NFT Collectors, Demand Provably Fair NFTs
Authors: CK Umachi, Tony Douglas
HonestNFT’s Vigilante NFT launch will be provably fair through a commit-reveal scheme. We use the Chainlink Verifiable Random Function (VRF) for a source of transparent and tamper-proof randomness. This should be the standard — not the exception.
The HonestNFT team and community have investigated hundreds of NFT launches, even providing in-depth audits of several. Very few of the NFT collections were provably fair. NFT collectors should demand better.
NFTs in many ways are like trading cards. When people purchase packs of trading cards, they expect a random chance to get a particularly rare one with high value. Imagine if the store owner or another insider stole those rare cards out of the packs before they were sold. Or better yet, check out how this played out for McDonalds where insiders rigged their Monopoly game to the tune of $24M. This same activity has been rampant in the NFT space.
One important component of our audits is trustlessness. Not to be confused with trustworthiness, trustlessness is core to blockchain technology. It means you do not need to place your sole trust in any institution or third party in order for a system to work. In the context of NFT transactions, trustlessness means buyers shouldn’t have to trust that the launch team and insiders will not unfairly mint the rarest NFTs for themselves. Instead, NFT launches should be transparent and verifiably fair. A commit-reveal scheme is an easy way to create provably fair NFT mints, and more projects should be using it.
Commit-reveal for NFTs means that you randomize the image that the NFT points to on IPFS, or another service, after the collection is minted. This ensures that even the creators of the project can’t know where the rarest NFTs are in the collection. Woof from Sneaky Vampire Syndicate, one of the few projects to implement a commit-reveal scheme, outlines their approach here. We recommend using random numbers supplied by Chainlink VRF to reshuffle the NFTs post-mint.
Chainlink VRF works by combining block data that is still unknown when the request is made with the oracle node’s pre-committed private key to generate both a random number and a cryptographic proof. The smart contract will only accept the random number input if it has a valid cryptographic proof, and the cryptographic proof can only be generated if the VRF process is tamper-proof. This helps provide users with automated and publicly verifiable proof directly on-chain that each application using Chainlink VRF for randomness is provably fair and cannot be tampered with or predicted by the oracle, outside entities, or development teams.
As we pointed out in our Guide to Effectively Cheating NFT Launches (and detecting cheaters), NFT sniping is a very common occurrence in the NFT space. Whether it’s insider extractable value (IEV) where teams rig their launches or poorly designed mechanisms where savvy traders can gain an advantage, it’s obvious that the playing field isn’t always fair.
One high-profile example of where a commit-reveal scheme should have been used is the case of Mekaverse. The widely-hyped NFT project — which sold $60M worth of NFTs in 24 hours — ultimately ran into allegations of insider trading and fraud.
The core team at HonestNFT are true believers in the potential of Web3. But to get to widespread mainstream adoption, we have to find reliable solutions to vulnerabilities and scams. For this reason we recommend NFT collectors demand provably fair NFT launches and use Chainlink VRF to do so.
Honest Protocol
Commit-reveal schemes are just one of many key features that NFT collectors should be demanding in projects. This is why we’re building the Honest Protocol. This trust and curation protocol will be the backbone of Web3 media, putting trust back into the assets and letting users define what trust means to them.
“We’re on a mission to redefine the NFT space by setting the expectation that each mint should be provably fair,” stated Ricardo Rosales, Core Team lead at HonestNFT. “By using a commit-reveal scheme and Chainlink VRF, we’re ensuring that the Vigilante NFT launch is tamper-proof and transparent, giving each of our community members a fair chance of receiving the rarest NFTs without manipulation.”
Join Us
If you’re interested in minting a provably fair Vigilante, our public sale launches on 3/9 at 8am PST. If you’re interested in joining our mission to make the NFT space fair, drop by our Discord channel. If you just want to follow along, follow HonestNFT on Twitter and check out our website.
About HonestNFT
HonestNFT is the premier community for making NFT drops fair and equitable. For more information, please visit https://honestnft.xyz.
About Chainlink
Chainlink is the industry standard for building, accessing, and selling oracle services needed to power hybrid smart contracts on any blockchain. Chainlink oracle networks provide smart contracts with a way to reliably connect to any external API and leverage secure off-chain computations for enabling feature-rich applications. Chainlink currently secures tens of billions of dollars across DeFi, insurance, gaming, and other major industries, and offers global enterprises and leading data providers a universal gateway to all blockchains.
Learn more about Chainlink by visiting chain.link or reading the developer documentation at docs.chain.link. To discuss an integration, reach out to an expert.
