Swan zk-UBI: Building a Decentralized ZKPs Computing Market with Filecoin Integration

Swan Chain - Building A Full Toolset AI Blockchain

4 min readFeb 6, 2024

As a trailblazer in cloud computing, Swan Chain, an Ethereum layer 2 AI computing blockchain built on the OP Stack, has been at the forefront of integrating storage, computing, CDN, and payment for Web3 and AI projects.

Now, Swan Chain introduces a groundbreaking Universal Basic Income (zk-UBI) program, This initiative leverages Swan’s robust computing resource network to provide substantial computational support for Filecoin’s zero-knowledge proofs (zk-SNARKs ).

In this article, we delve into the depths of zk-UBI, covering essential topics:

Understanding zk-UBI and Zero-knowledge Proofs (ZKPs)
Synergy between zk-UBI and Filecoin zk-SNARK
How to Receive and Contribute zk-UBI Tasks

About zk-UBI and zk-SNARK in Filecoin

Understanding Universal Basic Income (zk-UBI)

zk-UBI,a revolutionary model that allocates computational tasks based on various zero-knowledge proof systems, aims to provide a basic level of compensation to qualified Computing Providers within the Swan decentralized computing ecosystem.

Understanding ZKPs

ZKPs, short for “Zero-knowledge proofs” is a cryptographic proof allowing one party (the prover) to convince another party (the verifier) that a statement is true without revealing additional information.

Filecoin zk-SNARK

Filecoin employs zk-SNARK (Zero-Knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Argument of Knowledge) proofs, including time and space proofs (PoST and PoREP), to validate storage on its decentralized network. Specifically, Filecoin miners generate zk-SNARK proofs in the Commit 2 (C2) phase during the crucial sector sealing process.

Key Points about C2

C2 involves creating a zk-SNARK proof to validate the miner’s commitment to store sector data.
It is a GPU-intensive computation, requiring significant compute resources (peak memory of 275GiB for 32GiB sectors).

Interplay between Filecoin and Swan’s zk-UBI

Filecoin’s sealing process relies on the generation of computation-intensive zk-SNARK proofs to validate distributed storage commitments.Integrating such substantial workloads into Swan’s zk-UBI mechanism fosters a profound collaboration between the storage network and computing networks:

Filecoin storage providers(SPs) can efficiently outsource GPU-intensive zk computation tasks to Swan’s Computing Providers (CPs), reducing their own network resource consumption.
Swan CPs can earn rewards by contributing computing resources to generate verifiable proofs.
Swan benchmarks CP capabilities by monitoring proof generation times.

This interplay strengthens both networks and contributes to the growth of the Web3 ecosystem.

Key Component: zk-UBI Task Pool

Swan’s zk-UBI mechanism integrates various zk proof computations over time, such as Filecoin commit2, Aleo, StarkNet, Scroll, etc.

The zk-UBI Task Pool serves as a centralized hub for various zk workloads for CPs:

Storage Providers can contribute their zk-proof work to enrich the pool of tasks
Computing Providers can receive tasks from zk-UBI task pool
CPs generate proofs recorded on Swan Chain, allowing Storage providers to directly access the proofs they need.

By deeply integrating Filecoin’s intensive workloads and establishing an open task pool, Swan’s zk-UBI brings about mutually reinforcing network collaborations.

The Power of zk-UBI

Swan’s breakthrough zk-UBI system brings unique strengths powering the growth of decentralized infrastructure:

Specialized Network Interoperability — zk-UBI facilitates deep Collaboration between storage, computing and other specialized networks by aligning their incentives around intensive crypto workloads.

Community-Shared Value — Its ethos captures the vision of open access and shared value creation for collective benefit rather than siloed rewards.

Accelerated Innovation — By incentivizing integration of bleeding-edge crypto proofs like zk-SNARKs, zk-UBI unlocks new product possibilities.

How to Join

For Storage Providers interested in contributing tasks to this pool, please refer to this page: Contribute to zk-UBI Task

For Computing Providers, you can visit the following tutorial for deployment and to receive zk-UBI tasks: Computing Provider Setup

If you have an independent zero-knowledge proof system that requires robust computational support from the Swan Network, you can directly apply for our DevGrant here.

Swan Chain is currently hosting Swan Chain Saturn Testnet campaign, offering a significant SWAN giveaway. Join the campaign to experience the zk-UBI program and the chance to earn up to 150,000 SWAN here.

Conclusion

All programs will be announced in each phase, so stay tuned for more details. We’re thrilled about the Swan Chain Saturn Testnet and invite you to join us on this revolutionary journey!