Frequently Asked Questions
Table of Contents
- What is Pluto?
- What are Web Proofs?
- What applications can be built using Web Proofs?
- What are the trust assumptions that the Pluto SDK introduces?
- Who is building Pluto?
- Why are you building this?
- How does Pluto work?
- What other products will you be building?
- How can I get in contact with you?
What is Pluto?
Pluto is on a mission to solve the challenges of today’s blockchain applications using applied cryptography.
The first tools we are launching are being used by developers to incorporate Web Proofs into their applications.
What are Web Proofs?
Web Proofs are a type of zero-knowledge proof that prove information about Web2 data sources.
Web2 data — like data that comes from Uber, Amazon, financial institutions, attested sensors, e-mails, Spotify, or any other internet server — can be brought onchain using Web Proofs, and application developers can use this data to build new kinds of applications onchain.
Web Proofs expand the design space of interesting applications that can be built in Web3.
What applications can be built using Web Proofs?
Any application that would benefit from bringing Web2 data onchain can use Web Proofs to make a richer application experience for their users. Web Proofs can help applications bootstrap user identity and reputation on their own application using ‘borrowed’ data from Web2, and Web Proofs can enable more robust peer-to-peer interactions onchain.
Some specific examples of Web Proofs-enabled applications are:
- Onchain marketplaces with bootstrapped identity and reputation (think ‘onchain Craigslist’, but with proofs of reputation, or proofs of prior positive interactions)
- Sybil-resistance products, like reputation products built off of previously-silo’d Web2 data
- Social applications that require users to share a commonality, like being employees at a certain company, or mutual purchasers of a certain product online
- More expressive oracles, like weather oracles, sports scores oracles, and stock market pricing oracles
- Gray markets, like video game marketplaces and secondary ticketing marketplaces
What are the trust assumptions that the Pluto SDK introduces?
Please refer to the Trust Assumptions page in our documentation for a detailed list of trust assumptions that the first versions of the Pluto SDK will rely on. We want to be clear that our number one objective is to create useful infrastructure for developers, and we believe that credibly-neutral and censorship-resistant infrastructure is an absolute necessity for onchain application developers. We share our trust assumptions publicly in an attempt to demonstrate intellectual honesty and commitment to the shared values of this industry.
Who is building Pluto?
Pluto is built by a small team of engineers and operators from places like Stripe, Aztec, Y Combinator, Hubspot, and Uber. You can see more about our team on the About page.
We’ve built products in crypto for the past several years, and we understand the pain points developers face when building applications that use advanced applied cryptography. We spent years getting (and staying) up-to-speed with the latest developments in the space. Now, we’re building a company to help application developers build the next generation of useful, onchain applications.
We’re backed by some of the most thoughtful, experienced investors in crypto, including Geometry, Nascent, Variant, Figment Capital, and Robot Ventures.
Why are you building this?
Our passion to solve these problems stems from our shared experiences in building the internet as it currently exists. We have played a role in building the current system, and we desire for better. We believe the current internet is broken, and developers hold the key to the future.
We are the every-developer. We are building cryptographic tools to place in the hands of developers, so that we may together construct the technology to build a better internet.
You can read more about our company mission in our Introducing Pluto blog post.
How does Pluto work?
Pluto is a zero-knowledge implementation of TLSNotary.
To read more about how Pluto works, check out this technical blog post.
What other products will you be building?
There are several directions within applied cryptography that we will be pursuing, including additional tooling for zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP), tooling for multi-party computation (MPC), tooling for fully homomorphic encryption (FHE), and tooling for witness encryption (WE).
We will continue to build products that abstract away difficult-to-grasp applied cryptography into useful tooling for application developers.
How can I get in contact with you?
Sign up for SDK early access on this form. We’re offering product/design support to serious partners.
Join our community Telegram group here.
You can also DM us on Twitter @plutolabs_.