What is the Ethereum Attestation Service (EAS)? Why is there a need for an on-chain attestation system? And how does it work? This article will discuss the importance of attestation infrastructure for the development of Web3, starting from the demand.
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What problem does EAS aim to solve?
Web3 lacks an authentication mechanism to establish trust
Existing proof mechanisms in Web3 are inadequate
Introduction to ESA product design
Proof templates: providing structure for various attestations
Submitting proofs: the submission of relevant data by the attestor
EAS aims to become the standard
The challenge for EAS lies in widespread adoption
Let’s take a real-life example. If you go to a night market today, what kind of stall would you choose to transact with? Generally, it would be a stall you frequently visit or one set up by a familiar shop owner, or a restaurant recommended by a colleague. It could also be a business with a long queue or one that has photos from a TV interview displayed.
If a stall has no customers, looks dirty, or you’ve never been there before, the likelihood of an average person making a purchase is low.
The key conclusion that can be drawn from the above example is that trust is crucial for commercial activities to occur. Trust can be established through personal connections, such as familiarity with the shop, recommendations from friends, or knowing the owner. However, if there is no existing connection between the two parties (for example, when a customer chooses which food stall to eat at), trust usually comes from external attestations, such as the number of people in the queue or photos from a TV interview. However, these types of attestations are relatively lacking in Web3, as Web3 products are all online and do not have the same government guarantees (like consumer protection laws) or platform policies (such as consumer protection regulations for certain e-commerce platforms) as Web2. Therefore, it is difficult to create a diverse, long-tail business ecosystem, and there is a greater likelihood of the rich getting richer, as seen with Lido or Aave’s TVL being much higher than their competitors.
The lack of trust in the industry mentioned above is due to the lack of external attestation mechanisms, or more broadly, the insufficient foundational infrastructure for attestations. It is difficult to trust strangers online because both parties lack a way to prove their identities.
Recommended Reading:
Introduction to Proof of Personhood (PoP): Difficulties in the Development of Digital Identity
Reason for recommendation: This article clearly explains the purpose and significance of proof of personhood and can be read in conjunction with this article to understand the importance of attestation mechanisms for the development of the Web3 industry.
Although many projects and technologies have been experimenting with providing attestation mechanisms for Web3, such as Worldcoin using iris recognition to bind addresses with biometric features or POAPs using NFTs to prove participation in events, these practices have their limitations. The former has high verification costs and controversy, while the latter has low verification costs (the attested party does not need to submit any data), making it difficult to be considered strong evidence.
In order to provide a widely usable attestation mechanism for Web3, EAS implements two sets of contracts:
Template contracts: allow attesting entities to define the requirements for reviewing data
Attestation contracts: allow the attested party to submit the required data for attestation
EAS aims to construct a standardized method to simplify and streamline the attestation process for industries.
EAS Operating Framework
(Data source)
The EAS team believes that identity fundamentally comes from the accumulation of an individual’s past and future, rather than being a one-time check. Doctors prove your date of birth, governments prove your passport, teachers prove your grades, schools prove your degree, employers prove your employment record, and the list goes on. At every step in life, from birth to career, there are attestations that weave the structure of one’s identity.
The team believes that a complete attestation mechanism should allow anything to be recorded, from small transactions or event participations to driver’s licenses and academic qualifications, all using the same system. Therefore, EAS is designed as a universal attestation system.
EAS Template Information
(Data source)
EAS provides attesting parties (issuers and verifiers) with a set of templates (schemas) to define the content related to the attestation process, including UID, issuer information, and the information the attested party needs to provide.
Once the structure of the attestation process is determined, the process of attestation becomes simple. The attested party only needs to fill in the data according to the format and sign it with their wallet. It is also possible to choose between on-chain or off-chain records based on requirements and importance, with the former being more rigorous but the latter being cost-free.
Recommended Reading:
What is Attestation? Why is it the Key Infrastructure for Real-World Use Cases in Web3?
Reason for recommendation: This article introduces the difference between attestation and verification, which helps to better understand the importance of attestation and provides an overview of other attestation infrastructure projects besides EAS.
The design of EAS is simple, including just a few lines of code for the backend behind the template. The team’s goal is to become a universal standard for attestation in future applications, serving as the attestation standard for all application scenarios.
EAS aims to become the standard for attestation formats
(Data source)
Once all attestation formats are standardized, it can enhance the composability advantages of Web3. For example, in the future, a concert may require different attestations from various entities to ensure eligibility for ticket purchase, such as driver’s license proof, fan proof, or non-fake account proof. This will rely on the foundation of attestation standardization.
Based on the aforementioned design of EAS, the most challenging part of becoming a standard is convincing the majority to adopt it, which requires a certain level of influence.
The EAS team members come from the Ethereum core developer community, so their legitimacy is not an issue. However, whether the market accepts or even widely adopts it remains uncertain, and it is also a key factor in considering decentralized identity (DID) projects in the future.
Attestation
DID
EAS
ethereum
PoP
Proof of Personhood