Bytecoin is the first cryptocurrency created with CryptoNote technology. Bytecoin allows users to make absolutely anonymous money transfers through the CryptoNote algorithm. CryptoNote uses CryptoNote ring signatures to provide anonymous transactions and allows you to sign a message on behalf of a group. The signature only proves the message was created by someone from the group, but all the possible signers are indistinguishable from each other. Even if outgoing transactions are untraceable, everyone may still be able to see the payments received and thus determine one's income. By using a variation of the Diffie-Hellman exchange protocol, a receiver has multiple unique one-time addresses derived from his single public key. After funds are sent to these addresses they can only be redeemed by the receiver; and it would be impossible to cross-link these payments. As a primarily peer-to-peer (p2p) payment system, Bytecoin has many of the same use-cases as Bitcoin. Created in 2012, Bytecoin is one of the earliest developed cryptocurrencies. Until recently, the team behind the coin has kept themselves anonymous. Now, though, they’ve opened up multiple communication channels, removed some layers of anonymity, and even built several local communities. Bitcoin’s PoW consensus algorithm heavily favors miners that use powerful GPU and ASIC machines over those trying to mine with CPUs. This causes the network to centralize around the more powerful miners. Bytecoin attempts to close the gap between these two classes of miners with a new algorithm, Egalitarian Proof-of-Work (PoW). Egalitarian PoW uses a version of skrypt, a proof of work function similar to the hashcash function used by Bitcoin. The difference between the two is that scrypt isn’t memory bound. Because of this, you can produce highly efficient CPU mining rigs. GPUs will always be about 10 times more effective, though. The Bytecoin project has been fairly fractured since its inception in July 2012. Previously, several isolated teams worked on the project without seemingly communicating with each other. This led to numerous forks and versions of the coin. In July 2017, the team decided to change their image and provide more transparency to the community. The team still remains pseudo-anonymous by only providing names and headshots on their webpage – no bios or social media links. But, it’s tough to expect more from a project that’s focused on privacy. The team has been busy at work refactoring their code and are planning to release a new public API on February 6, 2018. They’ll also be entering the Asian, Middle East, and African markets throughout 2018.
Zebi is a young and innovative organization founded, mentored and managed by Oxford, MIT, Stanford, and IIT veterans and thought leaders from Silicon Valley with experience in Google, Uber, Amazon, Microsoft, and Oracle. Zebi specializes in providing Blockchain based offerings to governments and enterprises to leverage and protect their high value and sensitive data. India’s big data generation is increasing exponentially and is expected to reach 3 Zebibytes per year (Zebibyte = 1024^7 bytes) by 2020, driven by continued growth of internet usage, social networks, proliferation of smartphones, as well as the digital initiatives and structural reforms undertaken by the government. At the same time, incidents of data crimes such as data hacks, data leaks, data tampering, identity thefts are on the rise, which are costing Indian organizations and consumers more than $30 billion annually. Zebi specializes in providing blockchain based solutions to governments and enterprises to leverage and protect their high value and sensitive data. Zebi is one of the few enterprise grade product companies based in India offering best of the expertise of Silicon Valley at Indian prices Recognizing the need and opportunity to enable with technology the enforcement of data protection regulations, Zebi has created a Blockchain driven, unique and holistic solution to make high value and sensitive data readily available for legitimate use. Zebi safeguards data against hacking and tampering, while obtaining consent from individuals. The solution comprises of Zebi Chain™ to provide immutability to critical records, coupled with a central hub called Zebi Data Gateway which enables secure and instant data exchange through Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) APIs. Zebi’s innovative, proprietary solution set is one of the first in industry and is patent pending.