Gemini, founded by the twins Winklevoss, updated the infrastructure of its wallet, adding support for Bitcoin addresses Segregated Witness (SegWit).
SegWit is a scalable bitcoin solution, first activated at the end of 2017. In addition to increasing the block size, Segwit moves the “witness” signature data to a separate location. Thus, it solves the so-called transaction flexibility that facilitates second-level solutions, such as the Lightning Network (LN).
Claiming that Gemini is the first major crypto-exchanger that launched full, rather than partial support for SegWit, the author of a blog post Brian KimJohnson wrote that Gemini would allow SegWit to be used both for replenishment and for withdrawing bitcoins. The platform also launched support for transaction packaging, he said.
KimJohnson also wrote that Gemini did not make a frivolous decision and that "the choice to use your own SegWit addresses was based on saving space in the unit, as well as on security considerations."
His arguments in favor of SegWit emphasize that due to the separation of digital signatures from these transactions, “Bitcoin transactions weigh approximately 30–40 percent less and this reduces the transaction fee.”
The latest blog post stresses that support will lay the foundation for solutions such as LN, a second-level solution with Bitcoin scalability restrictions, which works by opening payment channels between users that keep most transactions out of the chain.
As previously reported, a large service of crypto-exchange and wallets Coinbase and its professional trading platform Global Digital Asset Exchange GDAX – now known as Coinbase Pro – deployed SegWit support for bitcoin operations in early 2018.
