The co-founder of Ethereum proposed lowering the number of validator signatures to ease the burden and improve the accuracy of load prediction in the future.
Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, has suggested a method to simplify the proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus process “considerably simpler and lighter,” reducing some of the strain on the Ethereum network.
Vitalik Buterin suggested a way to lessen the stress on validators by decreasing the number of signatures they need to produce on December 28. This would allow the network to continue working smoothly.
In an effort to promote decentralization and enable ordinary people to take part in staking, Ethereum now supports a relatively high number of validators, over 895,000.
He did point out that there are significant technical drawbacks to having so many validators, the most significant of which is the excessive strain on the network caused by the large number of signatures.
He went on to say that there are a lot of costs associated with carrying this burden, including difficult forking, scaling signatures via zero-knowledge proofs (SNARKs), and restricting quantum resistance.
Buterin suggested a more reasonable strategy with 8,192 signatures per slot as opposed to the current 28,000. He argued against the idea of attempting to make an ever-increasing number of signatures per slot work.
This would make the chain more resistant to quantum computing, simplify the technology significantly, and maintain the total amount of slashable ETH at around 1-2 million ETH. One way to make sure validators are being good is to use slashing.
Buterin proposed three possible methods: a system that uses decentralized staking pools exclusively, a system that uses “heavy” and “light” staking, and a system that uses responsible committees for rotating membership.
Reducing the digital signature burden to a reasonable level is the goal of the offered methods. Numbers are needed for the technique of switching participants.
The main benefit would be to make it much simpler to design protocols and infrastructure by putting the future signature burden at a tolerable level.
In his final remarks, he stated, “The future load of the Ethereum protocol becomes no longer an unknown.” He went on to say that the protocol’s capacity to handle more signatures per slot can be increased in the future through hard forks, but this can only happen when developers are certain that the technology can handle it.
Vitalik Buterin expressed concern in May about the potential risks of “stretching” Ethereum’s consensus beyond its primary roles in verifying blocks and ensuring the network’s security.
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