What is Real-Time Smart Contract Analysis

Let’s address the elephant in the room: blockchain has a security problem.

This is not a new discovery. At its core, blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that enables secure and immutable transactions without the need for intermediaries. However, despite its innovative potential, blockchain systems are not immune to security vulnerabilities. And Bitcoin hits a new all-time high and the cryptocurrency market approaches its historical peak of $3T market cap once again in 2024, the importance of security in blockchain cannot be overstated.

In recent years, security audits emerged as a preventative solution for developers to safeguard their smart contracts against hacks and exploits. These audits generally involve a holistic assessment of the project’s infrastructure and codebase to identify potential vulnerabilities and ensure that the project adheres to industry standards for security and compliance. While these audits are considered a security best practice and provide valuable insight into a system’s security posture before launch, a giant figurative “blind spot” exists for security events that occur after a smart contract has been deployed. This created the push for security solutions that can monitor and respond to on-chain threats in real-time. This, combined with security audits, creates an adaptive approach which ensures that blockchain systems remain resilient in the face of emerging security challenges.

At FuzzLand, we have developed a suite of solutions for post-deployment smart contract monitoring and analysis. One of the most common questions we’ve encountered in our conversations is: what is real-time smart contract analysis, and how does it compare to smart contract audits?

How real-time smart contract analysis works

Real-time smart contract analysis is a recent and significant advancement in the field of smart contract security. Unlike traditional security audits that often rely on static analysis of code repositories, it operates directly on-chain to enable comprehensive surveillance of smart contract behavior in real-time. This allows for 24/7 surveillance to detect any unwanted behaviors in smart contracts as they are deployed or interacted with on the blockchain. Automated security checks and algorithms are also leveraged to detect and flag common vulnerabilities like reentrancy bugs and logic flaws. This enables developers to quickly address potential security risks and reduce the window of opportunity for malicious exploitation.

Benefits of real-time smart contract analysis

While both security audits and real-time analytics play crucial roles in enhancing the security resilience of smart contracts, the latter offers distinct advantages that make it well-suited for addressing the dynamic and evolving nature of blockchain-based attacks. Audits are valuable for conducting a snapshot of the system’s security posture pre-deployment, but state changes like smart contract upgrades can introduce new security risks (i.e. a million dollar bug in the system waiting to be triggered by a specific state). Employing a security researcher to regularly test a deployed contract is impractical, and conducting periodic audits can be resource-intensive and time-consuming. Thus, real-time analytics provide a cost-effective alternative for companies to be able to maintain a smart contract’s security integrity with the continuous monitoring of the smart contract post-deployment, even in the event of state change. There are no “out of scope” vulnerabilities since it is a global simulation.

In the event of an attack, the time for incident response is measured in milliseconds. Real-time monitoring enables developers to quickly detect, identify, and react to potential threats to minimize impact and reduce financial loss.

It is important to note that smart contract developers should not use real-time analytics solutions as a replacement for a security audit. Instead, the two act as complementary methods to enhance smart contract security, enabling comprehensive surveillance of the smart contract before and after it is deployed.

How FuzzLand delivers next-gen tools for real-time smart contract analysis

At FuzzLand, we believe that innovative technology requires innovative approaches to security. We developed real-time analytics solutions using our proprietary fuzz testing framework which has uncovered 7,600+ critical security vulnerabilities in Ethereum smart contracts.

Blaz+ is our suite of security solutions for real-time smart contract monitoring, analytics, and alert. Blaz+ Analysis is a solution that utilizes fuzzing and formal verification to offer 24/7, post-deployment smart contract security analysis triggered by each state change. Blaz+ Alert is a precise, real-time incident detection and response system that monitors for stateful vulnerabilities in smart contracts and alerts security personnel of malicious activity within milliseconds of it occurring.

To learn more about how Blaz+ can elevate your smart contract security, visit https://fuzz.land.