Vitalik Buterin Tells Crypto Firms to Put Security First for the Next Two Years

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has a blunt message for crypto companies: spend the next two years worrying about staying alive and staying secure. Speaking Thursday, Nov. 5, he said attacks keep exposing weak spots across the industry, and firms need to treat security as the main event rather than a side quest.

The good news, per Buterin: smart-contract vulnerabilities and attacks are on the decline. Most of the major hacks over the past 18 months clustered around user interfaces and centralized components, he said. Core infrastructure is getting sturdier, he added, and the range of infrastructure capable of offering stronger safeguards keeps widening. Attacks, however, haven't stopped.

Looking ahead, Buterin expects big trading platforms, custodians and other financial institutions to push more operations on-chain, where users interact through smart contracts. He pointed to Binance's launch of BNB Chain as a sound call, saying users who operate on-chain can tap into the security of blockchain infrastructure. More institutions, he predicted, will drift that way.

But none of that automatically produces safer businesses. Buterin flagged a practical snag: teams that don't care about security can take efficiency wins from artificial intelligence, bigger headcounts or beefier technical chops and pour them into more aggressive business instead of better safeguards.

If security failures pile up past a certain level, Buterin expects regulators and industry leaders to demand more responsibility and more cautious business practices. Regulation and accountability mechanisms are already bending toward requiring companies to emphasize security, he said, and participants are adjusting to the shift.

The Ethereum Foundation has been shipping code and tools for safer options, including code for quantum-safe signatures and support for wallets protected by quantum-safe tech. Buterin's catch: users have to see the risks and actually switch those protections on.