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Glossary

Glossary

This glossary contains terms and definitions used throughout the Safe documentation.

Account Abstraction

Account Abstraction is a new paradigm that focuses on improving the user experience when interacting with the blockchain by replacing the use of externally-owned accounts with smart accounts.

Some Account Abstraction features are:

  • Elimination of seed phrase reliance
  • Ease of multichain interactions
  • Account recovery
  • Gasless transactions
  • Transaction batching

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Bundler

Bundlers are nodes that participate in the ERC-4337 standard who bundle user operations from an alternative mempool and submit them to the blockchain. Bundlers pay for the associated transaction fees in advance, which are later refunded by the user account who proposed the user operation or by a Paymaster.

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EIP-1271

The EIP-1271 (opens in a new tab) is an Ethereum Improvement Proposal (opens in a new tab) that proposes a standard way for any contract to verify whether a signature on behalf of a given contract is valid. This is possible via the implementation of a isValidSignature(hash, signature) function on the signing contract, which can be called to validate a signature.

EIP-712

The EIP-712 (opens in a new tab) is an Ethereum Improvement Proposal that proposes a standard for hashing and signing of typed structured data instead of just bytestrings.

EntryPoint

According to the ERC-4337, the EntryPoint is the singleton smart contract that processes bundles of UserOperation objects sent by the Bundlers. It verifies and executes them by calling the target smart accounts according to predefined rules.

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ERC-4337

The ERC-4337 (opens in a new tab) is an Ethereum Request for Comments (opens in a new tab) that introduces a higher-layer pseudo-transaction object called UserOperation. Users send UserOperation objects into a separate mempool. A special class of actor called Bundlers package up a set of these objects into a transaction making a handleOps call to a special contract, and that transaction then gets included in a block.

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Externally-Owned Account

An externally-owned account (also known as EOA) is one of the two types of Ethereum accounts. A private key controls it; it has no code, and users can send messages by creating and signing Ethereum transactions.

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Gasless Transaction

Gasless transactions (also known as meta-transactions) are Ethereum transactions that are executed by a third party called relayer on behalf of a smart account to abstract the use of gas. Users must sign a message (instead of the transaction itself) with information about the transaction they want to execute. A relayer will create the Ethereum transaction, sign and execute it, and pay for the gas costs. The main benefit is that users can interact with the blockchain without holding the native token in their account.

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Multi-signature

A multi-signature account is a smart account that allows you to customize ownership and control structures according to your needs. Multiple externally-owned accounts can be designated as owners, and you can specify how many of those owners must approve a transaction before it is executed.

Possible configurations:

  • 0/0 Safe: An account with no owners, controlled entirely by Safe Modules. This configuration is typically used for automation or executing conditional functions within a protocol's architecture.
  • 1/1 Safe: An account with a single owner who has full control and ownership. Ideal for setting up a smart account with a single EOA that can take advantage of all smart account functionalities. Warning: If the owner loses access to their private key, there is no way to recover the account. A recovery plan or an emergency mechanism to handle key loss should be set.
  • N/N Safe: An account with multiple owners, all of whom must approve a transaction before it is executed. This setup is perfect for scenarios where equal ownership and responsibility among all participants are required. Warning: If any owner loses their private key, the Safe may become locked and unable to process transactions. A recovery plan or an emergency mechanism to handle key loss should be set.
  • N/M Safe: An account with multiple owners, but only a subset of them is required to approve a transaction. This configuration is useful when you want to distribute responsibility while maintaining flexibility in decision-making.

How does it work?

  • Multi-signature is a function native to Safe smart contract.
  • The contract stores the owners' addresses and the threshold needed to execute a transaction in the smart contract storage.
  • When the user wants to perform a transaction, they send a payload containing the transaction details and the owners' signatures to the Safe account.
  • The safe account iterates through the signatures to verify that the payload has been signed correctly and by the correct owners.

Benefits:

  • Enhanced Security: Reduces the risk associated with single points of failure, protecting your assets even if a key is lost or compromised.
  • Customizable: Tailor each smart account to fit your specific needs, allowing you to set up configurations that work best for your particular use case.
  • Interoperable: Flexibly assign a variety of signers as owners, including:
  • Upgradable: Easily adjust the number of owners and the signing threshold for your account whenever
  • Key Rotation: Rotate ownership of any accounts at any time, maintaining security while adapting to changes.
  • Shared Control: Grant shared access and control of your account to multiple individuals, ensuring collaborative management.
  • Auditability: Maintain a transparent, auditable record of who signed each transaction and when providing clear accountability for all account activities.

Network

A blockchain network is a collection of interconnected computers that utilize a blockchain protocol for communication. Decentralized networks allow users to send transactions, that are processed on a distributed ledger with a consensus mechanism ensuring the batching, verification, and acceptance of data into blocks. This structure enables the development of applications without the need for a central authority or server.

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Owner

A Safe owner is one of the accounts that control a given Safe. Only owners can manage the configuration of a Safe and approve transactions. They can be either externally-owned accounts or smart accounts. The threshold of a Safe defines how many owners need to approve a Safe transaction to make it executable.

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Paymaster

Paymasters are smart contracts that allow an account to pay for the gas fees of other users. This feature abstracts away the concept of gas fees by subsidizing them for users, allowing them to pay with ERC-20 tokens, and enables many other use cases.

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Relayer

A relayer is a third-party service acting as an intermediary between users' accounts and blockchain networks. It executes transactions on behalf of users and covers the associated execution costs, which may or may not be claimed.

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Safe{DAO}

The Safe{DAO} is the Decentralized Autonomous Organization (opens in a new tab) (DAO) that aims to foster a vibrant ecosystem of applications and wallets leveraging Safe accounts. This will be achieved through data-backed discussions, grants, and ecosystem investments, as well as providing developer tools and infrastructure.

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Safe{Wallet}

Safe{Wallet} (opens in a new tab) is the official user interface to manage Safe accounts.

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Safe Apps

Safe Apps are web applications that run in the Safe Apps marketplace. They support Safe, use the Safe Apps SDK to interact with it, and aren't owned, controlled, maintained, or audited by Safe.

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Safe Guard

A Safe Guard is a smart contract that adds restrictions on top of the n-out-of-m scheme that Safe accounts offer. They make checks before and after the execution of a Safe transaction.

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Safe Module

A Safe Module is a smart contract that adds functionality to Safe while separating module logic from Safe core contracts.

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Smart Account

A smart account (also known as a smart contract account) leverages the programmability of smart contracts to extend its functionality and improve its security in comparison with externally-owned accounts. Smart accounts are controlled by one or multiple externally-owned accounts or other smart accounts, and all transactions have to be initiated by one of those.

Some common features that smart accounts offer to their users are:

Safe is one of the most trusted implementations of a smart account.

Transaction

A transaction is an action initiated by an externally-owned account to update the state of the EVM network. Transaction objects must be signed using the sender's private key, require a fee, and be included in a validated block.

A Safe transaction is a transaction sent to a Safe Proxy contract calling the execTransaction (opens in a new tab) method.

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Threshold

The threshold of a Safe account is a crucial configuration element that enables using Safe as a multi-signature smart account. It defines the number of required confirmations from the Safe owners a (Safe) transaction must have to be executable.

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UserOperation

UserOperation objects are pseudo-transaction objects introduced by the ERC-4337 that users send to the UserOperation mempool. They wrap the users' transactions, and are sent to the EntryPoint contract by Bundlers.

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Wallet

A wallet is an interface or application that gives users control over their blockchain account. Wallets allow users to sign in to applications, read their account balance, send transactions, and verify their identity.

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