That would mean users could potentially recover their seed phrase—the private key used to sign trasnactions—as easily as they can reset the password on an email account.

The latest version is EIP-4337 (Ethereum Improvement Proposal 4337), also known as Account Abstraction Using Alt Mempool. The Ethereum (ETH) upgrade would allow users to create non-custodial wallets as programmable smart contracts. This would unlock a number of features, such as easy wallet recovery, signless transactions–which translates into lower transaction fees–and team wallets (also known as multisignature wallets).

According to Buterin, the upgrade could be one of the driving catalysts for Web3 adoption around the world. “One of the key properties we want blockchains to have is that they give you money before you register,” he said.

The idea, he said, is for users to be able to receive any token, like a stablecoin, that isn’t Ethereum with their smart contract wallet and be able to pay the gas fees without having to converthold ETH.