Smart contracts are self-executing contracts that run on blockchain networks, allowing for the creation of decentralized applications and services. They’re immutable, transparent, and automate the execution of agreements. While they offer many benefits, they’re not immune to security vulnerabilities.
Smart contracts are only as secure as the code written to implement them. To help mitigate risks, developers use various security tools to ensure their smart contracts are free from vulnerabilities. In this article, we’ll discuss the top 10 smart contract security tools that can help safeguard smart contracts.
What are smart contracts?
Smart contracts are contracts that are written in code and saved on the blockchain. They are used to automate agreements between the parties involved without relying on any intermediaries. As a result, all parties can immediately verify that the agreement has been reached. Smart contracts can also be programmed to trigger a workflow automatically when certain events occur.
A smart contract can automate the approval of fund transfer from a client to a freelancer without involving a bank, thus saving time and cost compared to traditional contract execution. Another example is decentralized arbitration through smart contracts, which is a method of settling disagreements between parties without involving traditional legal systems or centralized arbitration entities.
If there is a disagreement, the smart contract will gather evidence and arguments from both sides. Then, the smart contract will automatically conduct the arbitration process using a pre-agreed list of arbitrators selected by both parties or a decentralized network of arbitrators. The smart contract would execute the decision automatically after it is made, which could involve transferring funds to the winning party or releasing the product or service to the appropriate party.
Solidity is a popular programming language for developing Ethereum smart contracts. It is Turing-complete, which implies that the network’s code already incorporates the limitations and rules of the smart contracts. This ensures that no bad actor can modify the rules of the smart contract, thus reducing the chances of scams or hidden contract changes.
What are some security challenges of Solidity smart contracts?
Solidity contracts are different from traditional programming languages because they transfer large amounts of value as a core trait. This exposes them to high-risk attacks by attackers who aim to drain funds from these unchangeable entities.
Prior to launching smart contracts to the mainnet, it is strongly advised that developers perform an audit themselves or hire an auditing agency. That is because fixing security vulnerabilities retroactively once the smart contract has been published is very difficult.
Let’s look at some common security challenges of smart contracts.
Reentrancy Attacks
Imagine if you were in line to withdraw money from an ATM and someone cut in front of you each time you were about to get your money, continuously taking out money before your turn ever comes. This is essentially what a reentrancy attack does.
This happens due to two features of Solidity smart contracts.
- In Solidity, smart contracts execute one line at a time, meaning that they wait for each line to finish before moving on to the next one.
- Smart contracts have the ability to communicate with external contracts that may not always be trusted trusted and wait for their response before proceeding.
For example, if a smart contract A calls an external untrusted smart contract B, it is possible for B to contain malicious code that makes a recursive call back to A. This would generate an infinite loop. If the original transaction involved movement of funds from A to B, this loop will drain the smart contract A of all its funds.
Frontrunning
Frontrunning is a type of attack where someone takes advantage of their knowledge of a pending transaction to act before it is executed. In the context of smart contracts, this could mean that an attacker observes a transaction waiting to be processed and quickly submits their own transaction with a higher gas price (essentially paying more for faster processing). This way, the attacker’s transaction is processed before the original one, potentially manipulating the outcome. Imagine you’re bidding on an item in an online auction, and just before the auction ends, someone swoops in and outbids you by only a tiny margin. That’s similar to what frontrunning is in the world of smart contracts.
Integer Overflow & Underflow
In the context of smart contracts, integer overflow and underflow are vulnerabilities that can occur when numbers become too large or too small for the computer system to handle. When this happens, the numbers “wrap around,” resulting in unintended consequences. To prevent it, ensure that you are utilizing Solidity compiler version 0.8, which has built-in checks for overflows and underflows.
Our list of theTop Smart Contract Security Tools
Cyberscan
Cyberscope offers the Cyberscan Contract Address scan tool, which is highly useful for investors who want to make informed decisions. The tool focuses on analyzing smart contracts to ensure their security, which is especially important for new ventures that investors are often interested in.
With Cyberscan, you can access all the necessary metrics in one place, which saves you the trouble of doing multiple checks and searches across different sources.
To use the program, copy and paste the contract address into the designated field, select your network from the dropdown menu, and click the search button. The program will generate a detailed report from the smart contract analysis, including information about contract ownership, proxies, and any Audit or KYC attachments. It will also assess how closely the code matches established forks.
Similarityscan
This software tool can be used to compare a smart contract with a database of common smart contracts and determine the level of similarity. It is especially helpful for investors who want to verify if the project they invested in is original or copied.
The Similarityscan process typically involves comparing two source codes to find similarities by searching for shared characters or phrases. It is important to remember that thoroughly inspecting a smart contract is crucial for ensuring its security and reliability, even if it closely resembles a reliable implementation.
MythX
MythX is a platform that uses advanced symbolic analysis techniques to detect flaws in Ethereum smart contracts. It offers a cloud-based service with various security analysis tools, including manual review by security experts. By using MythX before deployment, developers can identify and fix vulnerabilities in their smart contract code, reducing the risk of potential errors in the Ethereum network.
MythX offers different pricing options, including a free tier suitable for freelance developers and small projects. For larger enterprises requiring more advanced security measures and support, there are enterprise plans available. The Ethereum development community highly values MythX, which is known for being one of the most comprehensive and innovative smart contract development security analysis tools.
Echidna
The Echidna is a tool for securing smart contracts that can be easily integrated into development processes with plugins for programming environments like Remix and Truffle. It’s a flexible choice because it supports Solidity, Vyper, and Bamboo, and can be used for various blockchain systems.
Echidna is a tool that can thoroughly test smart contracts using the fuzzing method. By generating random inputs, it can discover edge cases that traditional testing methods may overlook. Developers can use Echidna to establish their smart contract requirements, and the tool will then identify inputs that meet those criteria. This approach, known as “property-based testing,” is valuable in guaranteeing the accuracy and safety of smart contracts.
Truffle Security
The Truffle Security toolkit is designed to help developers identify, fix, and avoid security vulnerabilities in their smart contracts. It is built on top of the Truffle framework, which is a popular Ethereum development platform that simplifies the creation, testing, and deployment of smart contracts.
The main features of Truffle security include:
- Integration with MythX: Truffle Security collaborates with MythX, a security analysis platform that uses advanced symbolic analysis techniques to detect potential vulnerabilities in smart contracts.
- Automated scanning: Truffle Security offers an automated security check for smart contracts during development, which helps developers detect potential issues in the early stages of the development process.
- Continuous monitoring: Truffle Security offers a service to scan smart contracts for security vulnerabilities on an ongoing basis. This helps developers detect and fix such issues before any potential exploitation occurs.
- Database of vulnerabilities: Truffle Security updates its database of smart contract security flaws continuously as new vulnerabilities are discovered.
Safescan
Privacy has become a growing concern in the world of cryptocurrency anonymous team projects. However, this has led to risky behavior by people who hide behind anonymity. To tackle this issue, Cyberscope provides a solution that prioritizes transparency, accountability, and trust through a careful vetting process that holds project teams responsible. It is user-friendly software that performs background checks and analyzes all transactions linked to a given address. The resulting report provides relevant information to comprehend wallet histories, including risk warnings associated with specific transactions.
Signaturescan
This tool is specifically designed for the Ethereum blockchain and utilizes proprietary codes that have undergone security audits.
One of the key benefits of Signaturescan is its extensive database, which includes a wide range of patterns, vulnerabilities, and source code hacks. This comprehensive database is constantly updated to ensure users are protected against the latest security threats.
Signaturescan has powerful features that allow users to quickly detect any suspicious activity and take necessary actions to prevent any potential risks. Those who are responsible for maintaining the security and integrity of their blockchain-based applications, such as developers, blockchain analysts, and security experts, can benefit greatly from using this tool.
Slither
Slither is a tool that helps developers identify security weaknesses in their Solidity smart contracts. It is capable of identifying a variety of security issues such as reentrancy, uninitialized storage pointers, integer overflows, and underflows. Slither provides detailed reports on detected errors and suggestions for fixing them. Slither’s bytecode analysis can also reveal smart contract flaws that are not apparent from the source code alone. It supports inheritance structures and is compatible with Solidity versions up to 0.8.x.
ZeppelinOS
ZeppelinOS is a platform on the Ethereum blockchain that helps developers create, implement, and manage smart contracts. It simplifies the development process and provides tools and features aimed at reducing errors and vulnerabilities to simplify the development of smart contracts, and improve their security. The platform also enables developers to create smart contracts that are easy to upgrade.
The key features of Zeppelin include the following:
- OpenZeppelin: This is a set of reliable and secure building blocks for smart contracts, which can be used to develop customized smart contracts.
- ZeppelinOS SDK: The kit includes tools for creating, testing, and implementing smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain and is aimed at developers.
- ZeppelinOS Registry: It is a decentralized registry for smart contracts, which helps developers easily find pre-existing contracts that are secure and up-to-date, allowing for their reuse.
- ZeppelinOS Dashboard: It is a web interface that provides programmers with multiple options to manage their smart contracts, which includes monitoring activities and updating them whenever required.
Manticore
Manticore is a tool that is open-source and used for examining and testing smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain. Its purpose is to help developers and security auditors identify any flaws in their smart contracts before they are deployed on the blockchain. The tool is used for binary analysis and smart contract security.
It utilizes symbolic execution to fully navigate each path within a smart contract and generate test cases for validating contract behavior. One can also inspect a smart contract’s bytecode to identify potential security vulnerabilities or disassemble the contract to uncover its underlying mechanisms.
This tool supports programming languages such as Solidity, Vyper, and Bamboo. It can also be used together with other smart contract creation and testing tools such as Truffle and Mythril. This makes it a valuable tool for developers and security auditors who want to ensure the safety and security of their smart contracts.
Conclusion
Smart contract security is crucial for the successful adoption of decentralized technologies. Security breaches can lead to the loss of millions of dollars in cryptocurrencies and destroy investor trust in the technology. However, by using the top 10 smart contract security tools, developers can ensure that their smart contracts are secure and that the risks of vulnerabilities are significantly reduced. It’s important to keep in mind that security is an ongoing process, and developers need to stay up-to-date with the latest vulnerabilities and tools to protect their smart contracts.
