Article Title: “A Vision for Scaling Bitcoin: Bringing Mass Adoption”
Original Author: Eli Ben-Sasson
Translator: Odaily
Starknet is set to become the first network to settle transactions on both Bitcoin and Ethereum, expanding Bitcoin’s transaction processing capacity to thousands of transactions per second. This will be achieved within six months after a moderate upgrade to Bitcoin, made possible by OP_CAT. This is my proposal for the future of Starknet and also a suggestion for the blockchain, the global economy, and our individual rights. Concrete steps have already been taken, as detailed below.
The time has finally come for STARKs to meet new challenges. Now, STARKs will demonstrate its scalability on the most equitable currency in history – Bitcoin. By scalability, I mean true decentralization. I am not here to create another multi-signature sidechain, but to create a layer that can scale both Ethereum and Bitcoin simultaneously.
Cryptographic technology has the power to purify the digital world and the financial sector. It can bring integrity to currencies, rebalance power in society by wresting it back from large tech companies, and restore it to sovereign individuals. It is a tool that empowers humanity and grassroots communities. In short, it is a source of good. Therefore, we need a vision that can demonstrate this and resonate with everyone. To pursue this vision, I bid farewell to my peaceful academic career.
This vision is not complete without scaling the BTC chain. By scaling Bitcoin, we can unleash the power of blockchain to change the world. StarkWare is actively supporting this vision through practical development and has launched a $1 million fund to support new research that will uncover the pros and cons of adopting OP_CAT on Bitcoin.
Through a strategic partnership established between the ZeroSync Foundation and L2 Iterative Ventures (L2 IV) led by Weikeng Chen, we have achieved fruitful results. We have made breakthroughs in open-source work on STARK validators implemented in OP-CAT-based contracts and Bitcoin scripts, leveraging their team’s expertise in engineering and research. We also appreciate BitVM and the ZeroSync Foundation for pioneering new ideas about the possibilities of Bitcoin. Carter Feldman of QED has also provided us with assistance, showing what can be discovered by examining Taproot from a new perspective with an open mind.
Following this article, StarkWare and Starknet will release numerous official updates. But for now, I want to return to the basics and clarify why we are doing what we are doing.
The Fractured Year of 2008
In 2008, the global financial system collapsed. In response, Satoshi Nakamoto released the revolutionary Bitcoin whitepaper. At this pivotal moment, Nakamoto showed us how to do things differently. We, the public, could demand and enforce higher standards of integrity and transparency in the financial sector. Nakamoto introduced an inclusive protocol that invited everyone to participate and contribute, instead of relying on the fortresses and skyscrapers of traditional banks. This protocol, through Bitcoin mining and transaction fees, distributed value fairly and transparently to a broad base of contributors. The wider the base of contributors, the better and more secure Bitcoin becomes.
Bitcoin has given us more than just a ledger – it has given us confidence in change. It achieved this precisely when the banks were failing, busy repossessing homes, hoping we wouldn’t notice that “absolute security” was no longer guaranteed, despite all the mortgage institutions saying, “trust us.”
The impact of Bitcoin, if fully realized, can surpass the reality we see today. Its destiny should and must be as a globally adopted reserve. It can form the foundation of a global “network of trust” that supports all the social functions our free society requires: currency, property management, and social interactions.
The Bitcoin whitepaper envisioned a network that could be practically used for payments, regardless of scale, and operated by everyone, regardless of wealth. Today, there are 1.5 billion people in the world who don’t even have a bank account. For these people, Bitcoin payments are not just an alternative choice, but their first exposure to financial infrastructure. The current capacity of Bitcoin is too limited, and the existing capacity is too expensive for almost all of these 1.5 billion people. My motivation is to develop technology that makes Bitcoin and the free society it supports accessible to everyone.
The Origin of Bitcoin
Some people think StarkWare is obsessed with Ethereum. While we recognize the value of Ethereum and are committed to its success, we are first and foremost enthusiasts of STARKs. Starknet, as a Layer 2 solution on Ethereum, is a natural extension of our vision – that STARKs are a public good and should be extended to all truly decentralized blockchain projects.
Introducing ZK-STARKs to Bitcoin is not a deviation from our path; it is a full-circle return. So far, all of StarkWare’s systems have been deployed exclusively on Ethereum. However, the idea of scaling STARKs in the blockchain originated from a Bitcoin conference in the spring of 2013.
At the conference, I took the stage and presented my newly born, somewhat quirky cryptographic research, which later became known as STARKs. Many in the audience responded that this cryptographic research was exactly what the blockchain needed. In other words, I was “inspired” by Bitcoin two years before Ethereum was launched.
Therefore, StarkWare has had a deep connection with Bitcoin from the very beginning, and we have been observing this network with admiration. Now, I feel comfortable that with the emergence of Taproot and the potential implementation of OP_CAT, the possibilities of Bitcoin have been shaped.
We have also supported some groundbreaking Bitcoin projects, such as ZeroSync, which was the first to integrate ZK proofs with Bitcoin to enhance privacy and scalability. StarkWare also commissioned researcher John Light to write the report “Validity Rollups on Bitcoin,” which reevaluates the potential of integrating existing validity summaries with Bitcoin and concludes that there may be an ideal match. Our next-generation circle-stark prover-verifier, Stwo, operates on the finite field M31. This field works well with Bitcoin scripts, making us well-suited to provide the next generation of Bitcoin scalability solutions.
The Future We Hope to See
My dream is to see Bitcoin reach the necessary scale to serve everyone. This involves open participation without economic barriers. I believe we must adhere to Nakamoto’s commitment to decentralization and security.
The internet was initially a niche place for nerdy engineers and scholars to play. Over the years, it has become the infrastructure that runs our lives. Blockchain is a tool that operates on top of the internet and has the potential to democratize it by distributing trust and integrity to a large community of sovereign individuals, rather than entrusting it to a few big companies. But to truly reclaim power and bring it back to the masses, scalability must be achieved.
I also believe that the opportunity to scale Bitcoin should be used to advance a value cherished by many in the Bitcoin community: privacy. The same cryptography that provides scalability for Bitcoin also provides the raw materials to enhance privacy. Over time, we will see that you can have it all: your private keys, your coins, and your privacy.
How Do We Achieve This Goal?
StarkWare is currently taking three practical measures to achieve the scalability of Bitcoin:
First, we will propose a new design for Starknet, making it the first Layer 2 solution to settle on both Ethereum and Bitcoin. Our team will undertake or sponsor all necessary work to transform Starknet into a self-hosting decentralized Layer 2 that operates fully on Bitcoin while also running as a Layer 2 on Ethereum. The architectural details we are researching will be announced in the coming weeks.
Second, StarkWare will launch a $1 million fund to provide funding for Bitcoin researchers and developers studying OP_CAT and its implications. This funding will be awarded to individuals and projects that genuinely support or oppose the upgrade and provide proof-of-concept for OP_CAT usage. Details about this fund will be announced next week.
Finally, we believe that the OP_CAT Bitcoin soft fork is the safest path to scaling Bitcoin, especially for achieving Stark verification and rollups. Therefore, we publicly announce our support for OP_CAT. OP_CAT enables trustless rollups on Bitcoin by enabling recursive contracts that can autonomously manage and update their state, significantly increasing transaction throughput without overwhelming Bitcoin.
If you would like to discuss StarkWare’s expansion into the Bitcoin network, please contact us via email or join the discussion on Twitter/X.
What Can Scaling Bitcoin Unlock?
By scaling Bitcoin, we will be able to process millions of transactions per second for hundreds of millions of users, instead of the current approximately 13 transactions per second. Some envisioned use cases for Bitcoin after scaling include:
Simultaneously scaling Bitcoin and Ethereum: The current blockchain landscape is fragmented. You can choose Bitcoin as “digital gold” for storing value, but its utility is limited. Or you can choose Ethereum, which aims to be the “world computer.” Or you can have smaller chains that bridge the two main chains (DApps can choose one or both), which Starknet can manage in a fragmented way. It will enable scaling both simultaneously without interfering with the independent governance of either chain.
Privacy: STARKs, the cryptographic proofs to be used for scaling, have immense untapped privacy potential. This potential aligns perfectly with the Bitcoin community. One side of “zero-knowledge” technology is well understood, but it still needs to be unlocked and transformed into practical solutions. Integrating private Layer 2s into the Bitcoin ecosystem, leveraging technologies like Zcash, MimbleWimble, or Noir, can significantly enhance transaction privacy.
Providing financial services to the excluded: Bitcoin’s mission has always been to empower marginalized groups to some extent. Approximately 1.5 billion people globally lack access to traditional banking services, which is a massive barrier to financial inclusion. Previous attempts to scale Bitcoin have not provided a solution for mass adoption. With new scaling methods and additional tools, Bitcoin has the potential to provide an inclusive global financial system for the unbanked.
Financial innovations for Bitcoin: Today, Bitcoin supports digital cash payments, but modern markets require more: better self-custody options, including programmable custody vaults, risk management and hedging tools, credit, loans, derivatives, futures contracts, and more. These require additional functionality that cannot and should not be built directly on Bitcoin. However, Starknet being a Layer 2 on Bitcoin can provide a win-win solution: the security of Bitcoin as digital gold, coupled with significant financial innovation.
Improving user experience: Bitcoin’s original self-custody security makes it difficult to handle securely, especially from the perspective of ordinary users. Modern Layer 2 solutions will provide users with secure and simple self-custody interactions to meet their daily needs, while relying on the strong but cumbersome Layer 1 security of Bitcoin as a long-term store of value.
Why Choose STARKs and Starknet?
In simple terms, STARKs offer the largest scale, the most battle-tested security, and the most secure “toxic waste” that does not require trusted setups or external cryptographic primitives, even against post-quantum computing. Our new STARK prover-verifier, named Stwo, utilizes tiny numbers that are suitable for the Bitcoin stack, improving efficiency.
Starknet already has a vibrant developer community on Ethereum and a programming language that enables full functionality. For any developer familiar with Rust, Starknet’s native (and open-source) language, Cairo, will be very familiar. The current Bitcoin community lacks an obvious high-level language for building on-chain activities. I hope Cairo can fill this gap and become one of Bitcoin’s native languages.
Conclusion
This is a global initiative, and we want to hear global feedback – if you have any ideas, please share them with our team via email or Twitter/X.
