XRPL Smart Contract Hooks Passed Third-Party Security Audit

The global XRP Ledger community inches closer, yet again, to an amazing milestone in the protocol’s tech development. XRPL “Hooks,” the most anticipated upgrade to XRP Ledger technology since its launch, has been successfully audited.

XRP Ledger is now one step closer to smart contracts, security audit passed

According to the official announcement shared by XRPL Labs, the “Hooks” amendment that is designed to make XRP Ledger fully programmable has successfully passed a security audit. The codebase of the protocol update was audited by U.S.-based cybersecurity innovator FYEO.

The Hooks Amendment has passed its comprehensive security audit by @goFYEO, marking a significant milestone in our journey towards integrating Hooks into #XRPL.

Read about Hooks passing the audit here: https://t.co/BxfcINMG3l

— XRPL Labs (@XRPLLabs) June 5, 2023

FYEO leverages artificial intelligence (AI) instruments to ensure stringent third-party stress testing of blockchain software. The audit covered all elements of a potential upgrade, including the Hook API, helper functions and execution environment.

The team of XRPL Labs stated that it is satisfied with the results of a third-party security audit and will take all of the recommendations by auditors onboard:

The feedback from FYEO was exceptionally positive. During their audit, they found no serious or severe security issues. Several minor and a few moderate issues were found and were promptly resolved by us.

As covered by U.Today previously, XRPL Hooks are basically smart contracts for XRP Ledger. They will allow developers to write software programs with basic economic logics not unlike they do on major smart contract platforms.

The mainnet release of this functionality is expected to happen in Q3-Q4, 2023.

Why it is better to launch “Hooks” in sidechains: Opinion

Meanwhile, some seasoned XRPL experts are certain that “Hooks” should first be implemented in a sidechain, not in XRP Ledger mainnet.

Scott Chamberlain, a co-founder of the pioneering XRPL L2 Evernode, shared his concerns about the challenges of “Hooks” activation and proposed his own solution:

The Hooks ledger must be a sidechain and have tokenomics that connect it to the mainnet and make it a meaninful addition to the XRP ecosystem, not another Stellar.

As we previously reported, XRPL developer Wo Jake alerted in August 2022 that the blockchain could be “years away” from smart contract activation.

The mechanism is being tested in beta since February 2021.