After a nearly four-year wait since the initial proposal, Ethereum (ETH) developers are gearing up to include EIP-3074 in Ethereum's update, codenamed Pectra, scheduled for release later this year.
EIP-3074 promises numerous user experience improvements on traditional wallets by enabling the delegation of certain functions to smart contracts. In this way, according to the statements, it opens the way for capabilities such as mass approval of transactions, gas payment in various ERC20 altcoins, advanced security, account recovery and more. However, the upgrade removes full account abstraction as the authorized wallet cannot initiate transactions.
“All things considered, the teams were in agreement to move forward with EIP. 3074 will be included in Pectra,” said Tim Beiko, Ethereum Foundation protocol support lead.
However, developers have also expressed concern that EIP-3074 introduces a new vulnerability: a single malicious transaction can empty a user's entire wallet via a mass transaction. Although this possibility seems scary, some experts have given users reassuring information that well-designed wallets can reduce this risk.
Dan Finlay, co-founder of MetaMask, said in an article:
“I have not heard of a consumer wallet today that is vulnerable to this risk. All a wallet needs to do to eliminate this risk is to not allow blind signing of opaque hashes and also not allow signing with this reserved prefix.”
According to Beiko, Ethereum's Pectra update is expected to be ready in late 2024 or early 2025.
*This is not investment advice.