Stark Ware develop SHARP? And StarkNet is allowing open source provers creation for the public? Starkware and Starknet are Israel based origin?
This fact-check may be outdated. Consider refreshing it to get the most current information.
Executive summary
StarkWare developed the SHARP (Shared Prover) system and describes it as central infrastructure that aggregates and recursively combines proofs to reduce on‑chain verification costs [1] [2]. StarkWare and Starknet have progressively open‑sourced key prover implementations — Stone and the next‑gen S-two / Stwo — and announced community access and managed routes (Atlantic) to use SHARP; Starknet documentation and StarkWare blog posts confirm the prover code and new provers are released under open‑source licenses and integrated into SHARP [3] [4] [5] [6]. Multiple industry writeups and corporate pages identify StarkWare as an Israel‑based company (Netanya), and Starknet was developed by StarkWare [7] [8] [9].
1. Who built SHARP — StarkWare’s Shared Prover and how it works
SHARP is StarkWare’s Shared Prover: an aggregator that recursively combines many STARK claims into a single proof so multiple applications can share verification costs when submitting state updates on chain; StarkWare’s docs describe SHARP as the component that generates proofs submitted to an on‑chain verifier smart contract and a Fact Registry [1] [2]. Starknet materials present SHARP as the production proof‑aggregator in use across Starknet/StarkEx deployments, enabling off‑chain Cairo logic verification and historical state proofs [10] [4].
2. Is the prover open source — what StarkWare has released
StarkWare has a documented, multi‑stage open‑sourcing strategy for its prover technology. The company published the Stone prover under Apache 2.0 (the “Stone/Stone Prover” release), citing that developers can build custom proving services from it and that StarkWare used Stone as the basis for SHARP [3]. Subsequent StarkWare and Starknet posts say the next‑gen S‑two / Stwo prover will be open‑source “from day one” and integrated into SHARP and Starknet’s stack [5] [11] [12] [4].
3. Can the public create open‑source provers for StarkNet / use SHARP?
Yes — StarkWare and Starknet materials present two public paths: 1) direct open‑source releases (Stone, S‑two/Stwo) give developers a battle‑tested proving engine they can fork or adapt under Apache‑style licensing, and 2) managed services like Atlantic provide developer access to SHARP via verifiers (GPSStatementVerifier, Integrity Cairo verifier) so independent devs can verify proofs on Ethereum or Starknet without running the full proving stack themselves [3] [6] [4]. Starknet docs explicitly state SHARP is used to make proving affordable and that Atlantic is a managed ZK prover service to integrate with SHARP [4] [6].
4. Practical limits and governance: permissioned elements remain
Documentation and ecosystem analyses show that although core prover code is being open‑sourced and SHARP is the shared proving system, operational and governance mechanisms retain permissioned controls today: SHARP’s verifier contracts, bridge escrows and governance arrangements have upgrade and multisig controls described in L2Beat and StarkEx docs — i.e., sharing a verifier does not automatically imply fully permissionless operations or instant decentralization [13] [1]. Starknet’s decentralization roadmap frames open‑sourcing the stack and decentralizing sequencer/prover roles over time, indicating not all operational control has been transferred to the community yet [12] [14].
5. The geographic origin: StarkWare and Starknet’s Israeli roots
Multiple corporate profiles, news articles and industry summaries identify StarkWare as Israel‑based (commonly Netanya) and state Starknet was developed by StarkWare [8] [7] [9]. These sources consistently present StarkWare as an Israeli company that created Starknet and the underlying Cairo/STARK technology [8] [7].
6. Competing perspectives and implicit agendas
StarkWare and Starknet communications emphasize transparency, decentralization, and developer empowerment when discussing open‑sourcing [15] [3]. Independent ecosystem trackers note there remain governance levers and timelocks controlled by StarkWare multisigs and a Security Council — a reminder that open‑sourcing code and full protocol decentralization are distinct steps [13]. Some blog and community pieces celebrate open‑source releases as a decentralizing milestone, while StarkWare’s staged roadmap frames it as a managed transition with sequence and proving decentralization occurring over multiple phases [12] [11].
Limitations and what I could not find in these sources: available sources do not mention detailed technical differences in the provers’ internals beyond high‑level throughput claims, and they do not provide a complete timetable for when all operational control of SHARP and the sequencer will pass to community validators (not found in current reporting).