Security State 2022: Near Ecosystem

Demyd Korotkykh
Security analyst at HackenProof
2 Minutes Read

Researching security of NEAR projects

The goal of the research was to learn how much the NEAR ecosystem is secured. To calculate this, we’ve agreed on 2 factors that determine the security:

  • code audits
  • bug bounties

The first thing off was listing all NEAR projects. When we were categorizing these projects, we noticed that a lot of them are associated with the blockchain rather than used to connect with the blockchain. That is why we’ve filtered out third-party projects that do not connect directly with NEAR.

In the end, we’ve got 515 projects:

  • 319 dApp
  • 157 Infrastructure
  • 39 Wallets

We’ve then counted how many NEAR projects are protected by either of the approaches.

NEAR Security Infographics

Research Insights

  • The Near blockchain looks less secure, with only a quarter of projects having audits or bug bounties. But when considering such a large ecosystem, it is necessary to look more broadly. Many NEAR projects use out-of-the-box solutions – all blockchain operations are automated.
  • Out-of-the-box solutions lower the entry threshold — it is easier to implement a project. Because of this, Near is the choice of artists, and the percentage of GameFi and NFT projects on this blockchain is close to 30% of all projects.
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