hybrix Feature Friday | 16th of July
Every week we highlight a hybrix feature. This week we dive into: Offset Keys
There is an exciting feature in hybrix that few people know about: Offset Keys. This is a feature for which we are currently creating user interface elements, so everyone can start using it. In this feature friday we want to give you a peek as to how it works, and what we do with it. We’d also love to know what you can come up with once you know the power of offset keys!
Privacy and Security
Our wallet is built to handle keys deterministically and non-custodial, and it keeps your keys on your own computer only. We don’t touch them! Each time you log into your account, the necessary keys to move your currencies and send transactions are calculated on-the-fly. This is the only way to keep your security top-notch: not storage of keys on your computer.
Multiple Private Keys for One Asset
All the assets that you see when you access your wallet have a private key that is calculated with the offset 0 (zero). These private keys also create the addresses of your assets and that in turn enables you to see your balance, and move your crypto. However, there are many more possibilities when using offsets higher than 0. Essentially this means your wallet can hold a plethora of different Ethereum private keys, even hidden ones that nobody knows about, unless they know which offset to search for.
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Offset keys are a generated set of keys with your initial encryption seed used as a base key. With an offset your wallet creates a new set of keys generated from this base key. To simplify by example: You have a (super easy) encryption seed ‘LogMeIn’ for your wallet session. Wallet A, from now we will name this wallet A(0) because of it’s offset value 0, gets private key ‘123abc’. If you would offset wallet A by 2, a new key will be generated: ‘245cde’. This private key will give you access to wallet A(2).
Of course in real life the encryption seed and private keys are more complex, but the example above gives you an idea of how this works.
So How Can We Use This?
So what could this be useful for? Well, for one, we have used the power of offset keys to enable users to become allocators in the hybrix swap system. This makes it possible for these allocators to keep account of their swap crypto pairs on separate offset keys, and this also makes it possible to orchestrate swaps together with our swap matcher node.
What Are Your Ideas?
We would love to know what use cases you can come up with in relation to offset keys in hybrix! Let us know in the comments below, or give us a shoutout on Telegram or by sending us an e-mail!
