Subject: [bitcoin-dev] Trustless 2-way-peg without softfork

From: Dr Maxim Orlovsky <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 10 Sep 2023 20:04:19 +0000

Hi,

Several years ago my team from Pandora Project working on censorship-resistant distributed machine learning proposed Prometheus: a protocol for high-load computing on top of Bitcoin. The protocol operates as a multi-party game setting where an oracle ("worker") is provided with an arbitrary computationally complex task (any Turing-complete computing, machine learning training or inference etc) and the network is able to reach a consensus on whether a result reported by the worker is true. The consensus is reached via optional rounds of verification and arbitrage. The protocol is cryptoeconomically-safe, i.e. has a proven Nash equilibrium. The protocol was later transferred to LNP/BP Standards Association (https://lnp-bp.org) and was kept in a backlog of what can be done in a future as a layer on top of Bitcoin.

I'd like to emphasize that Prometheus works on Bitcoin, requires just several Bitcoin tx per task, and _doesn't require any soft fork_. All economic setting is done with Bitcoin as a means of payment, and using existing Bitcoin script capabilities.

Link to the paper describing the protocol: <https://github.com/Prometheus-WG/prometheus-spec/blob/master/prometheus.pdf>

Only today I have realized that Prometheus protocol can be used to build cryptoeconomically-safe (i.e. trustless) 2-way-peg on the Bitcoin blockchain without any soft-forks: a "worker" in such a case acts as an oracle for some extra-bitcoin system (sidechain, client-side-validated protocol, zk rollup etc) validating it, and the protocol will reach consensus on whether the state reported by the oracle is correct.

In other words, this is an alternative to BIP-300 and other similar soft-forks having the only purpose of doing 2-way pegs. It also enables the two-way trustless transfer of Bitcoins between Bitcoin blockchain, RGB and, in a future, potential new layer 1 called "prime" (to learn more about prime you can check my Baltic Honeybadger talk <https://www.youtube.com/live/V3vvybsc1A4?feature=shared&t=23631>).

Kind regards,
Dr Maxim Orlovsky
Twitter: @dr_orlovsky
Nostr: npub13mhg7ksq9efna8ullmc5cufa53yuy06k73q4u7v425s8tgpdr5msk5mnym

LNP/BP Standards Association
Twitter: @lnp_bp