- IOTA Foundation has hinted that it’s getting closer to its next phase of development
- The team has found a way to “frictionlessly” replace Coordinator with Coordicide
- IOTA is fast gaining traction in the blockchain space
IOTA (MIOTA), a leading blockchain and internet of things (IoT) project designed to power the Machine Economy via feeless micro-transactions and data integrity for machines, has revealed at its recent Barcelona conference that it’s getting closer towards the launch of Coordicide, a feature that would make IOTA entirely decentralized, more scalable and secure, according to a tweet on May 27, 2019.
IOTA hints at Coordicide during research summit in Barcelona. Is the end of the Coordinator coming soon? IOTA co-founder Serguei Popov (@mthcl_crypto) weighs in.https://t.co/bPGAEVjPad#IOTA #Coordicide
— IOTA (@iotatoken) May 27, 2019
Coordicide to Go Live Shortly
At the recent ReSum meeting organized by the IOTA research team and research council in Barcelona, co-founder of the IOTA project, Serguei Popov hinted that the primary objective of the summit was to figure out the best possible way to eliminate the existing centralized Coordinator and replace it with Coordicide, without harming the network.
For those who are not aware, the IOTA network is currently based on the Proof of Work (PoW) security mechanism.
As with all PoW-based networks, if an attacker takes hold of the majority of hashing power in the network, they can ultimately take over the network, carry out a 51 percent attack and split the network if they so desire.
In a bid to protect users funds during a double spend attack or a network split, the IOTA team created the Coordinator (Coo) functionality.
The primary objective of Coo is to prevent the IOTA network from double spends in the early stages of the project i.e, while the network is yet to have enough hashing power to secure itself against attacks.
The Coo is controlled by the IOTA Foundation and it periodically issues a normal signed transaction called a milestone.
Notably, an IOTA transaction is confirmed, “if and only if it is referenced by a milestone.” The Coo is responsible for ensuring that a milestone does not contradict its predecessors.
However, even if Coo issues an invalid milestone by confirming malicious transactions, the rest of the nodes in the network will not reference that particular transaction.
While the Coo has numerous exciting properties that make it a critical part of the IOTA network, in theory, it has its own shortcomings, including centralization, a single point of attack and lesser scalability.
Against that backdrop, the IOTA team has been working round the clock to formulate a method of replacing Coo with Coordicide, without putting users’ funds at risk.
Coordicide has been touted to foster scalability, transparency, decentralization, and security.
With the latest Coordicide announcement by the IOTA Foundation, it means the network may just be a few months away from attaining full majority and it could also fuel massive IOTA adoption.
At press time, the positive news has already boosted the price of IOTA (MIOTA) by $5.53 percent. MIOTA sits at $0.42, with a market cap of $1.18 billion.