RSK is a smart contract platform built on top of the Bitcoin blockchain that allows for faster transactions, better scalability, and Turing complete smart contracts. BTC can be transferred to the RSK blockchain to become "rootcoins" (RTC) to pay transaction fees, and RTC can be transferred back to BTC. RSK uses merged mining and a federated consensus model to provide security while allowing Bitcoin miners to participate. This expands the functionality of Bitcoin and strengthens its network security through broader participation of miners.

1. Rootstock
Smarter Bitcoin. A look at the RSK White Paper.
BlockchainHub ■ Stefan Kliment ■ August 29, 2016

2. Video: What is RSK?

3. Introduction to RSK

4. Introduction
to RSK
A little background info
• “Smart contracts” first
introduced as a concept in 1993
by Nick Szabo
• Rootstock serves as a smart-
contract platform that
incorporates a Turing Complete
Virtual Machine to Bitcoin
• Also provides faster
transactions and better
scalability

5. Introduction
to RSK
A little background info
• RSK is an evolution of QixCoin,
created in 2013
• Near instant confirmations: 300
tps, confirms payments in less
than 20 seconds
• SHA-256D merged mining

6. RSK as a Bitcoin Sidechain

7. RSK as a
Bitcoin
Sidechain
Moving on to the hot stuff
• BTC transferred into RSK
blockchain become “rootcoins”
(RTC). Essentially BTC living on
the RSK blockchain
• Can be transferred back
anytime at no additional cost
(standard RSK tx fee)
• RTC: base currency used to pay
miners for tx and contract
processing
• No currency issuance: all RTC
created from BTC

8. RSK as a
Bitcoin
Sidechain
Moving on to the hot stuff
• Turing-complete Rootstock
Virtual Machine (RVM) allowing
smart contracts
• Average first confirmation after
10 seconds
• Safe merged mining combining
PoW with federation (threshold-
signature based)
• Low-delay fast relay backbone
into peer-to-peer network
• Two-way pegging with sidechain
(currently federated, later fully
automated)

9. RSK as a low-cost BTC payment
network

10. A low-cost
BTC payment
network
Save some dough

11. A low-cost
BTC payment
network
Save some dough

12. RSK Use Cases

13. RSK Use Cases
Ok. And why is this interesting?
• Micropayment channels: secure
low valued payments without
fees for each tx, only when
channel is closed
• Hub-and-spoke networks allow
mutually untrusted users to
make low-cost one time
payments to and from third
parties with minimal trust
• Peer-to-peer distributed
exchanges

14. RSK Use Cases
Ok. And why is this interesting?
• Retail Payment Systems: BTC
adopted globally for everyday
retail transactions
• Escrow Services: oracles sign (or
don‘t sign) a transaction
defining whether it should be
executed (or not) without
touching funds under escrow
• Crypto-asset creation
(“altcoins”)

15. RSK Use Cases
Ok. And why is this interesting?
• Asset Securitization: creation of
digital tokens backed by real
assets (shares, debt, any other
asset)
• Decentralized remittances
• IP protection / registry
• Voting system: RSK allows the
creation of digital votes
• Micro-lending

16. RSK Use Cases
Ok. And why is this interesting?
• Supply chain traceability: digital
wallets allow for tracking and
tracing physical locations of a
product
• Online reputation & digital
identity
• In-game global currencies: BTC
as RSK coins, spendable in other
games
• Internet gambling / prediction
markets / fair-playing

17. RSK Technology Overview

18. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood
• Turing-complete resource-
accounted deterministic virtual
machine for smart contracts
• Two-way pegged Bitcoin
sidechain for BTC denominated
trade
• Hybrid merge-mining /
federated consensus protocol
for consensus security and low-
latency network for fast
payments

19. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood
• RVM: independent, compatible
with EVM (at opcode level)
• Provides Ethereum users
possibility to run projects with
security of the Bitcoin network
• Planned: new opcodes for fast
int32 arithmetic and better just-
in-time compilation for
enhancing performance

20. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood
• A sidechain is an independent
blockchain, native currency is
pegged to the value of another
blockchain by using proofs of
payment
• Two currencies can be
exchanged freely, automatically
and without incurring in price
negotiations
• BTC are locked in Bitcoin and
the same amount of RTC are
unlocked in RSK, vice versa

21. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood (Or: what the hell
is going on here?)
• Dynamic Hybrid Merged mining
/ Federation: DECOR+ block
reward sharing scheme. GHOST
rule counts uncles as normal
blocks and secures best chain.
BTC mining efficiency is
maximized
• Please dig into white paper for
more on this

22. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood (Or: what the hell
is going on here?)

23. RSK
Technology
Overview
More fancy words. Really, please
have a look at the white paper.
• DECOR+ protocol
• Two Stage Block Propagation
(2SBP)
• Push Missing Transactions
Protocol (PMT)
• Delayed Transaction Inclusion
Heuristic (DTI)
• Immediate Block Header
Propagation (IBHP)
• Two Prioritized Streams for
each Connection Protocol
(2PSC)

24. RSK
Technology
Overview
More fancy words. Really, please
have a look at the white paper.
• Mining on Unverified Blocks
Heuristic (MUB)
• Local Route Optimization
Protocol (LRO)
• Re-using of the Bitcoin Mining
Network

25. RSK
Technology
Overview
Under the hood
• Transaction Privacy: RSK itself
does not provide better
transaction privacy than Bitcoin,
relies on pseudonyms. VM:
CoinJoin or AppeCoin can be
implemented securely
• Scalability: far beyond Bitcoin in
its current state. RSK requires a
fifth of the size of a standard
Bitcoin payment, block payload
per time interval 8 times higher,
50% less bandwidth than
Bitcoin since blocks do not
contain tx data but only
references to known tx

26. Conclusions

27. Conclusions
Is this the end?
• RSK is the culmination of 4 years
of blockchain technology
improvements, making use of
the best features of
programmable money and
payments while increasing the
value of BTC
• Developers can create personal
and corporate decentralized
solutions that run on the most
secure network worldwide with
low tx cost

28. Conclusions
Is this the end?
• Bitcoin miners can participate in
the smart contract market,
ensuring sustainability of the
mining industry
• Broaden the base of miners
strengthening Bitcoin’s network
security
• Development of a
decentralized, instant and
inexpensive financial system

29. Follow RSK
Rootstock
rsk.co
@RSKSmart