The people steering Wormhole’s cross-chain messaging

The security overhaul at the Guardian Network

Google Cloud is the newest addition to the Wormhole Guardian Network. This decentralized set of validator nodes includes RockawayX, P2P, Figment, and Everstake. Rishi Ramchandani, Head of Web3 APAC at Google Cloud, says the collaboration demonstrates an investment to help scale the Web3 ecosystem. Google Cloud’s infrastructure provides verification redundancy across the entire Guardian set by backfilling any Guardian that experiences downtime. Dan Reecer, co-founder and COO of Wormhole Foundation, says this collaboration enables a platform-wide security upgrade to minimize downtime. The security strategy uses a multi-layered approach. The Global Accountant maintains 1:1 parity between native and wrapped assets across blockchains. The Governor monitors and limits asset outflows to prevent cross-chain contagion. This system provides security for thousands of application developers and users across over 30 blockchains. Teams like Circle and Uniswap use the wider Wormhole network. Wormhole is the only interoperability protocol unconditionally approved by the security experts of Uniswap’s Bridge Assessment Committee. The collaboration also includes researching the addition of trustless ZK verification mechanisms to optimize multichain security through extended research and product development.

Growth leaders and core developers

Katya Ternopolska leads growth at the Wormhole Foundation. She earned a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Toronto. Before joining Wormhole in January 2024, she held roles at Polygon Labs and Aave. She previously worked as a Marketing Lead at Rift Finance and a Marketing Analyst at Maple Finance. The foundation also awarded a grant to xLabs, led by Gabriel Zimmermann, to act as an official core contributor. The xLabs team brings experience in building blockchain technology that spans building core infrastructure to running nodes, smart contracts, and web applications across Ethereum, Solana, Algorand, and core software protocols today. xLabs handles relayer operations, infrastructure products, developer experience, and protocol maintenance. The team built WormholeScan and worked on the Portal Token Bridge and Wormhole Connect. I see the importance of these technical contributions as the platform moves over 40 billion dollars through over 1 billion cross-chain messages. The upcoming Sigma Hackathon in Fall 2024 will provide participants access to Google Cloud AI and Web3 expertise. You should note that the foundation also provides grants, research, ecosystem programs, and technical support to enable teams to build decentralized products. Wormhole also offered a $10 million whitehat agreement to the attacker of the 2022 exploit. Does the involvement of a massive provider like Google Cloud affect the decentralized nature of the Guardian Network?

Technical comparison and protocol stability

Wormhole’s security includes a 19-member Guardian Network with a 13-of-19 threshold. The 2022 Solana exploit cost the protocol $326 million because of a signature verification bug. The attacker fraudulently minted 120,000 ETH. Jump Trading, the parent company of Wormhole, replaced the $320 million loss with ETH. The 120,000 ETH exploit occurred at 18:26 UTC, and the patch was implemented at 00:33 UTC. Wormhole’s relayer delivery charges pass through costs to users, with examples in the documentation showing 4.2 USDC on Ethereum L1 and 0.3 USDC on Base, Optimism, Arbitrum, and Avalanche. LayerZero fees include source gas, destination gas, and a per-DVN fee.

Wormhole supports 35+ blockchains, whereas LayerZero supports over 90 blockchains. Wormhole uses the Wormhole Token Bridge and Native Token Transfers. Wormhole provides access to liquidity and users on over 30 leading blockchain networks, while LayerZero has established adoption across multiple networks. The network maintains a $5 million bug bounty for security researchers.