The Telegram Open Network’s application chain team and Polygon Labs are set to bring Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) functionality to the TON ecosystem.
In a July 9 announcement, the TON Applications Chain (TAC) and Polygon announced that the TON L2 had integrated Polygon CDK and the interoperability protocol Agglayer to bring EVM-compatible decentralized applications (DApps) to TAC.
It aims to increase the range of applications available to the TON network’s users, including decentralized finance (DeFi), gaming, and identity solutions.
“This collaboration enhances our ability to bridge the gap between TON and Ethereum ecosystems,” which should boost DApp integration within Telegram, said TAC’s CEO Pavel Altukhov in a statement.
By utilizing applications like Wallet in Telegram, the EVM-compatible integration will see Ethereum developers granted access to a large number of users on Telegram, allowing them to implement more real-world crypto applications. Some of the potential use cases cited by the team include DeFi applications, gaming and decentralized identity solutions.
In a July 6 post to X, Messari noted that the number of daily active addresses on the TON network had surpassed Ethereum during the month of June.
TAC’s founding team includes Curve founder Michael Egerov and the team behind The Open Protocol (TOP), which offers crypto wallet functionality from within the Telegram app.
The statement describes TAC as a layer-2 network built on TON designed to bring EVM-based decentralized applications to TON and Telegram users.
Rise of phishing attacks on TON
Despite the recent success of the TON ecosystem — which has been bolstered by a significant uptick in trading activity of new tokens on the network — there has also been a rise in phishing attacks on the blockchain.
On June 24, SlowMist founder Yu Xian warned the Telegram ecosystem was “too free,” with phishing links spread through the platform’s message groups, airdrops and other “deceptive methods.”
Although the Telegram messenger typically requires phone numbers to be tied to an account, Xian explained that phishing risks were higher for users with anonymous numbers.
Users of this nature do not have accounts linked to SIM cards, and as such, their accounts can be lost if they are phished by bad actors on the platform.
As of April, Telegram has an estimated 196 million daily active users and 800 million monthly active users, according to BankMyCell.