Today we continue to talk about a new track. Before looking at this project, I didn’t know that the VPN track could be decentralized and implemented using blockchain. Nowadays, blockchain can really be used in any field.
The project we are talking about today is Orchid protocol, which currently has a market value of 60 million U.S. dollars and a ranking of 300+. Let’s take a look at it today.
Introduction
Orchid Network is committed to creating a decentralized VPN service that allows users to obtain services from network bandwidth providers around the world. OXT is Orchid’s native ERC-20 utility token. OXT is used by nodes for staking fees when joining the network, and by users to pay for VPN services. Orchid also allows users to use legal currency to purchase pre-charged Orchid accounts to obtain services.
Orchid is the next generation VPN and privacy tool that keeps the internet open and accessible by eliminating centralization, rewarding network contributors, and harnessing the power of blockchain. A bandwidth market provided by node providers based on the Ethereum blockchain and using OXT tokens. Users can use OXT tokens to pay bandwidth fees to node operators, and the system will be based on a staking mechanism.
Project Vision
Orchid Network is committed to creating a decentralized VPN service that allows users to obtain services from network bandwidth providers around the world.
Market demand
The Internet is supposed to be a free, open platform that allows free access to information, collaboration and communication across national borders. Unfortunately, it's not a truly open and free place. More than 75% of the global population has limited or censored internet access. ISPs around the world collect user data and then sell the data. Orchid is a new surveillance-free layer on top of the existing Internet, allowing users to bypass firewalls, access information and communicate freely.
team
Orchid’s four co-founders come from the blockchain and financial fields. They are Dr. Steven Waterhouse, Jay Freeman, Brian J. Fox and Gustav Simonsson as CEO.
Waterhouse is a well-known figure within cryptocurrency, and he also co-founded venture capital firm Pantera Capital, which invests in some of the most popular companies in the industry.
Jay Freeman is the creator of Cydia, an alternative Apple App Store for jailbroken Apple devices that is currently used by approximately 30 million jailbroken Apple products.
Brian J. Fox was responsible for creating the first interactive online banking system for U.S. bank Wells Fargo in the mid-1990s. At the same time, Gustav Simonsson is also one of the core security developers of the Ethereum network, helping the Ethereum network initially launch in 2015.
What makes Orchid unique?
The main idea behind Orchid is to use blockchain technology to enhance the existing VPN experience.
Using cryptocurrency-based probabilistic nanopayments, users can benefit from anonymous VPN usage that does not rely on centralized servers and the risks associated with country-specific infrastructure. As a freely exchangeable ERC-20 token, OXT also provides owners with transaction incentives to own and increase the value of the network.
A separate feature allows users to purchase so-called "Orchid Credits" with fiat currency. In this case, OXT cannot be extracted and converted elsewhere and can only be consumed at the network provider. This is intended to attract people who don’t want to trade in cryptocurrencies.
Orchid’s appeal isn’t just among cryptocurrency users, however. Developers highlight the growing trend toward internet freedom in the face of rising geopolitical tensions and local restrictions. Web 3.0 technologies are being used to provide some kind of semi-open Internet, as was envisioned when consumer access started to become mainstream in the early 1990s.
Project implementation mechanism
The Orchid Protocol organizes bandwidth sellers into a structured peer-to-peer (P2P) network called the Orchid Market. Customers connect to Orchid Market and pay bandwidth sellers to form a chain of proxies for specific resources on the Internet. Unlike more common methods of sending and receiving data from the global internet, Orchid Market's proxy chain naturally separates information about the data's origin from information about its destination; no one relay or proxy has either information, or knows about either personal identity. The structure of Orchid Market further supports this separation of information by providing strong resistance to collusion attacks – the ability of a group of bandwidth sellers to overcome this separation of knowledge.
How does the project avoid being monitored and censored?
Currently, to access a website, you need to establish a connection with the website server, and data interaction will pass through the central node controlled by the government department.
Using the Orchid protocol randomly sends your information to a number of nodes and then to the target server, making this process difficult to track and monitor by the central node.
In terms of payment, the Orchid Protocol conducts micropayments through tokens. They use a new payment solution. This solution is a concept proposed by Pass and Shelat in the "Micropayments for Decentralized Currencies" paper. The Orchid Protocol team is working on this Iterations were carried out based on the plan.
It is a probabilistic small-amount payment scheme. Small-amount payments are made through random selection of bills. After being selected, the payment is then redeemed on the chain. The whole process is like a lottery and is full of surprises.
The process is as follows:
1. Users open a payment account by depositing OXT tokens into the Ethereum smart contract.
2. The user can then send a valid micropayment to any provider on the network that accepts payment for services.
3. If the user is drawn, the service provider can exchange the ticket for OXT tokens through on-chain transactions.
4. Based on the level of funds in the account, decide whether the user needs to deposit more OXT tokens in his account.
5. Over time, the value transferred on-chain is expected to match the value represented in probabilistic nanopayments.
It can be simply stated as the user first mortgages a sufficient amount of tokens on the chain, and all subsequent small-amount transfers will be recorded off-chain first. When an account is selected, it will be settled and redeemed once on the chain. Through this A probabilistic lottery method that improves speed and enables micro-payments.
However, there may be some problems with this. First, users must mortgage more or several times more tokens in the early stage, and the cost may be higher. The second is that there are not many users and service providers in the early stages of network launch, so the probability of users being selected will be very high, and problems such as slow settlement due to network congestion may occur.
How does Orchid Protocol address data breach and privacy concerns? The Orchid Protocol is equivalent to adding a network middle layer between users and the Internet, segmenting and filtering personal information, such as IP addresses and geographical location information, through multiple routing service providers to protect personal privacy.
Secondly, Orchid Protocol also plans to make the payment process anonymous. Currently, Ethereum’s payment is pseudo-anonymous, that is, the ledger data is public and the user’s account address will be exposed. They may later use hybrid services, or other anonymous currencies and anonymity solutions to solve this problem.
Adopt an algorithm
In the Orchid Protocol network, the network traffic market is a distributed P2P network with many network node service providers and network users. This means that if a payment channel is established between each user and the node service provider , then the Orchid Protocol network based on the Ethereum network will generate high transaction fees when operating, so the Orchid Protocol team adopted a probabilistic payment method - micropayment.
Micropayments, simply put, are “pay as you go.” We are using traditional operators such as mobile/telecom, and generally pay in the form of monthly or annual subscriptions. This is also the business model of most such activities. So if I want to change this system to, "Only when there is Internet access If the network broadband fee is paid only when needed, the entire model will become more flexible and reasonable. This is exactly what the micro-payment of the Orchid Agreement aims to achieve.
Based on the ultra-micro payment mechanism, network users do not need to pay the full fee when using the bandwidth service of the Orchid Protocol network. Instead, they pay based on the total number of users of the entire network and the number of node service providers. Under the ultra-micro payment mechanism, assuming that user A originally needed to pay a bandwidth usage fee of US$1, then user A will now send his node provider a "winning" ticket with a winning probability of 1/100, and the amount is US$100. , when user A does not win, there is no need to pay for the bandwidth service this time. Only when user A wins, payment will be required. This means that the more people use the entire network, the probability of winning will be The smaller it is, the average payment of user A will become very low, greatly reducing the cost for network users.
Technical features
The OXT Orchid protocol mainly has the following technologies: 1. High security: distributed nodes can make nodes more distributed and connections more secure. ② Token incentives: Although the previous onion network was good, there was still a risk of being monitored due to fewer connected nodes. Token incentives allow more nodes to participate, thereby achieving network security. ③. Huge market: With the increasing demand for security, privacy, etc., and the current problems of the Internet, more people are looking for a more satisfactory anonymous network. The Orchid Protocol can theoretically carry huge market demand, and its connection to the blockchain is also very logical and necessary.
Incentives
The value medium and payment medium of the entire Orchid Protocol network is Orchid's encrypted token OXT. For network node service providers, they need to "seize" market share by pledging OXT. The more OXT pledged, the more money they have in the network. The higher the possibility of obtaining rewards, just like in the BTC network, the mining pool with higher computing power successfully produces blocks, the greater the possibility of obtaining BTC rewards for producing blocks.
Token distribution
The current total supply is 1,000,000,000 OXT, and the circulation volume is 962,629,339 OXT. It has basically been circulated. The current currency price is 0.06 US dollars, and the peak price was 1 US dollar (21 years). It seems that it has dropped 99%. The opening price on the first day is still 0.36 US dollars. , so it also fell below the issuance price. In terms of distribution, the proportion of currency held by the project side is too high, 75% of the currency holdings.
market view
Orchid uses the latest and most secure technology to establish channels between devices and uses WebRTC technology to mask network traffic, making the network traffic in the channel look like video call and voice communication traffic to outsiders. This way, it is almost impossible for others to know which server the user is accessing or the type of data the user is sending. Orchid also supports "multi-hop networking", allowing network traffic to be simply routed through multiple service nodes before reaching the target page.
The final summary is whether there is a false demand in the field of decentralized VPN, because as long as we play in the currency circle, we will basically use this thing, and everyone knows that this thing is also prohibited in our country, but there are There is no stopping what is needed, and the biggest problem with many of these VPNs is that they run away after being used, and you have to find a new one. Have many friends encountered this kind of headache? However, this protocol is decentralized, and anyone can become a node by pledging OXT tokens. This still solves certain pain points. The project team’s currency holding ratio is too high, and they keep shipping. So overall, I don’t recommend buying it.