Enigma Price (ENG)

The developers of Enigma understand that data is never safe until humans have access to it. Just remember numerous hackers’ attacks spoiling the reputation of huge corporations such as LinkedIn hack in 2012, Ashley Madison data breach in 2015, Equifax cybersecurity incident in 2017, and Yahoo! data breaches in 2013, 2014. The companies store end users’ data, but responsibilities for protecting it have been placed on individuals. However, people are ill-equipped for the tasks of this kind. Enigma steps forward to do that for them using its unique model based on a highly optimized version of secure multi-party computation, and a modified distributed hashtable for holding secret-shared data.

Another goal pursued is to get rid of the negative effects of centralization thus making governance more efficient. Currently, much data is controlled by huge corporations. The lack of transparency leads to disastrous data breaches, surveillance, and manipulations. Blockchain and decentralized architecture bring a new system to society. No party receives absolute power and control as the system has public nature that guarantees transparency giving strong incentives to remain honest. With Enigma, users are more willing to share their data in a secure environment enabling protocol that works by encrypting smart contract data and sending it to the nodes, where computations are performed. The data is distributed between multiple nodes, which have access to a piece of encrypted data making it secure.

Enigma technology

The computational model of the platform includes secure multi-party computational processes fulfilled by different nodes of the network. A modified distributed hash-table is used to store data, while the external network controls the operations and manages access control, identities, serving as a tamper prooflog of events. Security deposits are needed for the correct work of the system. Just like in the Bitcoin system, there is no need for a third party. The personal data is controlled in an autonomous manner. Data sharing is entirely private which is guaranteed by cryptography. Every time a user requests a computation from the Enigma network, a fee is required.

With Enigma, the data is encrypted before it is shared with the third party. It’s used in computations without being decrypted allowing untrusted computers to run computations on sensitive data without risk of hackers’ intrusion as the actual data is never revealed. This helps to resolve the problem of data security which is rather acute nowadays as users often share sensitive information via centralized cloud services.

Enigma mimics the features of Bitcoin’s decentralized networking architecture. The data is encrypted after being split up into pieces and then distributed randomly to numerous computers within the network which are called “nodes”. The nodes perform computation in the same way that computers do. The metadata helps to identify the data that is stored in the bitcoin blockchain.

Enigma team was the first to prove that it’s possible to use and maintain data without holding it. Also, the team launched the project Catalyst a platform that enables anyone to start their own crypto hedge fund and make cross-chain transfers without applying to a third party. Catalyst provides a marketplace for the exchange of data and tokens to alleviate trading.

Enigma’s ICO

Enigma conducted the initial coin offering on September 11, 2017, having raised 45 million US dollars. The fixed supply of 150 million ENG tokens is distributed in the following way: 75 million tokens are distributed via a token sale (including pre-sale for the key investors), 37.5 million tokens are allocated for community incentives (data licensing, trading competitions and so on), 37.5 million tokens are retained by the Enigma team. The team planned to burn the unsold tokens but the hard cap was attained within a few hours. The Enigma community includes now tens of thousands of supporters.

It’s possible to buy ENG tokens on such reputable platforms as Binance, Bittrex, and Huobi. Since ENG is still an ERC-20 token, it can be stored on MyEtherWallet, Metamask, and any other ERC-20 wallet. ENG is paired with ERC-20 tokens as long as the testnet functions. The team doesn’t specify the date when the mainnet will be launched as it leads to speculation cycles.

Enigma’s team and partners

Guy Zyskind and Oz Nathan are the key personas standing behind the platform. Both have graduated from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). The system was developed under the advisement of MIT Professor and data scientist Alex “Sandy” Pentland.

Guy Zyskind became the co-founder and CEO of Enigma. He is a pioneer in blockchain education and a software developer. He also was a teacher in the first-ever conducted blockchain class at MIT. Many of the other team members are also MIT graduates. Another key figure in the company is the co-founder and CPO of Enigma Can Kisagun, the former founder of the company Eximchain. Prior to launching the new project, he also worked at such an industry giant as McKinsey & Company.

The Director of Engineering is Victor Grau Serrat, former co-director of the Development Lab at MIT with huge experience in software development. Tor Bair holds the position of the Head of Growth and Marketing at Enigma. He was a data scientist at Snapchat and Spotify, and also worked as a derivatives trader.

As for the key partners, Enigma has managed to set up a prospective collaboration with a few other prominent projects in the blockchain industry such as KyberNetwork (KNC) and EtherDelta.