Introducing: The Inco Gentry Testnet

Today, we're thrilled to unveil the release of the Gentry testnet enabling universal confidential computing. This marks an important milestone as we build towards the universal confidentiality layer of Web3, powered by Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) and secured by Ethereum (EigenLayer).

Until 2009, there existed partial homomorphic schemes, which enabled only a limited number of operations. But in 2009, Craig Gentry came up with the first Fully Homomorphic Scheme (unlimited operations for both addition and multiplication (and others)) during his PhD. Gentry’s work was defined by two major breakthroughs:

• First, he gave a scheme that is homomorphic with respect to arithmetic circuits (involving not just addition but also multiplications) of logarithmic depth.

• Second, he showed the “bootstrapping theorem” that if a scheme is homomorphic enough to evaluate its own decryption circuit, then it can be turned into a fully homomorphic encryption that can evaluate any function.

Since then, there have been many advancements that have led to making FHE practically viable for programmable on-chain confidentiality. We have named our testnet after Craig Gentry to honor the man who enabled homomorphic encryption in it’s modern form.

The Gentry testnet supports the following capabilities:

• Faucet: A service that allows you to claim free INCO testnet tokens for testing purposes.

• Block Explorer: A tool that allows you to view and analyze transactions, blocks, and smart contracts on Gentry testnet.

• Developer Tools: A suite of tools that enables you to deploy and interact with smart contracts and dApps on Gentry testnet. Check out for remix fork or hardhat template to get started.

• Bridging: Connects Gentry Testnet to other blockchains, allowing for cross-chain asset transfers and interoperability. Learn more about it here.

Additionally, there are many innovative dApps on Gentry Testnet for you to explore on our demo app arcade such as confidential ERC20 transfers, hidden random card generator, on-chain 2-factor authentication, confidential DID, and confidential credit scoring among others.

How To Get Started:

You can use our developer tools to deploy your own solidity smart contracts & dApps on Inco using our Remix fork or HardHat template. Check out our documentation to learn more: https://docs.inco.org/

What’s Next?

Inco Paillier Testnet 2.0:

• We will be announcing our incentivized testnet in the coming months, Paillier testnet 2.0.

• Pascal Paillier is a researcher and entrepreneur in cryptography and the CTO at Zama. He has spent the past 25 years inventing new cryptographic techniques for critical industries. With over 60 academic papers and more than 12,000 citations, Pascal is a leading figure in homomorphic encryption.

• We are privileged to have collaborated closely with Pascal and Zama over the last few months to bring FHE to the forefront of Web3 Ecosystem. We're naming our testnet 2.0 the Pallier Testnet to honor their contributions.

Inco Advocate Program:

• We will be officially launching our advocate program for community members interested in community engagement, event hosting, product feedback, content creation, design, and translation.

Inco Builders Program:

• We will be introducing our first cohort of the builder's program, where we will work closely with a select group of builders interested in programmable confidentiality use cases across gaming, DeFi, governance, and identity. We will provide them with resources such as technical, business development, and marketing support to help them go from 0 to 1. Find some novel ideas that leverage FHE here.

Lastly, we’d like to emphasize that Gentry Testnet is not an incentivized testnet and is developed for builders to start exploring FHE on-chain.

Inco will unlock a new realm of possibilities within web3. We welcome you to join us on our journey to empower the next wave of innovative applications. We are always eager to meet folks interested in exploring deeper into this space. Feel free to DM us on Twitter, Discord, or Telegram.

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