Buterin Calls Security the Main Priority for Crypto Exchanges

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin stated that in the next two years, the main priority for cryptocurrency exchanges and custodial companies should be asset security. In an interview on November 4, he noted that industry participants need to reassess their approaches to infrastructure protection amid major cyberattacks.

"In the next two years, their main task is not to win, but to survive," Buterin emphasized.

In his opinion, Binance and other large platforms will transition to a more conservative risk management model, which he described as a "bunker mode." This approach involves strengthening fund protection and reducing reliance on potentially vulnerable infrastructure components.

Buterin noted that recently, the number of smart contract hacks has significantly decreased, according to his observations. However, the largest attacks in the past year and a half have more often affected user interfaces and centralized systems rather than the fundamental mechanisms of blockchains.

One of the necessary protective measures the developer mentioned is the use of multi-signature wallets. Transferring funds in them requires confirmation by several independent keys. This reduces the risk of asset loss if one key is compromised, although it does not eliminate other security threats.

Buterin also suggested that further major hacks could lead to stricter regulatory requirements for the storage of digital assets. In his view, companies will be forced to pay more attention to access control and the protection of client funds.

How AI Will Aid the Development of Lean Ethereum

A separate topic of the interview was the long-term Lean Ethereum program, which aims to increase network performance without sacrificing decentralization and security.

Buterin plans to use zero-knowledge proofs (ZK), artificial intelligence, and formal verification to improve the protocol. The latter allows for mathematical verification of the compliance of program code with pre-established requirements.

According to the developer's assessment, implementing the remaining roadmap using methods from five years ago could take about 20 years. He believes that the use of AI significantly accelerates the development and verification of technical solutions. However, the timelines for implementing individual updates are yet to be determined.

Buterin also expects that second-layer networks (L2) will develop their own solutions in the areas of decentralized finance, privacy, and corporate applications. He considers merely replicating Ethereum's capabilities to increase throughput insufficient.

Speaking about DeFi, the developer emphasized that reducing the likelihood of complete asset loss is more important than a slight difference in protocol yields. Among the promising directions for Ethereum, he also highlighted the tokenization of real assets, where rights to financial instruments and other objects are represented using blockchain technology.