Hydro enables new and existing private systems to seamlessly integrate and leverage the immutable & transparent dynamics of a public blockchain to enhance application and document security, identity management, transactions, and artificial intelligence. Hydro enables developers to seamlessly deploy blockchain in their existing applications, without the need to create expensive infrastructure. If you are building a fintech app in investing, savings, or insurance, Hydrogen is already leveraging the Hydro blockchain technology. Through the Hydrogen API, you can build a blockchain application without being a blockchain developer. The proposed technology is called “Raindrop” - a transaction performed through a smart contract that validates private system access publicly, and can complement existing private authentication methods. The technology is intended to provide additional security for sensitive financial data that is increasingly at risk from hacking and breaches. Initial implementation of the Hydro Raindrop is performed on the Hydrogen API Platform. This modular set of APIs is available to enterprises and developers globally to prototype, build, test, and deploy sophisticated financial technology platforms and products. The Hydro Raindrop will be made available to the world developer community as open source software, to allow developers to integrate the Hydro Raindrop with any REST API.
The Cosmos network consists of many independent, parallel blockchains, called zones, each powered by classical Byzantine fault-tolerant (BFT) consensus protocols like Tendermint (already used by platforms like ErisDB). Some zones act as hubs with respect to other zones, allowing many zones to interoperate through a shared hub. The architecture is a more general application of the Bitcoin sidechains concept, using classic BFT and Proof-of-Stake algorithms, instead of Proof-of-Work.Cosmos can interoperate with multiple other applications and cryptocurrencies, something other blockchains can’t do well. By creating a new zone, you can plug any blockchain system into the Cosmos hub and pass tokens back and forth between those zones, without the need for an intermediary. While the Cosmos Hub is a multi-asset distributed ledger, there is a special native token called the atom. Atoms have three use cases: as a spam-prevention mechanism, as staking tokens, and as a voting mechanism in governance. As a spam prevention mechanism, Atoms are used to pay fees. The fee may be proportional to the amount of computation required by the transaction, similar to Ethereum’s concept of “gas”. Fee distribution is done in-protocol and a protocol specification is described here. As staking tokens, Atoms can be “bonded” in order to earn block rewards. The economic security of the Cosmos Hub is a function of the amount of Atoms staked. The more Atoms that are collateralized, the more “skin” there is at stake and the higher the cost of attacking the network. Thus, the more Atoms there are bonded, the greater the economic security of the network. Atom holders may govern the Cosmos Hub by voting on proposals with their staked Atoms.