The Open Network
The Open Network (TON) is a Layer 1 blockchain based on technology from Telegram. It is an open decentralized network maintained and developed by a community of enthusiasts, users and developers. They are united by common values — a free and distributed Internet, of which decentralized technologies and cryptocurrencies are a part. The task of the developers is to mainstream blockchain. To make access to its benefits as simple as a familiar app on your phone.
TON's Mission is to create and use the latest technologies that enable the open, free, decentralized exchange of value, information and ideas. Technologies that are designed to protect the freedom, privacy and rights of all people, to make this world a more balanced and self-governing place. One of the objectives of the project is the massification of cryptocurrencies and reaching billions of users, and thanks to its performance it was certified in a public test on October 31, 2023 as the fastest blockchain in the world by managing to process 108,409 transactions per second (TPS).
History[edit | edit source]
Telegram Open Network was first announced in 2017 as an initiative to create a scalable, high-performance blockchain platform. The goal was to overcome the limitations of existing blockchains and enable mass adoption of cryptocurrencies and decentralized applications.
In 2018, Telegram held a successful private token sale to fund the development of Telegram Open Network. However, the project faced regulatory and legal challenges, leading to delays and legal disputes. Finally, in 2020, Telegram was forced to cancel the launch of the project due to legal issues with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Despite these setbacks, TON source code was released as open source software, allowing the community to continue developing the platform.
On May 29, 2020, a community of independent developers, validators, winners of public Telegram contests and crypto enthusiasts announced the continuation of work on the project
The team continued to maintain and develop the original testnet2 network, which was launched by the Telegram team on November 15, 2019.
In May 2021, the community voted to rename the testnet2 network to mainnet. And the name «NEWTON» changed to «TON Foundation», which became a non-profit community, aimed at further developing and supporting the network
On June 29, 2021, the Telegram team agreed to transfer the ton.org domain and a GitHub account to The Open Network community in response to an open letter.
On August 9, 2021, EXMO announced the listing of Toncoin cryptocurrency, which became the native currency of TON. It is used for network transactions, transactions, games or collectibles on products created on TON blockchain. Toncoin is among the TOP 15 coins in the CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko rankings.
On July 6, 2020, the mining of all available Toncoins (98.55% of the total stock) began. The coins were placed in special PoW Giver smart contracts, allowing everyone to participate in their distribution until June 28, 2022. About 200,000 TON were mined daily.
In September 2023, at the TOKEN2049 conference, TON Foundation and Telegram announced the launch of TON Space, a non-custodial space that gives users full control over their Wallet-based digital assets directly within Telegram.
On October 31, during a public performance test, TON managed to break the world record for the number of transactions per second, achieving a result of 108,409 TPS.
The first independent live TON conference, The Gateway, was held in Dubai on November 10-11, 2023.
On January 29, 2024, the pilot season of the incentive program for users of TON ecosystem was launched: The Open League.
Technology[edit | edit source]
TON team has meticulously considered every detail to create a comprehensive Blockchain and a complete infrastructure capable of decentralizing various services. To achieve all this, TON bases its development on the following technologies: Proof-of-Stake and Sharding for high scalability. The creation, development and deployment of smart contracts uses the FunC and Fift programming languages and TON Virtual Machine (TVM). All TON smart contracts run independently on TVM. TVM is stack-based, making it efficient and easy to implement.
TON blockchain consists of a three-tier network:
At the first level we have the Master chain, which works thanks to a powerful Proof of Stake (PoS) algorithm that gives great speed, scalability and security to the network. This master chain is the main chain of TON network and is currently operational. That is, every time an operation is made in TON, it is carried out on the master chain.
Then, at the second level, we find the Work Chains, which are secondary chains that connect to the Master chain. Each of these secondary chains may have its own set of consensus rules, including different account and transaction address formats, virtual machines running smart contracts and basic cryptocurrencies, etc. All of this without ceasing to be compatible with the Master chain, thus being able to interact with it, and with each other, without problems.
Finally, we have the third level, which is the Sharding Chains. Sharding chains are part of the work chains and their role is to provide a scalability boost to them, dividing the work and parallelizing it. In this way, TON's scalability would skyrocket to levels much higher than what we would find in chains like Polkadot or Solana currently. All of this is possible thanks to the bottom-up scheme that TON uses for its shard chains, giving rise to what they call Infinite Sharding Paradigm.
TON blockchain is designed as a distributed supercomputer, or «superserver», designed to provide a variety of products and services that promote a decentralized vision of a new Internet.
Utility and Featured Products in TON[edit | edit source]
Developers can run their decentralized applications on TON blockchain and users can actively use them in their daily lives.
With TON blockchain it is possible not only to store funds securely in a personal wallet without intermediaries and send coins in any amount whenever and wherever you want with minimal fees, but also to use a variety of decentralized applications based on TON. As of March 19, 2024, there are 611 applications in TON App catalog — developers are actively using blockchain as a secure and decentralized environment to launch their services.
Tonkeeper[edit | edit source]
The first non-custodial wallet to store, send and receive Toncoin. You can also use the wallet to transact with TON Jettons, as well as store, send and receive digital collectibles and other NFTs. You have sole control of your funds and are responsible for the secure storage of your seed phrase to access the wallet.
STON.fi[edit | edit source]
A decentralized AMM exchange built on TON blockchain, offering virtually zero fees, low slippage, an extremely simple interface, and direct integration with TON wallets. The exchange is available to trade Toncoin for other Jettons, stablecoins, wrapped BTC, ETH, and other coins. Additionally, at STON.fi you can provide liquidity and generate returns in many farming pools with great APYs.
TON Proxy[edit | edit source]
TON Proxy, a network proxy and anonymizer layer designed for TON nodes, is like an Invisible Internet (I2P) project that facilitates the creation of decentralized VPN services and blockchain-based alternatives to TOR. This capability improves online privacy and makes it easier to create decentralized applications that can be more resistant to censorship. As of September 30, 2022, TON Proxy became compatible with HTTP Proxy.
TON DNS[edit | edit source]
Launched on June 30, 2022, TON DNS works similarly to domain names associated with other cryptocurrencies, offering «.ton» as a domain zone. The program assigns easy-to-digest names to accounts, smart contracts, services, and network nodes. This service simplifies the process of accessing decentralized applications by allowing users to use short, simple domain names instead of long strings of alphanumeric characters. Domain names can also be linked to wallet addresses.
TON Storage[edit | edit source]
On December 31, 2022, TON Storage, a decentralized file storage system, was introduced. Through TON Storage, we are creating a decentralized P2P cloud storage system that backs up your data across our decentralized network using smart contracts.
Fragment[edit | edit source]
The Fragment platform auctions anonymous Telegram usernames and numbers on TON blockchain. Recently, the purchase of Telegram Premium subscription for Toncoin was added.
Getgems[edit | edit source]
The leading NFT exchange platform on TON Network. Hundreds of collections available and a beautiful and easy-to-use interface, as well as very friendly commissions. Recently the platform joined the CNFT revolution, a new way to create NFTs massively and consuming a minimum amount, which only TON Network is capable of achieving. To use the platform all you have to do is connect your wallet where you store your NFTs.
TONup Launchpad[edit | edit source]
This platform, whose mission is to help launch innovative projects in TON ecosystem, is responsible for providing services such as fundraising, token creation, mentoring, listing, and empowering developers from around the world to build in TON. TONup eliminates these barriers by offering technical and marketing advice to help promote projects that bring some value proposition to the ecosystem.
TON Lending Protocol[edit | edit source]
A product presented by the investment manager of the MEXX exchange, which allows users to borrow funds with collateral in TON.
TON Browser[edit | edit source]
One of the best announcements was the proposal for a new browser based on TON, which is planned to be launched in 2024 and will have interoperability with all the main ecosystem projects.
TON and Telegram Alliance[edit | edit source]
The closeness that both projects have always had has been strengthened in recent months. For TON, it is essential that both the Blockchain and the Telegram Super App offer real use cases to attract Web2 users, providing them with tangible products according to their needs.
On November 10, 2023, a historic event was held for TON community, called The Gateway, which was held in Dubai and attended by more than 500 enthusiasts, developers, and investors who want to continue building and innovating in TON with the vision to reach an increasingly wider audience thanks to its alliance and closeness with Telegram.
In the preamble to that event, TON Blockchain achieved quite notable progress, such as achieving a Guinness record for the highest number of transactions in a Blockchain, and exceeding the number of TON accounts and wallets by more than 40 times in relation to the year 2021 — which put it in the eyes of hundreds of investors and made TON cryptocurrency place itself in the TOP 10 cryptocurrencies with the highest market capitalization.
TON Space wallet[edit | edit source]
Launching TON Space self-custodial wallet on Telegram from the main menu is a huge achievement for TON as it can leverage the massive audience of 800 million active Telegram users who can easily have access to a Wallet in which most jettons of TON ecosystem are available.
The Open League[edit | edit source]
A massive rewards program that offers more than $160M in Toncoin only during the 1st stage to teams that launch projects on TON that increase active community and TVL in the ecosystem.
TON Gaming[edit | edit source]
An alliance that aims to revitalize the gaming industry by taking advantage of Telegram's audience of 800M users and supporting developers at every stage of the online game creation process.
Main objective in the future will be to continue in alliance with Telegram building the Telegram Web3 Super App. This will help massify crypto adoption in each region of the planet through an easy and simple to use user experience mostly through the Telegram Mini Apps.
Community[edit | edit source]
Since its inception, the project has had a very close relationship with its community, which has participated in every stage of development and continues to support every decision made to grow the ecosystem. In 2023, TON had a very large expansion in many countries and very varied applications have been built to facilitate the change and adaptation to the Web3 that is being born today. TON managed to place itself in the TOP 10 cryptocurrencies with the highest market capitalization and continues to take giant steps to occupy the first places.
TON has a huge number of developers who are located all over the world and work remotely. Each member of the Core Team is a generalist. No release is made by anyone, no update is tested by fewer than three team members, and a public bug bounty is offered.
Since 2022, TON has been working with the best external teams to audit the code, find vulnerabilities and bugs in it: CertiK, Trail of Bits, Hexens, Quantstamp and others.
Now the core team is more focused on working on the core: node, compiler, system smart contracts and some infrastructure services like the blockchain bridge.
TON already has numerous teams and independent developers who create diverse products. TON has become totally «community-driven».
TON has a grant program to support promising ideas and solutions useful for the development of TON ecosystem.
TON Society[edit | edit source]
The new social network of TON ecosystem, works in Telegram as a geo-hubs, provides the user with digital identification and reputation throughout the ecosystem thanks to the achievements he achieves in The Open League incentive program.
TON Community now exceeds 30M users thanks to the ambitious projects like Notcoin. It is expected that TON ecosystem will reach a massive audience and fulfill the long-awaited promise of making crypto accessible to all.