Umbra Gateway

The Problem

Helios solves trustless state verification, and keeps RPC calls local (as possible) but every eth_getProof call still goes to centralized RPC providers who collect:

• Your IP address
• Which addresses you're querying
• Request timing and patterns
• Transaction correlation data

There is no privacy-preserving RPC alternative.

The Solution

A two-component privacy infrastructure:

1. Anonymized RPC Gateway

• Tor hidden service (.onion endpoint)
• x402 micropayments (pay-per-request in USDC on Base)
• Proxies to execution nodes without logging
• Chainalysis Oracle compliance check (sanctions screening for US deployment...eventually)

2. Privacy Wallet Client

• Electron desktop app
• Embedded Helios (WASM) for trustless verification
• Arti (Rust Tor) toggle for all RPC traffic
• x402 payment client for RPC access
• WalletConnect v2 for dApp connectivity (eventually)

Architecture

User Wallet (Electron)          Anonymized RPC Gateway (.onion)
┌──────────────────┐            ┌────────────────────────────┐
│ Helios WASM      │            │ 1. Receive JSON-RPC        │
│ Key Management   │─────Tor────│ 2. x402 payment validation │
│ x402 Client      │            │ 3. Chainalysis check       │
│ WalletConnect    │            │ 4. Proxy to execution node │
└──────────────────┘            └────────────────────────────┘

Key Differentiators

vs Infura/Alchemy	vs Raw Tor	vs Nym alone
No metadata collection	x402 monetization model	Production-ready (Arti 1.0)
Sanctions compliant	Compliance layer	Toggleable privacy levels
Privacy-first design	Sustainable infrastructure	Integrated wallet UX

Tech Stack

• Gateway: Rust (axum + arti + x402)
• Client: Electron + React + @a16z/helios WASM
• Privacy: arti-client (Tor), nym-sdk (Nym mixnet)
• Payments: x402 protocol on Base (USDC)
• Compliance: Chainalysis Sanctions Oracle

Quick Start

# Gateway
cd gateway && go run main.go

# Client
cd client && npm install && pnpm dev

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Conclusion: Currently, all privacy plays ultimately depend on the RPC layer. Solving RPC privacy is foundational—the other ideas can build on top of this infrastructure.