategy in which there are so many anonymous members that individuals feel safe that they will not be identified and targeted however these DAOs normally have identifiable influential members managing some aspects of the DAO
• Traditional law enforcement strategy against herd defenses is to identify the prominent members of an organization and make an example of them through prosecution to deter the rest
• The dominant legal position is that DAOs are considered general partnerships, exposing members to personal liability for any of the DAO's actions and obligations
• Therefore there is a significant risk that prominent members of many successful DAOs will be subject to legal prosecution in the foreseeable future

Risk Mitigations

• DAO-NET to attain DAO Limited Liability Company status under Wyoming law. If funding for the DAO-NET proposal is not approved then contingent funding strategies are available including reapplying under Project Catalyst Fund 8, using standalone DAO smart contract funds in the event multiple proposals are funded and offsetting labor costs using a retroactive payment plan from the DAO-NET Treasury to free sufficient capital to complete DAO LLC filing.
• DAO-NET to use a totally algorithmic solution to reduce the number of identifiable influential members as much as possible
• All DAO-NET software developed will be open source allowing others to replicate and expand upon the decentralized solution in the wort case scenario of DAO-NET being legally disbanded

2 ) Bias by some Community Advisors and Voters against large solutions being divided into multiple proposals

• Current Project Catalyst funding process has a known limitation in which large proposals are unlikely to be funded unless the proposal is ranked number 1 in voting
• A solution to this limitation is to break a large proposal into smaller proposals funded under multiple challenges however some members view this as gaming the system or argue that large proposals should be funded by incremental funding in multiple funding rounds so that funding can be based upon achieving milestones
• This negative view of parallel funding is slowing innovation and making it more likely that projects are not completed due to lack of later funding regardless of success in achieving milestones up to that point
• Project Catalyst process already has auditing requirements for achieving milestones before funds are released which would apply to each proposal individually so that line of argument is not really valid
• Another known limitation of the Project Catalyst funding process is that there are insufficient funds to pay competitive living wages for labor costs in developed countries which results in jobs being shipped overseas to developing countries or requires workers to take on multiple gigs simultaneously however this wage gap can be addressed using the multiple proposal approach

Risk Mitigations

• This proposal seeks to change the discussion from whether or not multiple proposal solutions are a valid approach, to what are the proposal elements and challenges that need to be addressed in multiple proposal solutions
• As an experienced Community Advisor, with industry experience in the writing and assessing of proposals, this proposer has included all the elements required in the CA guide plus contingencies for the various funding scenarios like a single proposal being funded up to all the proposals being funded with the intention that CAs objecting to the idea of multiple proposals will provide feedback on what elements or concerns are not being addressed from their perspective so that future solutions will be more complete
• With the exception of the Product Manager and Lead Developer, who are required to participate in every proposal for integration purposes and have manageable workloads, no contractor will be involved in multiple proposals to prevent resource contention as being a reason to doubt feasibility of the solution overall

3 ) Recruitment of contractors required

• While the core integration team is filled, several specific proposal roles remain to be filled

Risk Mitigations

• Skill requirements have been clearly defined
• Labor budgets in the proposal are competitive with similar Project Catalyst proposals, with contingencies for higher wages if required including using standalone DAO smart contract funds in the event multiple proposals are funded or offsetting labor costs using a retroactive payment plan from the DAO-NET Treasury
• A number of Cardano experienced consulting firms have been identified that offer development services

Related Links

Proof of Humanity: https://www.humanprotocol.org/blog/how-to-proof-of-humanity?lng=en-US

DAO Net Proposal: https://cardano.ideascale.com/a/dtd/DAO-Net/380999-48088

CryptoFusion Funder Proposal: https://cardano.ideascale.com/a/dtd/CryptoFusion-Funder-DAO-Net/381146-48088