Mimblewimble

Written by Alex Gedevani

Introduction

MimbleWimble is a blockchain protocol with a different implementation of aProof-of-Work that is designed for increased privacy and better network scalability. The protocol is drawing close attention in the industry as it improves upon some of the issues facing Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

It was named after the Tongue-Tying Curse in Harry Potter because it aims to prevent users from saying too much about their transactions. The MimbleWimble paper was published in 2016 by a pseudonymous contributor. Since then, projects like Grin ($GRIN), Beam ($BEAM), and Litecoin ($LTC) have worked with the design.

In a MimbleWimble blockchain, transaction data is only visible to the respective participants. Outside observers only see a transaction of encrypted inputs and outputs, as the transaction sender, recipient, and amount are hidden. By obfuscating the transaction details, MimbleWimble has increased privacy over Bitcoin, where value transfers are traceable.

Another edge of the protocol is the ability for compressing transaction data, which reduces the blockchain size. MimbleWimble uses a feature called cut-through as a solution to scalability, which minimizes the block data by removing redundant transaction information. As a result, MimbleWimble requires less computational resources.

Suggested Readings

Mimblewimble explained like you’re 12 by Conor O'Higgins

Mimblewimble: The good and the bad by Mohamed Fouda

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