In 2024, we more than doubled our team, protected over $10 billion in blockchain assets through private security audits, and over 200,000 students learned how to develop smart contracts following our courses.
Our mission to create a secure web3 ecosystem drove unprecedented community growth.
So, let’s start by looking at the highlights.
Now, let’s explore the story of innovation behind these numbers.
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The year began with the launch of a completely redesigned website, to better reflect Cyfrin’s evolution and growth. This was quickly followed by the public release of Cyfrin Updraft, our industry-leading blockchain education platform, after a successful three-month beta period that saw:
This enthusiastic response validated our commitment to providing accessible, high-quality blockchain education to developers worldwide.
But this was not all.
Smart contract vulnerabilities can be difficult to detect manually. So, in April, we launched Aderyn to help auditors and developers find potential security issues in their Solidity code before deployment.
Aderyn is an open-sourced Rust-based solidity smart contract static analyzer offering:
With the solid foundations provided by our platforms and tools, it was time to amplify our impact through collaborations.
Our collaboration with Chainlink Labs established Cyfrin as a key security provider for Chainlink the BUILD and SCALE projects. This enabled enhanced access to high-quality public and private smart contract audits for projects within the Chainlink ecosystem. Through this collaboration, we're:
We leveraged the momentum of this huge collaboration and followed up with another.
In May, we partnered with ZKsync, as the main sponsor of Cyfrin Updraft, significantly expanding our support for zero-knowledge-proof technology and Layer 2 scaling solutions. This allowed us to create a comprehensive support system for projects building on ZKsync, combining security expertise with educational resources.
The partnership’s key initiatives include:
Over the summer, we focused on security.
July marked the launch of a completely redesigned CodeHawks, our competitive audit platform. This major update introduced numerous improvements to make the platform more efficient, user-friendly, and effective for auditors and protocols. Key enhancements included:
The platform launch coincided with "Security Audit Summer," which showed our commitment to identifying and addressing critical security challenges in major protocols.
And instead of taking August off for a long holiday, we used it for growth.
In August, the master smart contracts and DeFi development educator @ProgrammerSmart joined Cyfrin. As an expert in both languages, he’s the creator of “Solidity by Example” and “Vyper by Example,” which we acquired when he joined. His Curve V1 Stableswap and Uniswap V2 courses are available on Cyfrin Updraft.
Then, we followed up with a big collaboration.
Cyfrin achieved a major milestone by being selected as a whitelisted security auditor for Arbitrum DAO's $2.5M Subsidy Fund. Through this initiative, we are proud to help projects in the Arbitrum ecosystem access top-tier security services.
And to wrap up the month, we struck another partnership.
Our collaboration with PwC Deutschland is a significant step toward bridging traditional enterprise with blockchain technology. This partnership focuses on:
Then, we followed up with another collaboration, aiming to make blockchain more secure and widely used.
September marked another step toward blockchain's mainstream future through our partnership with Soneium, an innovative Ethereum Layer 2 platform developed by Sony Block Solutions Labs. This collaboration embodies our belief that widespread blockchain adoption requires security built into systems from the start, not added as an afterthought.
Projects building on Soneium receive comprehensive security support through:
But there was more to come in September.
Cyfrin partnered with Optimism’s Superchain to provide top-tier security services for its ecosystem of L2 builders. Through this collaboration, we offer private audits, priority onboarding, accelerated scheduling, and 24-hour support to help secure the Superchain's vision of scalable, decentralized growth.
Superchain focuses on solving scalability and driving mass adoption while we are strengthening protocol security. With our missions aligned, we're making web3 safer and more scalable.
And this leads us to our last major release of the year.
In October, we unveiled Cyfrin Profiles, a unique, personalized Cyfrin account that delivers a harmonized experience across the entire Cyfrin ecosystem. More than just a technical update, this innovative feature:
On top of that, we have been busy developing and releasing the best blockchain development and security courses.
Following the official launch of Updraft in February, we released a total of 9 courses throughout the year:
And true to our mission of making web3 safer, we also delivered a year of excellence in blockchain security.
Private audits remain the most reliable way to enhance security, and we completed 41 in 2024. We helped secure over $10 billion in Total Value Locked (TVL) across multiple blockchain ecosystems and protocols, representing approximately 7% of the entire Decentralized Finance (DeFi) TVL as of this writing. Moreover, we’re proud to be a trusted auditor of leading Tier 1 protocols, including ZKsync, Chainlink, Wormhole, Securitize, Lido, Starknet, and Ethena.
Through these audits, we discovered more than 696 vulnerabilities, including 32 critical, 52 high, 115 medium, 157 low, 197 informational, and 145 gas-related issues. Each vulnerability we identified and addressed strengthened the security posture of the protocols we worked with, helping protect protocols and increase user trust in web3.
Auditors earned millions in rewards across 24 competitive audits on CodeHawks. The top 10 security researchers on our leaderboard have earned nearly $450,000 in rewards.
2024 has been a transformative year for Cyfrin, marked by substantial growth, innovative product launches, and strategic partnerships. From our early-year release of Updraft to the launch of our Profiles, each milestone has contributed to our mission of strengthening blockchain security and advancing developer education.
We're thankful to our community, partners, and team members who contributed to this remarkable year of achievement. Together, we're building a safer, more secure blockchain ecosystem.
The foundations we've laid this year set the stage for even greater impact in 2025. Thank you for being part of our journey. Here's to another year of innovation, growth, and excellence!
We’re all fired up and ready to go, and next year is shaping up to deliver more! Here’s a sneak peek into our plans for next year.
We remain committed to creating a secure, transparent, on-chain environment for everyone. Our focus will be on:
With these guiding priorities, we aim to empower the next generation of Blockchain and smart contract engineers and set new standards for security, education, and community in 2025 and beyond.
