In 2021 the act of “staking” digital assets is an increasingly popular means of generating passive income and supporting your favorite blockchain projects.

As you may know, AVADO is welcoming many incredible projects onto our platform, and this month we held an ask-me-anything (AMA) with HOPR in AVADO’s telegram group . HOPR is a blockchain and crypto project dedicated to data protection and privacy that recently launched its staking program.

Introducing HOPR

The digital age has struggled to accommodate the privacy needs of the world. While there have been numerous efforts to maximize user privacy, very few of them have managed to achieve total privacy.

Traditionally, data is transmitted across the internet to the desired location, and each packet of data comes with its meta. The metadata portion is the piece that provides governments and corporations with everything they want to know about the user. Usually, they exploit this without anyone’s permission as metadata is often public. But this is about to be changed with HOPR.

HOPR is a Swiss blockchain project that has built a privacy-preserving protocol, and it’s considered to be a player in the future of privacy. Instead of our web activity being tracked by web browsers, ISPs, and websites, HOPR is offering a decentralized peer-to-peer (P2P) solution; in short, the project aims to secure your data, information and erase digital footprints.

Whenever we are online, our data is being leveraged by companies and governments for a myriad of reasons, and even when we opt to use platforms that claim to offer end-to-end encryption, such as WhatsApp , our fundamental right to privacy isn’t guaranteed even if you use a VPN as there is still at least one company processing your data and info.

HOPR is unique in that it is not running a dedicated blockchain. Instead, they’ve created a decentralized, layer-0 foundation for developers to build upon. No single entity owns and operates the network, and by staking HOPR, users contribute to the decentralization of the platform.

In his opening remarks to the AMA , HOPR Founder, Sebastian Bürgel stated:

“HOPR provides essential and compliant network-level metadata privacy for everyone. That means you can transmit data from A to B without any third party knowing WHAT data you are transferring (it’s end-to-end encrypted), but beyond that, third parties don’t even know that A and B are exchanging data.”

He explains that this is what they call “metadata privacy,” adding that the protocol can accommodate the needs of including decentralized finance (DeFi) and the Internet of Things (IoT).

AVADO

The AVADO Box is a robust piece of hardware with simplicity and accessibility at the core of its design.

Its purpose is to allow everyday users to interact with decentralized applications (dApps) and staking platforms without the need for the user to learn any programming and coding. Running a Node for staking often requires a great deal of knowledge to set up and maintain.

Simply plug it in, follow the basic instructions, browse the AVADO DappStore, and engage with many amazing blockchain/crypto platforms. As mentioned earlier, you can now operate a HOPR node by staking HOPR tokens with AVADO, so let’s look at what the community had to ask the HOPR team.

AMA

On September 4th, 2021, AVADO hosted an AMA on Telegram. Answering questions by HOPR Founder Sebastian Bürgel and the AVADO team, so that our community could get deep knowledge on how to stake HOPR on AVADO, about the team, the project, and much more.

Let’s unpack a few of the questions and answers from the session, which can be viewed in full here.

When will cover traffic be ready?

“Let me, first of all, get everyone up to speed on what cover traffic is. Cover traffic is fake traffic that is indistinguishable from real traffic on the HOPR network. It provides essentially “background noise” on top of which nobody can see where you send packets. “

Sebastian elaborates that this feature is essential. For HOPR, this feature must be introduced slowly, as users who are staking HOPR can earn revenue for relaying data, and thus a careful rollout is necessary. It would be a shame for larger stakers to lose their funds on their node due to an attack. It’s a rather complex technology, even when running on the AVADO, so making sure that cover traffic is safe and secure takes priority.

What are the earning rewards with AVADO?

Staking on AVADO allows users to earn interest on their staked amount and earn NFTs. At present, a stake on HOPR offers a base interest of 18.25% APR. On top of that you can boost your APR by earning rewards in forms of NFTs. There are a few ways to earn different NFT rewards depending on which testnet you participate in, so be sure to check out the full breakdown here .

AVADO is providing a HOPR Package in the DappStore and supporting HOPR with a specially designed device. Are there any differences in running HOPR on their own devices compared to an AVADO?

Decentralization is a top priority for HOPR. As Sebastian notes: “A privacy network should not just run in some cloud which is at the end controlled by a handful of people. But who has a 24–7 running machine at home? Most of us don’t. So many people realize that AVADO is the easiest way to get your node up and running.”

He further adds that the AVADO box doesn’t have a noisy fan compared to any other device on the market, concluding that a pre-configured device is convenient.

Staking HOPR on AVADO

From the very start, blockchain and cryptocurrency technologies were designed for the masses, and until recently, the industry was struggling to bridge that gap.

Staking on AVADO is as easy as it sounds. Connect the device to your computer, browse the DappStore to find HOPR. Within a few clicks, you are cementing yourself as a part of the decentralized future and earning yourself some digital assets in the process.

If you are interested in running HOPR on a dedicated device, please have a look at the most convenient solution available HERE .