Safe wants Ethereum users to create wallets with emails — not seed phrases

Developers have a new way to build social logins into blockchain applications following a partnership between smart contract wallet Safe and Web3Auth.

The tool, SafeAuth, combines Web3Auth’s social login technology with Safe’s Account Abstraction software development kit (SDK) 

Smart accounts were introduced via the ERC-4337 standard, built to improve the general Ethereum user experience through more intuitive and customizable crypto wallets.

SafeAuth enables users to set up smart wallets using an existing email address, removing the need to remember lengthy seed phrases. 

These smart accounts will also be interoperable, meaning that users will be able to link and interact with different blockchain applications through a single smart account. 

The ERC-4337 standard was deployed to Ethereum mainnet in March and data shows adoption has remained relatively slow, with weekly retention of smart wallets that use ERC-4337 dropping to as low as 1% for accounts older than five weeks. 

Lukas Schor, a Safe co-founder, told Blockworks this should not be surprising as adoption often takes longer than people wish. 

“The ERC-4337 standard is still in ‘draft mode’ and occasional changes … are still happening, making it harder for in-production solutions to adopt it,” Schor said. 

Schor said that ERC-4337 also introduced additional smart contract risk, meaning it may take time for larger applications and wallets to opt in.

“Currently, the primary use-case for ERC-4337 is sponsored transactions for ‘free NFT drops’ or similar applications; we are still missing applications to leverage more complex features of accounts abstraction like recovery or sessions keys,” he said.

Read more: Ethereum’s ERC-4337 Account Abstraction Smart Contract is Live

Tobias Schubotz, Safe’s product lead, shared optimism about the future of smart accounts. He said Safe itself has seen a 201% increase in monthly average users, now totaling more than 376,000. 

“This indicates that Safe is being adopted faster than the overall crypto space, suggesting a growing interest and potential for smart accounts in the broader blockchain ecosystem,” Schubotz said.

“At the core of this solution is adaptability, users can choose additional authentication, such as multiple email addresses, as they deem necessary,” he said. “Similar to how one might employ a social login or email for various online platforms, SafeAuth offers a unified access method.”

Schubotz added that developer tooling such as SafeAuth can also assist in increasing the adoption of smart account standards such as ERC-4337. 

“By offering an SDK that enables developers to seamlessly integrate a social login feature into their platform, Safe is further encouraging the adoption of smart accounts,” he said. 

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