Treasury #448

Web3 Without Barriers: Virto Connect

Treasury

37mins ago

Approved

Content

AI Summary


Beneficiary:	Virto Team
Requested amount:	9,700 KSM (~147,634 USD at 15.22 USD EMA30)

Introduction

Virto Connect is a native solution to abstract accounts for Substrate chains designed to remove the biggest barriers to Web3 adoption.

Today, users face a steep learning curve: installing wallets, managing private keys, understanding blockchain addresses, and purchasing tokens to pay fees. These hurdles block mainstream adoption.

Virto Connect solves this with two core capabilities:

Account abstraction via pallet-pass: users can log in with familiar methods —passkeys, Substrate keys, Ethereum wallets (e.g., Metamask), OAuth (Google/GitHub), and zkLogin for privacy-preserving authentication.
Feeless transactions via a native “gas tank”: users don’t need to hold tokens to interact; fees are abstracted at the protocol layer.

With this approach, we aim to make Web3 feel like Web2 while staying fully native to Substrate and universally compatible with dApps.

Our team has more than three years of experience researching and designing products that lower the barriers to use Web3 (among them, the native DAOs — yet to be implemented in the Hub after migration, and our Infrastructure for Payments — awarded with a W3F Grant).

✅ Already delivered

FRAME components: pallet-pass, transaction extensions, session keys integration, gas tank extension.
Client-side: VirtoSDK and Web Component Library (registration, login, transaction signing).
Live demo: https://demo.virto.dev
Security audit: completed by Guvenkaya.

We request 9,700 KSM (~147k USD) to fund the implementation of this solution, covering both the already delivered code and infrastructure and the remaining roadmap features (new authenticators, seamless DAO onboarding, device permissions, account recovery, and zkLogin).

Virto Connect is open-source infrastructure for the entire Polkadot/Kusama ecosystem—lowering entry barriers, improving usability, and enabling mass adoption.

Proposal

Funding request: 9,700 KSM (~147,634 USD at 15.22 USD EMA30)
Scope: Completion of the project, including:

Offsetting the resources invested in the delivered components (FRAME pallets, SDK, demo, audit).
- Q1: Pallet Pass improvements + Gas Tank refinements.
- Q2: Authenticators: Passkeys & Substrate wallets (production-ready integrations).
- Q3: Audit process
Delivering remaining features (2025 roadmap):
- Q3: JWT/OAuth authenticator.
- Q4: Seamless DAO onboarding, per-device permissions & recovery, zkLogin authenticator.

Outcome: A fully featured, audited, open-source smart authentication stack that any Substrate chain can adopt to reduce UX friction and drive user growth.

📸 Demo Preview

👉 Live demo: https://demo.virto.dev

FAQ

Q: What's the difference between this solution and the «x» solution out there?
A: Virto Connect is not just a solution that abstracts accounts on the client side, or heavily relies on a third-party authentication service, but it's a native system —that can be configured in the Hub—, and it's perfectly compatible with any existing authentication mechanism (like Passkeys, but also Substrate keys, Ethereum wallets, or Google/Facebook/etc. login, or any login based on zero-knowledge proofs).

Q: Why not implement this using smart contracts?
A: We're making a native integration with the blockchain. This is basically inviable using smart contracts. For example, this system sets the account origin by signing in using passkeys, an Ethereum wallet, or your Gmail login, or handles fees without requiring tokens. Both things occur even before a smart contract starts running.

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Comments

F331...SGhU

Hello Virto Team

Thank you for this proposal, the project looks very promising. I have a few questions to better understand some details:

Gas Tank: how is it managed in the long term? Who is expected to fund its refill and under which model?
Development Time: how many hours have already been invested in the project, and how many do you estimate are required to deliver the remaining features?
Budget: could you provide a more detailed breakdown of the requested amount? (split between already delivered work and upcoming development, number of people involved, their roles, and the estimated workload per resource).

Thanks in advance for your clarifications

Fa6m...wiBr

Dear Proposer,

Thank you for your proposal. Our first vote on this proposal is AYE.

The Big Spender track requires 60% quorum according to our voting policy v0.2, and any referendum in which the majority of members vote abstain receives an abstain vote. This proposal has received five aye and zero nay votes from eight available members, with one member abstaining. Below is a summary of our members' comments:

Members discussed the project and evaluated its potential to simplify blockchain authentication by incorporating familiar login methods and fee-less transactions. They noted that the solution would lower entry barriers for Web3 adoption, while emphasizing that additional product management and design support might be necessary for greater productization. One view recommended proposing the initiative on Polkadot to ease pressure on Kusama, whereas others highlighted the team’s strong track record and diligent efforts on the network. Overall, they supported the proposal as it aligned with experimental values and innovation, resulting in a predominantly favorable vote with one abstention.

The full discussion can be found in our internal voting.

Please feel free to contact us through the links below for further discussion.

Kind regards,
Permanence DAO
Decentralized Voices Cohort V Delegate

📅 Book Office Hours
💬 Public Telegram
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🗳️ Delegate

Up 1

HPSH...ZDvo

This is Barath Kanna, representing the PBA Alumni Voting DAO.

We have voted AYE on this referendum.

Our reasoning is that Virto Connect addresses one of the largest barriers to Web3 adoption: onboarding. By combining account abstraction (passkeys, OAuth, zkLogin, Substrate & Ethereum wallets) with feeless transactions through a native gas tank, it makes interacting with Substrate chains feel as seamless as Web2 while remaining fully native and decentralized.

The Virto team has a strong track record, having already delivered FRAME components (pallet-pass, transaction extensions, session keys integration, gas tank extension), a client-side SDK, and Web Components. Their prior work, including W3F grant contributions, further reinforces their credibility.

We believe this proposal will significantly improve accessibility and adoption for dApps in the ecosystem and is a valuable investment for Kusama.

If you would like to discuss this or any other proposal with the Alumni community, please join us on Discord: https://discord.gg/MsqrdQpGzp

HcEb...jJ5F

Wallets and logins are some of the only currently core needs of Kusama. They will receive continued support for now. Hopefully this gets ported to Polkadot soon.

Disclaimer:
Our modeling includes more than 1000 non-linguistic parameters so these are only verbal observations also included in the vote calculations and they are not an extensive review of the full rationale behind this vote.