Ethereum Classic Labs has initiated an integration with smart contract I/O infrastructure provider, Chainlink.

Chainlink also offers a very high degree of security, at the same level as the base blockchain of Ethereum Classic itself, with a proven decentralized oracle library.

Polkadot hopes to use Chainlink’s Oracles to bridge different blockchains to allow for resource transfer between chains.

Ethereum Classic Labs has initiated an integration with smart contract I/O infrastructure provider, Chainlink, to bring decentralized oracles to the Ethereum Classic network. Decentralized Oracles help bridge the blockchain smart contracts with off-chain data.

The Ethereum Classic blockchain is built to be unable to engage with any data that is off-chain by virtue of certain consensus protocols that are used that keep the network locked in to be used with on-chain data alone.

One such consensus protocol is determinism, where there is a deterministic order to process transactions using the available on-chain data. Such locked-in behavior grants a higher degree of security but prevents Ethereum Classic from being able to interact with other blockchains or any external inputs and outputs.

This also harms the network ecosystem as data cannot be acquired for smart contract developers on the platform from external sources, like the traditional payment data for settlements, market data for DeFi, IoT data for insurance, etc.

Decentralized Oracles are a solution to this problem by forming a gateway for data flow between a blockchain and the non-blockchain data. This is done by reformatting APIs so that two different applications are compatible for data exchange.

This off-chain sourced data can then be taken onto the blockchain and then used to build more versatile smart contract applications. This kind of external access opens up a number of new venues for developers on Etheruem Classic like building new smart contract solutions using data from IoT devices, payment systems, cloud networks, web APIs, online data, and other blockchains.

Chainlink also offers a very high degree of security, at the same level as the base blockchain of Ethereum Classic itself, with a proven decentralized oracle library. This is essential as ETC Labs themselves mention in a blog post that the smart contract integrity can be affected if the oracle is centralized.

Chainlink decentralizes both the data retrieval and the data source. Additionally, developers can also manually aid decentralization by gathering data from various similar sources to prevent centralization from one single source.

On the other hand, devs can also do the opposite, by assigning various oracles to gather data from the same data point in order to ensure decentralization.

Although Chainlink’s primary target has been to bring the service to the Ethereum blockchain for a while now, it was also recently seen integrating with the blockchain interoperability platform, Polkadot, for to enable its parachain technology and its blockchain framework.

Polkadot also hopes to use Chainlink’s Oracles to bridge different blockchains to allow for resource transfer between chains.

James Wo, the founder of ETC Labs, says, “This extended functionality to off-chain environments substantially scales the number of use cases smart contract developers can create using Ethereum Classic and ultimately makes it easier and more seamless for developers to build on Ethereum Classic.”