What is Distributed Validator Technology (DVT)?

Distributed Validator Technology (DVT) is an open-source protocol that decentralizes the duties of a validator by allowing a group of network validators to act as one single validator together. This technology is designed to minimize staking risks and lower the financial threshold required to stake on the network significantly, making it more accessible to individuals holding less than 32 ETH in Ethereum Staking.

Related Reading: What is a Node/Validator?

Key Components

DVT consists of three main components:

• Distributed Key Generation: The private validator key is split into parts, each handled by different nodes in the network. This ensures that no single node has total control or knowledge of the private key
• Shamir’s Secret Sharing: The private key is split into multiple pieces, and only a certain number of these pieces can put the original key back together. This setup makes it difficult for an attacker to gain unauthorized access to the key
• Multi-Party Computation: This protocol allows multiple parties to jointly calculate something while keeping their inputs secret. In DVT, MPC helps nodes work together to make signatures without sharing their key pieces

Use Cases

DVT has several use cases:

• Decentralized Staking Pools: DVT can be used by staking pools and liquid staking providers to switch to a decentralized model, reducing penalties and slashing by ensuring minimal downtimes
• Staking Infrastructure Providers: DVT can be used by infrastructure providers to offer more robust services, such as Active-Active cluster redundancies
• Solo Validator Setups: DVT can be used by solo validators to distribute their signing power across multiple nodes, minimizing the risk of failure and penalties due to downtime

Implementation

Several protocols and projects are using or implementing Distributed Validator Technology (DVT):

• Secret Shared Validator Technology (SSV Network): The SSV Network is a leading project that employs DVT for decentralized Ethereum staking. It uses DVT to distribute validator responsibilities across multiple nodes.
• Obol Network: Obol Network is another project that has developed DVT as its core technology to enable decentralized staking on Ethereum.