Enigma: Privacy and Scalability for All of Crypto-kind

Elevator Pitch Blockchains have gained so much popularity due to their decentralization and public nature. However, there are some drawbacks to the typical blockchain such as complete lack of privacy and data overload. That is where Enigma comes in.   What Problem Does it Solve? Privacy is a massive issue for blockchain. So much private data is stored in every node, leading for opportunity for data leaks and complete lack of privacy online. The other main issue for blockchain is the intense verification process that data has to go through. This bogs down the blockchain and ruins the opportunity for many blockchains to scale when they gain popularity. How Does it Solve the Problem? Enigma capitalizes on the scalability issue that many cryptocurrencies have through a differentiated blockchain. Their blockchain is different in that computations and data storage are not replicated by every node in the network. Each node only holds a small subset of the data. There is also difficulty in having privacy in cryptocurrencies, but enigma has secret contracts that allow users to still publicly prove that they did a computation correctly without revealing the data that is computed over. This maintains each token-holder’s privacy in transactions. Token System You might be thinking to yourself, so Enigma is cool, but what is the point of buying the coin? The coin has 3 primary uses: as payment for actions or computations done on the network, to pay to buy data on the platform from other users, and it is also occasionally used as a security deposit to ensure everyone is not tampering with data. If one member is found to be dishonest, they lose their security deposit. The real big use of the 3 is the ability to purchase user data especially in this day and age where user data is so valuable. Coin Distribution Enigma is distributed in a slightly concerning way. The top two addresses have 9.8% and 8% respectively and 8 other addresses each hold 5.5%. Many of these addresses are likely members of the Enigma team because Enigma is holding onto 37.5 million coins for their team. It is concerning, though, that the top 10 addresses hold 60% of the coins. Is It Decentralized? Currently, Enigma is not decentralized. They are working towards creating that decentralized network and want to have it completed by the first quarter of 2019. This can be a bit worrisome as they are more susceptible to attacks when there only needs to be a single point of failure. Team The Enigma team is something worth getting excited about. Their main leadership consists of MIT grads and researchers. Guy Zyskind, Co-Founder and CEO, got an M.S. degree from MIT focused on blockchain technology. He is also responsible for the incredibly impressive whitepaper. Can Kisagun, Enigma Co-Founder, got his MBA from MIT and worked at McKinsey previously. Tor Bair is in charge of Growth and Marketing also received his MBA from MIT and previously worked as an options trader. Victor Grau Serrat is the Senior Software developer and worked for 7 years in the MIT D-Lab. The final major team member is Frederic Fortier, Senior Software Developer, and he has a passion for the quantitative trading platform that is now known as Catalyst. While that does not cover their whole team, those are the major members. If you’re interested, check out the rest of their fast-growing team here. Partnerships Enigma has plenty of partnerships, including those with AION, Kyber, Endor, Investfeed, Ether Delta, NepolionX, ETHLend, and Nebula Genomics. Enigma’s partnership with ETHLend is especially exciting because they’re putting their ability to provide privacy into action. ETHLend is a decentralized lending marketplace and Enigma is working with them to protect credit data to provide security and privacy for users of the ETHLend dApp. ETHLend users will also be able to use Enigma/Catalyst to devise management strategies and make better financial decisions, thus expanding the ETHLend lending ecosystem. Another interesting partnership is with AION, where Enigma is again privatizing the data for AION so the AION multi-tier blockchain network can enable users to process sensitive data. Price Analysis Like many cryptocurrencies, Enigma hit an all-time high in early January at around $8.15 and now sits at $1.72 as of the time writing the article. While the price has dropped, many believe Enigma to be undervalued due to the various possibilities for Enigma in the future. It is hard to determine where the coin price may go in the future because the project is still so young and that means that it is a risky investment, but no one invests in any cryptocurrency as a safe investment. Where Are They Going? While this is an older roadmap, Enigma has yet to put out a new one. Enigma is moving towards a better version of Catalyst in the future and want to accomplish their decentralized goal. There are many smart minds in Enigma and they’ve hit the marks of their roadmap so far so there isn’t much reason to believe they won’t continue to do so. There is certainly some risk, though, because they are still so young. Final Takeaways Enigma has a very promising future due to their impressive leadership team and vast possibilities. It is hard to tell where it will go in the short run, but in the long run it has a higher chance of success.  One of the most exciting things in the short run is Catalyst 2.0, coming out in Q2-Q3, and that could be a big deal for them. The success of Catalyst 2.0 once it is released will be very important to monitor.   We’re building a library of the most relevant altcoins. Check out other altcoin reviews here. We are also building a library of scamcoins, which can be found here.    Post navigation