Sidechain · settles to Bitcoin
B² Network ticker B2
Summary
Two chains run B² today. User transactions go to the B² rollup (chain ID 223), built from Optimism's OP Stack: one sequencer makes a block every 2 seconds, batches are posted as blob data to B² Hub (chain ID 213), and one state commitment per 600 rollup blocks follows on the Hub. B² Hub runs B²'s forks of the Ethereum proof-of-stake clients Geth and Prysm, with 12-second blocks and a closed validator set. B²'s docs describe another design, with zero-knowledge proofs and data committed to Bitcoin under a time-locked challenge; that commitment page reads TODO and no live deployment was found. B² also says the Hub moved to a Proof of Signal plus Stake consensus in September 2025, yet on 27 September 2026 the Hub explorer still showed 12-second blocks from three fee recipients. 2561215212831
Design
- System
- SidechainB² markets itself as a Bitcoin layer 2 and its docs describe a zero-knowledge rollup that settles on Bitcoin. The running mainnet is an optimistic rollup built from Optimism's OP Stack (chain 223) whose parent chain is B²'s own B² Hub (chain 213), a proof-of-stake network that runs B²'s forks of the Geth and Prysm clients and is operated by a small permissioned group. Bitcoin checks neither chain, and BTC arrives through a custodial bridge. With its own consensus and a custodial bridge to Bitcoin, B² is filed as a sidechain.
- Settles to
- BitcoinBTC enters from Bitcoin through B²'s bridge after six Bitcoin confirmations, and B² says Hub state is periodically committed to Bitcoin Taproot outputs. Bitcoin does not validate B² blocks or enforce withdrawals; the rollup's batches and state commitments go to B² Hub, B²'s own chain, not to Bitcoin.
- Settlement family
- Bitcoin family
- Scarce resource
- Other
- State model
- Accounts
- Finality
- Other
- Who makes blocks
- The rollup has one sequencer: the node guide sends every transaction to a single sequencer endpoint on a third-party hosting domain, and B² lists staking to become a sequencer only as a future use of B2. B² Hub shows 2,046 equal-weight validator keys, all active since its first epoch in April 2024 with none added since, and 50 Hub blocks sampled on 27 September 2026 paid only three fee-recipient addresses. Bitcoin Layers reports three permissioned Hub validators with undisclosed identities.
- Fork choice
- The rollup has no open fork choice: nodes follow the sequencer's blocks and later check them against batch data posted to B² Hub. B² Hub's forked Prysm client follows the chain with the most validator votes, then finalizes checkpoints, but only among its closed validator set, so a few operators decide the canonical Hub chain. Nothing in the reviewed setup lets Bitcoin's most-work chain override either chain.
Qualifications
- System class · Contested. B² calls itself a Bitcoin layer 2 with a layer 1.5 hub; its running software is an optimistic rollup on its own parent chain; Bitcoin Layers files it as an alternative rollup that inherits no Bitcoin security. All agree Bitcoin does not verify B² state. This profile uses sidechain.
- Scarce resource · Contested. B² Hub runs proof-of-stake software with a standard deposit contract, and B²'s tokenomics says users stake B2 to become validators, but every live validator key has been active since the Hub's first epoch with none added later, and no reviewed evidence shows B2 or BTC stakers choosing blocks. In practice permission, not an open resource, decides who produces blocks.
- Finality · Partial. A rollup block is the sequencer's promise until its batch reaches B² Hub; Hub checkpoints then finalize it, but only by the votes of a few permissioned operators. There is no stage at which Bitcoin finality applies to B² transactions.
- Data availability · Partial. Batch data is posted as blobs to B² Hub, which keeps them for about nine days under its configuration, and the Hub's operators are permissioned. B²'s docs also describe copies in decentralized storage and inscriptions on Bitcoin; neither was verified.
- Proof system · Contested. B²'s rollup page describes a zkEVM with STARK and SNARK proofs, but the node guide runs Optimism's op-geth and op-node, the explorer is configured as an optimistic rollup, and it lists numbered state commitments from a designated proposer with no dispute games.
- Bitcoin proof verification · Not applicable. The docs describe committing proof checks to Bitcoin Taproot scripts with a time-locked challenge. The commitment page reads TODO and the committer software was last changed in May 2024; no live deployment was found to assess.
- Consensus upgrade · Contested. B² says B² Hub moved from proof of stake to Proof of Signal plus Stake, weighting validators by AI-agent signals, on 18 September 2025. B²'s public Pulsar code is a CometBFT-based repository last updated in October 2025, while a year later the Hub still produced 12-second blocks from three fee recipients, and B²'s node guide still pointed rollup nodes at the Hub's proof-of-stake consensus endpoint.
- Upgrade authority · Applies. Bitcoin Layers says a centralized party can immediately upgrade specific B² system contracts. The B2 token contract lets its owner pause all transfers and mint new tokens up to the cap. In July 2026 B² said an attacker had gained unauthorized access to the upgrade authority of its B2 staking contract, and it suspended staking.
Tradeoffs
- Emphasizes
- Scalability Contested
- Gives up
- Decentralized operation and trust-minimized custody: one sequencer orders rollup blocks, a small permissioned group runs the parent chain that holds the rollup's data, rollup nodes are configured to trust B²-hosted parent-chain endpoints, and BTC on B² depends on a custodial multi-party signing wallet rather than on Bitcoin's rules.B²'s docs and posts say the network inherits Bitcoin's security through Taproot commitments and proofs. Bitcoin Layers says it currently inherits no security from Bitcoin, and this review found no Bitcoin-enforced check of B² state or withdrawals, so the security corner is not listed and the reading is marked contested. Scalability here means cheap EVM execution kept off Bitcoin, not a measured rate.
- Full node at home
- Practical at home 121320B²'s rollup node guide asks for 4 vCPUs, 8 GB RAM, a 1 TB NVMe drive and a two-way internet connection it lists as 100 MBps, which a home machine can meet. The guide sets the node to trust B²-hosted Hub endpoints for parent-chain data, and no guide for running an independent Hub node was found, so a home node rechecks rollup execution but not the Hub operators. Hub blobs expire after a fixed window, about nine days under the Hub's consensus settings; B² publishes a recovery runbook for nodes that fall behind it.
- Throughput claims
- Unclassified: 200 2830Unclassified; do not compare.Milliseconds from submission to a pre-confirmation reply, as claimed by B² for its Pulsar engine; a latency claim, not a transaction rate.B²'s post mentions a stress test of 1 million transactions, but gives its results only as an image, states no hardware, network or method, and does not tie the figure to that test. A pre-confirmation is an early promise from validators, not settlement; B²'s own post says it still needs on-chain confirmation. B²'s Hub explorer still showed 12-second blocks from three fee recipients on 27 September 2026, so whether the engine behind this claim serves the live rollup was not confirmed.
Scaling layers
No scaling layer recorded in this profile.
Capabilities
| Capability | How it is provided | Notes and sources |
|---|---|---|
| Account abstraction | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Atomic swaps | Unknown | No protocol-level trust-minimized swap was found. EVM contracts could implement hash-locked swaps, but none was reviewed, and any swap involving BTC on Bitcoin still depends on the custodial bridge. |
| Authenticated data publication | Unknown | Not yet assessed under this row's current definition. |
| Light clients | Unknown | Not yet assessed under the current definitions; no light client for B² was found. B² describes threshold-signature light clients for the Hub as a feature, but no implementation was reviewed, and the Hub's validator set is closed. 1 |
| Native staking or delegation | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| On-chain governance | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Parallel execution | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Payment or state channels | Unknown | No payment or state channel layer anchored to B² was found. |
| Programmable spending | Native (protocol or core-team software) Earlier definition | Contracts run on an EVM with Cancun-era rules active from genesis, written in Solidity with standard tools. Bitcoin wallet users can act through smart accounts from Particle's BTC Connect, which B²'s guide says was deployed on testnet. 101116 |
| Protocol-verified messaging | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Reversible transfers or recovery | Unknown | Not yet assessed under the current definitions; the earlier review found no protocol feature for cancelling, delaying or recovering payments. The rollup page describes account recovery and revocable sub-accounts as part of its zkEVM account design, and B²'s agent accounts are said to support social recovery, but no cited source shows either live on mainnet. 13 |
| Rollups | Unknown | B²'s tokenomics lists staking across other rollups on B² Hub as a future use of B2, but no rollup other than B²'s own was found settling on the Hub. B² itself is not a rollup on Bitcoin; see the class note. 14 |
| Shielded transfers | Structured assessment pending | Not yet assessed for any chain. |
| Signed partial offers | Unknown | Not yet assessed under this row's current definition. |
Reading these values
- How this feature is provided
- Built into the protocol, core-team software or independent software says where a feature lives and who can change it. These are implementation layers, not quality: core-team software is not closer to the protocol than independent software.
- Structured assessment pending
- The shared review has not assessed this feature for any chain yet (Account abstraction, Native staking or delegation, On-chain governance, Parallel execution, Protocol-verified messaging and Shielded transfers). That does not mean it is absent, and a chain’s profile may already describe it.
- Unknown
- The review has not established this for this chain under the current definition; the note beside it says why. Unknown is not absent and not a low score. A feature reads “Not present” only when a source shows it is absent.
- Earlier definition
- Payment or state channels, Programmable spending and Rollups keep the earlier definition until the next fact-check. There, “Native” does not separate the protocol from core-team software, “Ecosystem software” does not say who publishes it, and “Partial” does not say which layer.
- Reading across rows
- The list of capabilities is incomplete. Do not read these rows as a chain leading or lagging overall.
Ecosystem & custody
| Product type | Status | Notes and sources |
|---|---|---|
| Automated market makers | ThinGlowSwap | GlowSwap publishes B² mainnet addresses for a concentrated-liquidity AMM with a swap router and position manager, and DefiLlama tracks it on B² as a Uniswap V3-style exchange. Whether any other exchange operates on B² was not established, and GlowSwap's operator and liquidity were not reviewed. 3234 |
| Issuer-native stablecoins | Unknown | B² announced its BTC-backed U2 stablecoin as launched on 1 September 2025, but its docs give no U2 contract address; the explorer shows a token named U2 Stable Coin with three holders. USDT and USDC on B² are bridged: neither Circle's nor Tether's network lists name B². 4725303536 |
| Algorithmic stablecoins | Unknown | No algorithmic stablecoin with material usage was verified. The explorer shows satUSD, named Satoshi Stablecoin V2, a third-party dollar token whose design was not reviewed and is not assumed to be algorithmic. U2's docs describe a mint path that uses derivative hedges, but the only U2 token found had three holders. 426 |
| Bridges | First-partyB² official bridge (Bitcoin to B²), Meson, Symbiosis, Hyperlane, Echo Bridge, TeleSwap | B²'s bridge takes BTC from Bitcoin after six confirmations; its guide still said on 27 September 2026 that withdrawal is not yet available, and the bridge app itself could not be checked because B²'s site is region-blocked here. Meson's own list shows B² with BTC, USDC, USDT, ETH and POL. DefiLlama lists the other routes, which were not reviewed. Risk: Bitcoin cannot enforce this bridge, and B²'s bridge guide says its withdraw function is not yet available, so no documented official route returns BTC from B² to Bitcoin. Bitcoin Layers says deposits go into a multi-party signing wallet managed by B² and a custodian, with fewer than five individual signers publicly announced, and that a central party can immediately upgrade specific system contracts. The custodian Cobo announced in 2024 that it co-manages B²'s bridged assets with B² using multi-party signing. Other BTC tokens on B², such as uBTC, uniBTC and stBTC, rely on their own custodians. 82629313334 |
| Block explorers | First-partyB² Network explorer (Blockscout), B² Hub explorer (Blockscout) | Both explorers run Blockscout software on B²-operated sites and read B²'s own chain data; they are not an independent check of the operators. The rollup explorer is configured as an optimistic rollup whose parent chain is the Hub. Other explorers were not reviewed. 7222324 |
| Hardware wallets | Unknown | See custody rows: Trezor and Ledger recognize the B2 token only as a token on BNB Smart Chain, a copy on another chain. Neither lists the B² network itself or the BTC used as gas on it, and B²'s docs name no hardware wallet, so hardware-wallet use on B² is undocumented rather than ruled out. 373839 |
Hardware-wallet custody
| Device maker | Status | What users can and cannot do |
|---|---|---|
| Ledger | UnknownSame as native: Unknown | Cannot: Find B² Network among the networks in Ledger's asset registry Cannot: Rely on a Ledger coin page for B² or B2: every page tried returned 404, and the readable first page of Ledger's supported-assets list does not name itLedger's asset registry lists BSquared Token (B2) on BNB Smart Chain under the contract address B²'s guide gives. That is a token copy on another chain, not custody on the B² network or of the BTC used as gas there, so it does not count here. Signing B² transactions through a general EVM wallet paired with a Ledger was not documented by Ledger or B² and was not tested. 9383940 |
| Trezor | UnknownSame as native: Unknown | Cannot: Use a Trezor-listed B² network: Trezor's BSquared Network page lists only BNB Smart Chain Cannot: Find Trezor guidance for the BTC used as gas on B²Despite its BSquared Network title, Trezor's page is a token page for B2 on BNB Smart Chain, which a Trezor Safe 3, 5 or 7 can hold through Trezor Suite, MetaMask or Rabby; that token copy does not count as custody on B². B² runs an EVM, so using a Trezor with B² itself through MetaMask or Rabby may work, but neither Trezor nor B² documents it. 37 |
Public data
iKnow Blockchain has no public-data lookups for B² Network yet. This is a limit of the service, not a statement about the network.
| Lookup | Status | What it covers and its limits |
|---|---|---|
| Address or account | Not available yet | Public-data lookups for this chain are not built yet. |
| Tokens and assets | Not available yet | Public-data lookups for this chain are not built yet. |
| NFTs | Not available yet | Public-data lookups for this chain are not built yet. |
| Transactions | Not available yet | Public-data lookups for this chain are not built yet. |
Sourced developments
Developments: Review overdue Reviewed Sep 27, 2026; next review was due Oct 7, 2026, 12:00 UTC.
Publication date · newest first
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B² rollup nodes switch from data snapshots to importing published block files
B² changed its rollup node guide so new nodes load history by importing block files that B² publishes in ranges of about 500,000 blocks, instead of downloading a full snapshot of another node's data directory. Archive-node instructions were merged into the same guide.
- Implementation:Documented
- Release:guide updated
- Activation:applies to new node setups
Sources: B² Network (GitHub) — Replace snapshot downloads with geth import for rollup nodes (external site) · B² Network Documentation — Deploy a rollup node (external site)
-
B² publishes a recovery runbook for rollup nodes stuck after long outages
B² added an operator runbook for rollup nodes that fall so far behind that the batch data they need has already expired from B² Hub, which keeps blobs for a limited period. The fix stops the normal derivation software, feeds the node the current chain tip from a public B² endpoint, and resets its safe and finalized markers.
- Implementation:Documented
- Release:runbook and scripts published
- Activation:available to operators
Sources: B² Network (GitHub) — Add b2 op-geth catch-up/recovery runbook and scripts (external site) · B² Network Documentation — OP-Geth Catch-Up & Recovery Runbook (external site) · B² Network Documentation — Deploy a rollup node (external site)
-
B² documents its multi-signer price oracle for B² mainnet
B² added a developer guide for its oracle service, which publishes BTC, uBTC, WBTC, uniBTC and USDT prices on B² mainnet. A coordinator gathers median prices from four exchanges, and the on-chain contract accepts a new price only with valid signatures from at least 3 of 4 signers. Feeds are offered through Chainlink-style and Supra-style interfaces.
- Implementation:deployed per guide
- Release:documentation published with mainnet addresses
- Activation:contracts listed for chain ID 223
Sources: B² Network (GitHub) — Add B2 Oracle Service Guide (external site) · B² Network Documentation — Integrate B² Network Oracle Services (external site)
-
B² reports unauthorized access to its B2 staking contract and suspends staking
B² said it had found a security incident in its B2 token staking service: someone had gained unauthorized access to the staking contract's upgrade authority. B² suspended B2 staking, said the issue was contained and promised to compensate affected users in full, with unstaking handled through support tickets. News reports put the loss at about 8.59 million B2, which the attacker sold on BNB Smart Chain.
- Implementation:incident reported by B²; staking suspended
- Release:not a protocol release
- Activation:suspension announced 22 July 2026; later status not verified
Sources: Metaverse Post — B² Network Suffers $3.86M Exploit, Offers Attacker Legal Immunity For Partial Refund (external site) · CoinDesk — Bitcoin, Ethereum-linked protocols lose $35 million in multiple attacks hours apart (external site)
-
B² announces B² Mind, an AI agent skill platform
B² announced B² Mind, a service in which AI agents turn a user's plain-language request into planned on-chain actions drawn from a library of skills, then ask the user to sign. B² says skills never hold private keys or send transactions themselves, and that each plan is simulated and risk-rated before the user confirms.
- Implementation:announced as launched
- Release:not a protocol release
- Activation:availability not independently verified
Source: B² Network — B² Network on Medium (RSS feed) (external site)
Topics your AI can explain
Your AI can explain these topics for B² Network through the connection, with sources.
Known gaps
What this profile's review did not establish:
- No throughput figure is listed; the only speed claim found is B²'s unmeasured pre-confirmation latency claim, filed as unclassified.
- Whether B² is a Bitcoin layer 2, an alternative rollup on its own parent chain or a sidechain is contested; this profile files it as a sidechain for the reasons in its class note.
- The operators of B² Hub are not published. The three-operator reading rests on Bitcoin Layers and a 50-block fee-recipient sample taken on 27 September 2026.
- Who runs the rollup sequencer (B² or a hosting provider) was not confirmed; the node guide points at a sequencer endpoint on a third-party hosting domain.
- B²'s claim that Hub state is committed to Bitcoin Taproot outputs was not verified; no Bitcoin transactions were traced, and the committer software was last updated in May 2024.
- Whether the Pulsar engine and Proof of Signal plus Stake consensus are live anywhere, and how they relate to the Hub that rollup nodes use, could not be confirmed.
- Who holds the BTC behind the official bridge rests on Bitcoin Layers (a multi-party signing wallet managed by B² and a custodian, with fewer than five signers publicly announced) and on Cobo's 2024 announcement that it co-manages B²'s bridged assets; B²'s current docs name no signers, and B²'s website was region-blocked for this review, so the current bridge and withdrawal status could not be checked.
- The Hub's validator key count, its blob retention window and its client versions were read by the original reviewer from B²'s public Hub consensus endpoint on 27 September 2026; the verification pass did not query chain endpoints and re-confirmed only the 12-second blocks, the three fee recipients, the Hub's April 2024 start and the Geth and Prysm lineage, from B²'s explorer and GitHub.
- How the July 2026 staking-contract incident happened, whether compensation was completed and whether B2 staking has resumed were not verified; B²'s own statement on X could not be read, and the account here relies on news reports quoting it.
- B²'s tokenomics says B2 pays gas on B² Hub, while the Hub explorer labels its fee coin with a placeholder name; this was not reconciled.
- No official U2 contract address was found; the only U2 token seen on the explorer had three holders.
- The rollup's withdrawal path to B² Hub, its challenge window and who may post state commitments were not reviewed.
- Third-party bridges other than Meson, the custody of wrapped BTC tokens such as uBTC, uniBTC and stBTC, and the design of satUSD were not reviewed.
- GlowSwap's operator and liquidity were not reviewed.
- Ledger and Trezor list only the B2 token on BNB Smart Chain; hardware-wallet use on B² itself was not tested.
- Whether Particle's BTC Connect smart accounts are live on B² mainnet was not verified; B²'s guide says testnet.
- No light client, payment or state channel, or other rollup settling on B² Hub was found.
- Audit reports for B² contracts were not read for this profile.
Sources
Oldest dated source check: Source checked Sep 27, 2026 Next check due Oct 27, 2026.
- Core Modules Overview (external site)
- B² Hub (Layer 1.5 PoSg Consensus) (external site)
- B² Rollup (Bitcoin Layer2) (external site)
- U2 Stablecoin (BTC-Collateralized Settlement Layer) (external site)
- B² Nodes (external site)
- B² Commitment (external site)
- Basic information (external site)
- Bridge to B² Mainnet (external site)
- Add B2 token on BNB Chain (external site)
- Write a contract (external site)
- Integrate Particle Account Abstraction (external site)
- Deploy a rollup node (external site)
- OP-Geth Catch-Up & Recovery Runbook (external site)
- Tokenomics (external site)
- nodes/rollup.json (mainnet rollup configuration) (external site)
- nodes/genesis.json (mainnet genesis) (external site)
- B2Token.sol (external site)
- pulsar (external site)
- b2-committer (external site)
- B² Hub consensus configuration (beacon API) (external site)
- B² Hub active validators (beacon API) (external site)
- The B² Network Blockchain explorer (external site)
- B² Network explorer configuration (external site)
- b2hub mainnet explorer (external site)
- Explorer token search for U2 (external site)
- Explorer ERC-20 token list (external site)
- Explorer list of state commitments posted to B² Hub (external site)
- Hub explorer list of recent B² Hub blocks (external site)
- Cobo Partners with B² Network to Enhance Advanced Bitcoin Layer 2 Infrastructure with Co-Managed MPC Custody Solution (external site)
- B² Network on Medium (RSS feed) (external site)
- Bsquared Network review (content/layers/bsquared.ts, source of bitcoinlayers.org/layers/bsquared) (external site)
- Contract Address (external site)
- Meson supported chains and tokens (relayer API) (external site)
- Protocols dataset (external site)
- USDC contract addresses (external site)
- Supported Protocols (external site)
- BSquared Network wallet (external site)
- Ledger crypto-assets service, tokens with ticker B2 (external site)
- Ledger crypto-assets service, network list (external site)
- Ledger Supported Coins & Tokens (external site)
Report an error
Found something wrong or out of date? Reporting is free, and every chain goes through the same process. Published corrections appear in the public log.
Funding disclosure
Funding disclosures appear here when an upkeep arrangement exists, in the form “Upkeep funded by [name]; verdicts unaffected.” The funder ledger has not been published yet. Neutrality & funding