ERC-6735: L2 Aliasing of EVM-based Addresses

Identify and translate EVM-based addresses from different Layer 1, Layer 2, or Sidechains

Abstract

The document describes the minimal set of business and technical prerequisites, functional and non-functional requirements for Aliasing of EVM based Addresses that when implemented ensures that two or more Layer 1, Layer 2, or Sidechains can identify and translate EVM based addresses from different Layer 1, Layer 2, or Sidechains.

Motivation

The members of the L2 WG of the EEA Communities Project managed by OASIS have recognized that the ability to deterministically derive addresses of a digital asset or an externally owned account (EOA) in EVM based execution frameworks for L1s, L2s, Sidechains based on an origin chain of an asset or EOA, known as address aliasing, simplifies interoperability between EVM based L1s, L2s, and Sidechains because:

• It allows messages from chain A (source chain) to unambiguously address asset A (smart contract) or EOA on chain Y (target chain), if asset A or EOA exists on Chain X and on Chain Y.
• It allows a user to deterministically verify the source chain of a message, and, if required, directly verify the origin chain of asset A or EOA and its state on its origin chain utilizing a canonical token list of the (message) source chain.

The ability to unambiguously, and deterministically, relate an address for a digital asset (smart contract) or an externally owned account (EOA) between EVM based L1s, L2s, and Sidechains where this digital asset or EOA exists, also known as address aliasing, is critical prerequisite for interoperability between EVM based L1s, L2s, and Sidechains. However, there is currently no way to do so in a standardized way – imagine every internet service provider were to define its own IP addresses.

Hence, the L2 WG of the EEA Communities Project managed by OASIS, an open-source initiative, intends for this document to establish an unambiguous and deterministic standard for EVM based address aliasing based on the concept of root → leaf where an address alias is derived based on the address on the origin chain and an offset which is an immutable characteristic of the origin chain.

See Figure 1 for the conceptual root → leaf design with offset.

Figure 1: Root → Leaf address aliasing concept using an chain immanent characteristics from L1 to L2 and L3 and back.

Alternative Figure 1 Description: The figure describes conceptually how (interoperability) messages from source to target chain utilize address aliasing. At the bottom an EVM based L1 is uni-directionally connected to three EVM based L2s – A, B, and C – each with an alias of L1 address + L1 Offset. In addition, A is uni-directionally connected to B with an alias of L1 address + L1 offset + A offset. B is uni-directionally connected to an EVM-based Layer 3 or L3 with an alias of L1 address + L1 offset + B offset signaling that the address is anchored on L1 via the L2 B. And finally D is uni-directionally connected to C via the alias L1 address + L1 offset + B offset plus D offset indicating the asset chain of custody from L1 to B to D to C.

To further clarify the connections between the different possible paths an asset can take from an L1 to different L2/L3s and the relativeAddress of that asset, we visually highlight in red the path from the EVM based L1 to the B L2, to the D L3, and finally to the C L2.

Figure 2: Visually highlighted path in red from the EVM based L1 to the B L2, to the D L3, and finally to the C L2.

Alternative Figure 1 Description: The figure is the same as Figure 1. However, the uni-directional connections between the EVM based L1 to the L2 B, to the L3 D, and finally to the L2 C are highlighted in red.

Note, that address aliasing between non-EVM and EVM-based L1s, L2s, and Sidechains, and between non-EVM-based L1s, L2s, and Sidechains is out of scope of this document.

Specification

Typographical Convention: Requirement Ids

A requirement is uniquely identified by a unique ID composed of its requirement level followed by a requirement number, as per convention [RequirementLevelRequirementNumber]. There are four requirement levels that are coded in requirement ids as per below convention:

[R] - The requirement level for requirements which IDs start with the letter R is to be interpreted as MUST as described in RFC2119.
[D] - The requirement level for requirements which IDs start with the letter D is to be interpreted as SHOULD as described in RFC2119.
[O] - The requirement level for requirements which IDs start with the letter O is to be interpreted as MAY as described in RFC2119.

Note that requirements are uniquely numbered in ascending order within each requirement level.

Example : It should be read that [R1] is an absolute requirement of the specification whereas [D1] is a recommendation and [O1] is truly optional.

The requirements below are only valid for EVM based L1s, L2, or Sidechains. Address aliasing for non-EVM systems is out of scope of this document.

[R1] An address alias – addressAlias – to be used between Chain A and Chain B MUST be constructed as follows: addressAlias (Chain A) = offsetAlias (for Chain A) relativeAddress (on Chain A) offsetAlias (for Chain A)

[R1] testability: addressAlias can be parsed and split using existing open source packages and the result compared to known addressAlias and relativeAddress used in the construction.

[R2] The offsetAlias of a chain MUST be 0xchainId00000000000000000000000000000000chainId

[R2] testability: offsetAlias can be parsed and split using existing open source packages and the result compared to known chainId used in the construction.

[R3] The chainId used in the offsetAlias MUST NOT be zero (0)

[R3] testability: A chainId is a numerical value and can be compared to 0.

[R4] The chainId used in the offsetAlias MUST be 8 bytes.

[R4] testability: The length of the chainId string can be converted to bytes and then compared to 8.

[R5] In case the chainId has less than 16 digits the chainId MUST be padded with zeros to 16 digits.

For example the chainId of Polygon PoS is 137, with the current list of EVM based chainIds to be found at chainlist.org, and its offsetAlias is 0x0000000000000137000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000137.

[R5] testability: chainId can be parsed and split using existing open source packages and the result compared to known chainId used in the construction. Subsequently the number of zeros used in the padding can be computed and compared to the expected number of zeros for the padding.

[R6] The offsetAliasfor Ethereum Mainnet as the primary anchor of EVM based chains MUST be 0x1111000000000000000000000000000000001111 due to current adoption of this offset by existing L2 solutions.

An example of address alias for the USDC asset would be addressAlias = 0x1111A0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB481111

[R6] testability: This requirement is a special case of [R1]. Hence, it is testable.

[R7] The relativeAddress of an Externally Owned Account (EOA) or Smart Contract on a chain MUST either be the smart contract or EOA address of the origin chain or a relativeAddress of an EOA or Smart Contract from another chain.

An example of the former instance would be the relative address of wrapped USDC, relativeAddress = 0x1111A0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB481111, and an example of the latter would be the relative address of wrapped USDC on Polygon, relativeAddress = 0x00000000000001371111A0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB4811110000000000000137.

Finally, an example of an address alias for a message to another L1, L2, or Sidechain for wrapped USDC from Ethereum on Arbitrum would be:

addressAlias = 0x00000000000421611111A0b86991c6218b36c1d19D4a2e9Eb0cE3606eB4811110000000000042161

[R7] testability: Since this document is dealing with EVM-based systems with multiple live implementations, there are multiple known methods of how to verify if an address belongs to an EOA or a smart contract.

[R8] The order of the offsetAliases in an addressAlias MUST be ordered from the offSetAlias of the root chain bracketing the relativeAddress on the root chain through the ordered sequence of offsetAliases of the chains on which the digital asset exists.

For example, a valid addressAlias of an asset on chain A bridged to chain B and subsequently to chain C and that is to be bridged to yet another chain from chain C would be:

addressAlias = chainId(C) chainId(B) chainId(A) relativeAddress chainId(A) chainId(B) chainId(C)

However, the reverse order is invalid:

addressAlias = chainId(A) chainId(B) chainId(C) relativeAddress chainId(C) chainId(B) chainId(A)

[R8] testability: Since [R1] is testable and since [R8] is an order rule for the construction in [R1], which can be tested by applying logic operations on the output of [R1] tests, [R8] is testable.

Note, that a proof that a given order is provably correct is beyond the scope of this document.

Conformance

This section describes the conformance clauses and tests required to achieve an implementation that is provably conformant with the requirements in this document.

Conformance Targets

This document does not yet define a standardized set of test-fixtures with test inputs for all MUST, SHOULD, and MAY requirements with conditional MUST or SHOULD requirements.

A standardized set of test-fixtures with test inputs for all MUST, SHOULD, and MAY requirements with conditional MUST or SHOULD requirements is intended to be published with the next version of the standard.

Conformance Levels

This section specifies the conformance levels of this standard. The conformance levels offer implementers several levels of conformance. These can be used to establish competitive differentiation.

This document defines the conformance levels of EVM based Address Aliasing as follows:

• Level 1: All MUST requirements are fulfilled by a specific implementation as proven by a test report that proves in an easily understandable manner the implementation’s conformance with each requirement based on implementation-specific test-fixtures with implementation-specific test-fixture inputs.
• Level 2: All MUST and SHOULD requirements are fulfilled by a specific implementation as proven by a test report that proves in an easily understandable manner the implementation’s conformance with each requirement based on implementation-specific test-fixtures with implementation-specific test-fixture inputs.
• Level 3: All MUST, SHOULD, and MAY requirements with conditional MUST or SHOULD requirements are fulfilled by a specific implementation as proven by a test report that proves in an easily understandable manner the implementation’s conformance with each requirement based on implementation-specific test-fixtures with implementation-specific test-fixture inputs.

[D1] A claim that a canonical token list implementation conforms to this specification SHOULD describe a testing procedure carried out for each requirement to which conformance is claimed, that justifies the claim with respect to that requirement.

[D1] testability: Since each of the non-conformance-target requirements in this documents is testable, so must be the totality of the requirements in this document. Therefore, conformance tests for all requirements can exist, and can be described as required in [D1].

[R9] A claim that a canonical token list implementation conforms to this specification at Level 2 or higher MUST describe the testing procedure carried out for each requirement at Level 2 or higher, that justifies the claim to that requirement.

[R9] testability: Since each of the non-conformance-target requirements in this documents is testable, so must be the totality of the requirements in this document. Therefore, conformance tests for all requirements can exist, be described, be built and implemented and results can be recorded as required in [R9].

Rationale

The standard follows an already existing approach for address aliasing from Ethereum (L1) to EVM-based L2s such as Arbitrum and Optimism and between L2s, and extends and generalizes it to allow aliasing across any type of EVM-based network irrespective of the network type – L1, L2 or higher layer networks.

Security Considerations

Data Privacy

The standard does not set any requirements for compliance to jurisdiction legislation/regulations. It is the responsibility of the implementer to comply with applicable data privacy laws.

Production Readiness

The standard does not set any requirements for the use of specific applications/tools/libraries etc. The implementer should perform due diligence when selecting specific applications/tools/libraries.

There are security considerations as to the Ethereum-type addresses used in the construction of the relativeAddress.

If the Ethereum-type address used in the relativeAddress is supposed to be an EOA, the target system/recipient should validate that the codehash of the source account is NULL such that no malicious code can be executed surreptitiously in an asset transfer.

If the Ethereum-type address used in the relativeAddress is supposed to be a smart contract account representing an asset, the target system/recipient should validate that the codehash of the source account matches the codehash of the published smart contract solidity code to ensure that the source smart contract behaves as expected.

Lastly, it is recommended that as part of the relativeAddress validation the target system performs an address checksum validation as defined in ERC-55.

Internationalization and Localization

Given the non-language specific features of EVM-based address aliasing, there are no internationalization/localization considerations.

Copyright

Copyright and related rights waived via CC0.

Citation

Please cite this document as:

Kelvin Fichter (@smartcontracts), Andreas Freund (@Therecanbeonlyone1969), "ERC-6735: L2 Aliasing of EVM-based Addresses [DRAFT]," Ethereum Improvement Proposals, no. 6735, March 2022. [Online serial]. Available: https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-6735.