Opinion: Staking after the launch of Ethereum 2.0 carries serious risks

Network security expert Chase Wright expressed doubts about the prudence of staking after the launch of Phase 0 of Ethereum 2.0. His arguments are based on the experience of a validator running Prysm and Lighthouse clients in the Onyx, Witti, Altona and Medalla test networks.

1/ Why I won’t be staking ETH at launch, a thread…#Ethereum #eth2

Like many of you, I am excited for ETH2, the Beacon Chain, Phase 0, and everything that will come after.

I have participated in Onyx, Witti, Altona, and Medalla test networks.

I tried Prysm and Lighthouse.

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

Wright says he has fixed code issues on Github and participated in fuzz testing, so the testnets’ issues are not unfamiliar to him.

3/ I’ve pretty much done it all when it comes to getting familiar with the clients, how to run them, how to configure them, etc.

However, I will not be participating in the genesis, and I will not be staking ETH. Why?

Well, a few reasons really.

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

The reason for skepticism is that a typical Medalla testnet validator has yet to break even. This is due to the discovery of a bug in one of the clients. Such a problem, in the expert’s view, could also occur on the mainnet. He criticised the developers’ response, noting that to date there has not been a single successful ETH2 fork.

5/ Because the Medalla response to do fuck all is an unacceptable response. None of the teams have demonstrated their ability to «fix» a situation like this. To this date there hasn’t been a single successful fork of an ETH2 beacon chain.

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

“Вы собираетесь перейти в коммерческую стадию, потенциально с сотнями миллионов долларов в день, с нетронутым и прошедшим аудит кодом только для того, чтобы разбираться с форками позже? Нет, спасибо. Вас ждёт The DAO часть 2. Вопрос лишь когда», — выплеснул Райт.

7/ No. You want to come into a production network with potentially hundreds of millions of dollars day one with pristine, audited code, only to figure out how to deal with forks later? No thanks. The DAO Part 2 will happen, it’s not a matter of if but when.

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

“Виталик говорил, что в случае атаки на ETH2 будет осуществлен форк, но никто не хочет показать, как он выглядит. Черт!”, — поиронизировал эксперт.

8/ When Vitalik’s answer to what do we do when ETH2 is attacked is «fork» but nobody wants to demonstrate what a fork for ETH2 looks like…yikes…

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

Another bottleneck, in Wright’s view, is the poor interoperability among the ETH2 clients. He argues that rather than solving this problem, the development teams are more concerned with meeting the November deadline.

11/ Without a doubt there is a disconnect between the quality, funding, and cooperation between the ETH2 client teams. It’s one thing to say «You should run a non-Prysm node» and it’s another thing to actually put your $ down on doing so.

— Chase Wright (@mysticryuujin) September 23, 2020

Lead Ethereum Foundation developer Danny Ryan responded directly to Wright’s critique. He did not agree that the Phase 0 launch of ETH2 is being artificially rushed, which could lead to adverse consequences. At the same time, Ryan agreed with the critic that ETH2 is not for everyone.

I agree — Phase 0 is not for everybody.

Due your own research. Follow your own risk analysis.

But I do not agree that shipping soon is artificially and unsafely being rushed.

— dannyryan (@dannyryan) September 23, 2020

Earlier, Evan Van Ness reported that the Ethereum 2.0 launch could occur earlier than planned. Shortly before this, Ryan published an official proposal, EIP-2982, proposing the launch of ETH2.

What is Ethereum 2.0?

Recall that the final Medalla testnet went live on August 4. Ten days later the network experienced a failure, but Prysmatic Labs’ Raul Jordan ruled out any change to the Phase 0 launch timeline.

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