PolySwarm Alpha delivered a minimum viable product (MVP) that implemented an end-to-end Bounty workflow. The chief goal with Alpha was to allow Ambassadors and Experts to test transactions on a PolySwarm test network “testnet”) to provide early feedback and bug reports.

PolySwarm Alpha delivered the following:

• Bounty Manager: a collection of contracts for assessing threat via Bounties

• Artifact posting and retrieval to / from off-PolySwarm storage

  • Bounty Manager: a collection of contracts for assessing threat via Bounties
  • Artifact posting and retrieval to / from off-PolySwarm storage
  • Prototype algorithm for Arbiter selection
  • Reference implementations for Bounty publishing, Assertion response, and Arbiter ground truth determination
• Prototype algorithm for Arbiter selection
• Reference implementations for Bounty publishing, Assertion response, and Arbiter ground truth determination

Resources

PolySwarm Beta focused on delivering PolySwarm Offer support over Raiden-style Channels established directly between Ambassadors and Experts. We allowed channel open, close and settlement to occur on the PolySwarm test network (“testnet”) and sought bug reports and feedback from early testers on this new mechanism.

PolySwarm Beta delivered the following:

• Offer Channels

  • Distributed Channel Establishment
  • Multiple offers via single channel
  • NCT settlement at Channel Close
• Reference implementation for Offer production and response

Resources

PolySwarm Gamma focused on providing matchmaking features that facilitated collaboration between Ambassadors, Experts, and Arbiters. We allowed experts to be able to encapsulate their expertise into Workers tuned to specific types of Artifacts. We allowed Experts to be able to advertise these Workers in a PolySwarm Registry. The Worker Registry now allows Ambassadors to engage with Workers in a risk-free manner prior to the Stable release (Gamma will continue to utilize the PolySwarm testnet).

Additionally, this release enhanced and extended the Bounty instrument in light of Alpha and Beta feedback and experience. As one example, Bounties now benefit from the ability to solicit Assertions that are kept confidential from other Experts and revealed only after the Assertion deadline.

PolySwarm Gamma delivered the following:

• Worker Description Language (WDL) describing artifact analysis capabilities and Expert authorship attribution (for reputation)
• Distributed, searchable, registry of Workers and their capabilities.
• Confidentiality for pre-deadline Bounty Assertions
• Finalized Arbiter selection, response, and end-to-end Bounty feedback loop

Resources

PolySwarm Stable is live with external engines on the PolySwarm operational network, coinciding with the launch of the brand-new PolySwarm web portal: https://polyswarm.network!.

Stable will undergo a staged rollout, ensuring the security of the marketplace as we transition to using real Ethereum (ETH) and PolySwarm Nectar (NCT). This process is underway; additional engines from initial partners are coming online and will soon be moved to Mainnet.

Resources

PolySwarm’s second stable release is a combination of features outlined in our original roadmap as well as the most in-demand features requested by our users. We are grateful to our users for their constructive feedback, which we use to make the marketplace even better!

Visit https://polyswarm.network now to try our Threat Hunting, Metadata Searching, and URL Scanning features. We also have many more microengines.

Resources

PolySwarm’s future releases will mirror the evolving threat landscape and real-world usage of the network. We see several opportunities, contingent on observed PolySwarm usage, for the following features to benefit the network:

• Flexible Artifact Confidentiality

  • Basic: Artifacts selectively disclosed to Experts or SaaS providers
  • Advanced: Artifacts never revealed to anyone outside of SGX enclaves of fully homomorphic engines
• New Instruments (e.g. subscription-ready threat feeds)
• Deployment support for endpoint-resident Worker containers that supplant today’s endpoint protection suites