For most of 2024, I felt like I was living in the future. Google unveil A quantum computing chip can easily perform calculations that would take a conventional computer longer than the universe has existed. Waymo self-driving vehicles transfer More than 150,000 people weekly. Artificial intelligence models such as AlphaFold continued Accurately uncover complex biological challenges.

Despite the tremendous technological strides made elsewhere, parts of our industry seem to have ground to a halt, especially when it comes to security. While advanced technologies are transforming almost every sector, Web 3 security remains frustratingly underdeveloped.

The shift from the centralized model of web2 to the decentralized architecture of web3 has greatly expanded the attack surface. While decentralization is the backbone of web3 innovation, it has created an inherent security paradox: the same open, distributed nature that gives users freedom also creates an expanded and permanently exposed attack surface. With hundreds of billions of transaction volume annuallyThe risks involved in obtaining the right security have never been higher.

However, despite the exponential growth in the attack surface and the flow of billions across protocols, our industry clings to reactive manual audits as its security foundation. This approach - once viewed as the gold standard of Web 3 security - has proven insufficient and largely outdated. The data confirms this reality; 90% of contracts exploited subject Audits.

Just as web2 software development has evolved beyond manual testing to include a number of tools and technologies — continuous integration, automated testing, and runtime monitoring, to name a few — web3 now requires a similar shift in how we approach development and ultimately deploy it to the masses. .

Unique Web3 challenges

The state of smart contract security practices is particularly alarming when faced with the level of risk of a web3 security breach. There are three main reasons for this:

1. stability: When you deploy a smart contract, its code becomes permanent, and immutability is a key feature, not a bug. This means that, unlike web2 applications, where developers can quickly patch vulnerabilities, fixing smart contract flaws requires complex coordination across the entire protocol.
2. VisionThis challenge is further exacerbated by the public nature of blockchain code, where potential attackers have visibility into the source code. If there are vulnerabilities, bad actors can (and will) find them.
3. Direct control of assets: More importantly, Web3 vulnerabilities put actual assets at immediate risk. While web2 attacks typically target data, smart contract exploits result in direct, often irreversible, financial losses.

What makes web3 revolutionary – its immutability, transparency, and direct control over assets – is exactly what requires us to rethink security from the ground up.

Why do audits alone fail?

Let me be clear: I am not arguing against audits. They play an essential role in deploying secure smart contracts, but they should not be our first and only line of defense. When audits are all we have, users' assets are exposed. Take the Euler Finance hack in 2023 as an example; Losses exceeded $200 million, despite the presence of the protocol subject Ten different audits.

The main problem with relying on manual audits is that even the most advanced auditors cannot understand everything; Humans are prone to error. Smart contracts are becoming increasingly complex, and each new feature exponentially multiplies the potential attack vectors, making it nearly impossible for any manual review to identify all potential vulnerabilities. The fact that a project can undergo ten different audits and still get hacked proves this point – it's not about the skill of the individual auditors but rather the inherent limitations of manual auditing.

Proactive security case

In short, our industry's reliance on audits has created what I believe to be the irresponsible status quo of Web3 security — one in which proactively securing smart contracts is the exception rather than the rule. Realizing that web3 has innovated while leaving security in the past is exactly what led me to start Olympix, the developer-first web3 security platform that enables developers to secure code as they write it, in 2022.

Our goal is to automate as much of the audit process as possible, as we currently detect 20-50% of vulnerabilities before a project reaches the first audit. This allows security experts to focus their time on finding the most impactful, new vulnerabilities rather than routine issues. And it works; An internal analysis showed that in Q3 2024 alone, $60 million in pre-vetted exploited contracts could have been prevented if teams had used our tools. This includes high-profile hacks like Pendle ($6.5 million) and LIFI ($600,000). However, like audits, advanced tools like Olympix are not a complete solution. Web3's unique challenges require a sophisticated, multi-layered approach that combines proactive, development-first tools with traditional audits, bug bounty programs, and on-chain monitoring to create multiple layers of protection.

The way forward: from reactive to proactive

Take a look at your approach to security today. Is it based on one-time audits? Does the sophistication of your security practices match the level of complexity and risk of the project you have deployed? I think that for the vast majority, the security gap is still dangerously wide.

The truth is that in 2025, we will have everything we need to transform web3 security. The technology for secure deployment of smart contracts is here, the tools are there, and Olympix is ​​one of them.

I firmly believe that the future of our industry will be determined by trust, starting with our ability to protect the assets entrusted to us by our peers. Yes, web3 is transformative, but it's also unforgiving. With billions at stake, the strength and longevity of web3 rests on our shoulders. Let us proactively secure our future.