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    Vitalik Buterin Warns of RPC Risks, Proposes Partially Stateless Ethereum Nodes

    Story Highlights
    • Vitalik Buterin proposes partially stateless nodes to improve Ethereumโ€™s scalability and reduce resource demands.

    • The new node design helps users maintain privacy and avoid reliance on centralized RPC providers.

    • Partially stateless nodes enable selective data storage, supporting censorship-resistant and efficient blockchain access.

    Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has unveiled an ambitious new proposal that promises to turbocharge Ethereumโ€™s scalability and privacy while preserving decentralization.

    ย In a detailed blog post on May 19, Buterin introduced the concept of partially stateless nodes – a breakthrough approach designed to make running Ethereum nodes easier, more efficient, and censorship-resistant.

    Hereโ€™s what you need to know.

    The Hidden Danger of RPC Centralization

    There is a growing risk in the Ethereum ecosystem: the increasing dominance of Remote Procedure Call (RPC) providers. These services allow wallets, users, and decentralized apps to interact with Ethereum without running their own full nodes, but thereโ€™s a catch.

    โ€œA market structure dominated by a few RPC providers will face strong pressure to deplatform or censor users,โ€ Buterin warned.

    Some providers already exclude entire countries, creating a dangerous concentration of power that threatens Ethereumโ€™s foundational principles of openness and trustlessness.

    What Are Partially Stateless Nodes โ€“ And Why They Matter

    Buterinโ€™s solution? Partially stateless nodes – a novel node design that validates blocks โ€œstatelessly.โ€ Unlike traditional full nodes that require storing the entire blockchain history and all Merkle proofs, these nodes selectively keep only relevant data subsets.

    This means users can configure their nodes to store data tied to their own accounts, frequently used decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, and popular tokens like Ether and stablecoins. Queries outside this stored subset either fail or are routed through RPC providers, dramatically reducing storage needs and bandwidth without sacrificing security.

    Balancing Efficiency, Privacy, and Trust

    As Ethereum scales and gas limits rise, running a full node becomes increasingly resource-intensive. Partially stateless nodes aim to ease this burden, enabling more users to run nodes locally and maintain privacy-preserving access to blockchain data.

    Beyond reducing resource demands, this design addresses metadata privacy concerns, helping users avoid exposing their full transaction activity. 

    The approach aligns with ongoing Ethereum Improvement Proposals like EIP-4444, which focuses on decentralized history storage, and reflects Buterinโ€™s broader push to keep Ethereumโ€™s infrastructure robust and user-friendly.

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    FAQs

    What are partially stateless Ethereum nodes?

    Partially stateless nodes validate blocks without storing all blockchain data, keeping only relevant subsets for efficiency and privacy.

    How do partially stateless nodes improve Ethereum’s scalability?

    By lowering storage and bandwidth needs, more users can run nodes, bolstering the network’s overall resilience and accessibility as it scales.

    What are the benefits of partially stateless nodes for users?

    Users gain more control over their data, reduce reliance on potentially censoring RPC providers, and lower the barrier to node operation.

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