The New Safety Standard for Cryptocurrency

Where Decentralized Networks Meet Bank-Grade Security

Energi Cryptocurrency
Energi
3 min readJun 4, 2020

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Throughout the cryptocurrency space, scams and malicious behavior are at all-time-high, largely due to lack of security initiatives and innovation. During the migration to Gen 3, we had to fight several scammers and malicious actors that were attacking the network. These attacks typically involved a scammer stealing NRG from a user wallet and then transferring it to an exchange, where they dump the coins. The individual user suffers a loss, which in some cases can be dramatic, but also the whole network gets hit when the scammer dumps the coins and diminishes the value of every NRG holder.

To tackle this, we increased the number of confirmations needed to deposit NRG on exchanges to 5,000 as a temporary measure during the migration. Before, deposits to exchanges needed only six confirmations, and they were executed in about five minutes. Scammers were using this fast speed in their favor, stealing coins and dumping them quickly, so our team started working with users in ways to increase their protection.

After a long and thoughtful discussion, we started testing the increased number of confirmations, and the Energi Bureau of Investigations (EBI) was able to recover over $750,000 worth of NRG across more than 10 different cases.

A Step Closer to Mass Adoption

Imagine that someone gets hold of your contactless debit card and they use it to make a few purchases. You can freeze your card, denounce it to the police, and raise a ticket with your bank to get your money back. That’s why it feels safe keeping your funds with traditional banks; they have insurance and processes to secure your money. Energi users can now feel a greater sense of security, a stark contrast to the rest of the crypto space where it’s do-or-die, and letting your guard down for even a moment could be a life-changing disaster.

We’re confident to announce that we’ll be implementing this feature permanently on Energi. What began as a temporary measure has proven a massive success, and our feedback from those affected is extremely positive.

During the constructive discussion about this feature, some users pointed out that a longer confirmation time for deposits to exchanges could sometimes be inconvenient. We looked into this deeply, and the numbers show that security over speed has a better return for the majority of users because:

  • Long-term coin holders don’t move their coins that much.
  • Traders keep them in the exchange, so the feature doesn’t affect them.
  • Long-term professional investors will plan their cash-outs ahead of time, so they will factor in the longer confirmation time.
  • The price of NRG will be sustained higher, with less crashes (estimated as much as 50% higher), since scammers won’t be able to dump NRG, thus providing higher price levels for holders when they do need to take profit.
  • This new feature only applies to deposits on exchanges. All other transactions and trades will still be near-instant.

As an important note, remember our recovery features are currently designed only for larger crimes which can harm the whole network due to sizable dumping potential (amounts are typically at least a few thousand NRG). We are considering extending these services for smaller amounts, but not at this time.

Until now, many cryptocurrency holders were under constant stress of having their funds stolen and lost forever. NRG owners now have a safety net that significantly reduces this stress (as long as they contact Energi Defense immediately), disincentivizes criminals from attacking our users, and overall strengthens the network and affirms Energi as the leading protocol in user protection.

We’re sure that this innovative feature will change the way that the crypto world operates, and may become the new standard for exchange deposits across the space. One of our most vulnerable aspects of user protection has now been significantly bolstered, making Energi the safest cryptocurrency protocol in existence.

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