Seraphis General Paper Review
Hello everyone, Diego "rehrar" Salazar here on behalf of Cypher Stack. We've recently completed a proposal in which we reviewed Bulletproofs++. We have been asked by MRL community members to make a proposal for reviewing Seraphis.
Seraphis is an upcoming privacy protocol designed by Koe that is under consideration for inclusion in Monero. Before it can be seriously considered however, it would be wise for the protocol to undergo review. Seraphis is currently split into two papers. The first paper details a framework to be used for a privacy-respecting transaction protocol. The second instantiates it. After discussion with MRL personnel, we have decided to do things in a stepwise fashion. That is to review the general protocol overview first, and, if nothing is found that would give pause, the instantiation paper afterwards.
Cypher Stack asks for a total of 185 XMR to complete the review. We add a 10% volatility buffer, bringing the total up to 203.5 XMR. We aim to complete the review within two calendar (actual hours are not two months of man hours, but we have other work for oother clients as well) months of the proposal being funded. The deliverable will be a holistic review report of the first paper that will be freely and publicly provided to the Monero community for perusal, discussion, and consideration.
Merge request reports
Activity
mentioned in merge request !443 (merged)
Hi! I appreciate you taking on this task. Some questions to clarify the proposal:
- Is there a planned division of funds/time allocated for reviewing the abstract protocol paper vs the implementation paper?
- Are you going for a more holistic review or formal review of both papers, neither, one or the other?
Also, a question for the community:
Should we exclude Jamtis in the implementation paper from the review, so more time can be allocated to Seraphis proper? For: a) Jamtis is somewhat more straight-forward cryptographically, and b) being an addressing protocol, can be modified retroactively in the case of a catastrophic failure without a hard fork. Against: If Jamtis is really badly broken, users can lose funds (not very likely) or privacy (more likely), so it should be reviewed just the same.
closing this proposal, more context here @ https://libera.monerologs.net/monero-research-lab/20240511#c376271
kayabanerve: Not only does the Seraphis protocol paper not need review under FCMP++, we have a distinct immediate contract (so even if we had the money, I'd say we don't have the time in our mutual schedule).
