ConCert

A framework for smart contract verification in Coq.

See the Papers for details on the development. ConCert can find real-world attacks as explained here, here, and here.

How to build

Our development works with Coq 8.17 and depends on MetaCoq, and std++. The tests depend on QuickChick. The dependencies can be installed through opam.

Branches compatible with older versions of Coq can be found here.

Install dependencies and build ConCert locally

Installing the necessary dependencies requires the opam package manager and a switch with Coq 8.17 installed. If you don't already have a switch set up run the following commands

opam switch create . 4.10.2 --repositories default,coq-released=https://coq.inria.fr/opam/released
eval $(opam env)

To install the dependencies run

git clone https://github.com/AU-COBRA/ConCert.git
cd ConCert
opam install ./coq-concert.opam --deps-only

After completing the procedures above, run make to build the development, and make html to build the documentation. The documentation will be located in the docs folder after make html. Example smart contracts can be built by running make examples.

Install ConCert and dependencies

To install ConCert in your switch run

git clone https://github.com/AU-COBRA/ConCert.git
cd ConCert
opam install ./coq-concert.opam

Examples can be installed by running

git clone https://github.com/AU-COBRA/ConCert.git
cd ConCert
opam install ./coq-concert.opam --with-test

Structure of the project

Each folder contains a separate README file with more details.

The embedding folder contains the development of the verified embedding of λsmart to Coq.

The execution folder contains the formalization of the smart contract execution layer, which allows reasoning about interacting contracts, and perform property-based testing. The test folder contains the property-based testing framework. The key generators used for automatically generating blockchain execution traces for testing can be found in TraceGens.v. The testing framework was developed as part of a Master's Thesis at Aarhus University, and the thesis detailing (an earlier state of) the development can be found here.

The extraction folder contains an extraction pipeline for smart contract languages. Currently, we support smart contract languages Liquidity and CameLIGO, and general-purpose languages Elm and Rust as targets. Pretty-printers to these languages are implemented directly in Coq. One can also obtain an OCaml plugin for Coq by extracting our pipeline using the standard extraction of Coq (currently, it is possible for extraction to Rust).

The examples folder contains examples of smart contract implementations, embedding, extraction, and tests. Extracted smart contracts can be found here.

Notes for developers

The project consists of four subprojects: embedding, execution, extraction, and examples located in the corresponding folders. Each subproject has its own _CoqProject file and Makefile. The Makefile in the root folder dispatches the calls to the corresponding subproject.

Documentation

The project documentation in HTML format is generated for each build. We use the standard Coqdoc with improved styles and scripts of CoqdocJS (license) and local table of contents by TOC(license).

Papers

"Extracting functional programs from Coq, in Coq". Danil Annenkov, Mikkel Milo, Jakob Botsch Nielsen, Bas Spitters. Journal of Functional Programming (JFP), Volume 32, 2022, e11. DOI: 10.1017/S0956796822000077

Cite paper
``` @article{annenkov_milo_nielsen_spitters_2022, author={ANNENKOV, DANIL and MILO, MIKKEL and NIELSEN, JAKOB BOTSCH and SPITTERS, BAS}, title={{Extracting functional programs from Coq, in Coq}}, volume={32}, DOI={10.1017/S0956796822000077}, journal={Journal of Functional Programming}, publisher={Cambridge University Press}, year={2022}, pages={e11} } ```
"Finding Smart Contract Vulnerabilities with ConCert’s Property-Based Testing Framework". Mikkel Milo, Eske Hoy Nielsen, Danil Annenkov, and Bas Spitters. FMBC 2022.

Cite paper
``` @InProceedings{milo_et_al:OASIcs.FMBC.2022.2, author = {Milo, Mikkel and Nielsen, Eske Hoy and Annenkov, Danil and Spitters, Bas}, title = {{Finding Smart Contract Vulnerabilities with ConCert’s Property-Based Testing Framework}}, booktitle = {4th International Workshop on Formal Methods for Blockchains (FMBC 2022)}, pages = {2:1--2:13}, series = {Open Access Series in Informatics (OASIcs)}, ISBN = {978-3-95977-250-1}, ISSN = {2190-6807}, year = {2022}, volume = {105}, editor = {Dargaye, Zaynah and Schneidewind, Clara}, publisher = {Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik}, address = {Dagstuhl, Germany}, URL = {https://drops.dagstuhl.de/opus/volltexte/2022/17183}, URN = {urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-171834}, doi = {10.4230/OASIcs.FMBC.2022.2}, annote = {Keywords: Smart Contracts, Formal Verification, Property-Based Testing, Coq} } ```
"Formalising Decentralised Exchanges in Coq". Eske Hoy Nielsen, Danil Annenkov and Bas Spitters. CPP 2023.

Cite paper
``` @inproceedings{10.1145/3573105.3575685, author = {Nielsen, Eske Hoy and Annenkov, Danil and Spitters, Bas}, title = {Formalising Decentralised Exchanges in Coq}, year = {2023}, isbn = {9798400700262}, publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery}, address = {New York, NY, USA}, url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/3573105.3575685}, doi = {10.1145/3573105.3575685}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 12th ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Certified Programs and Proofs}, pages = {290–302}, numpages = {13}, keywords = {smart contracts, Coq, decentralized finance, blockchain, software correctness}, location = {Boston, MA, USA}, series = {CPP 2023} } ```
"Code Extraction from Coq to ML-like languages". Danil Annenkov, Mikkel Milo and Bas Spitters. "ML'21" at ICFP'21.

Cite paper
``` @article{annenkovcode, title={Code Extraction from Coq to ML-like languages}, author={Annenkov, Danil and Milo, Mikkel and Spitters, Bas}, year = {2021}, url = {https://icfp21.sigplan.org/details/mlfamilyworkshop-2021-papers/8/Code-Extraction-from-Coq-to-ML-like-languages}, location = {ML’21 at ICFP’21,} } ```
"Extending MetaCoq Erasure: Extraction to Rust and Elm". Danil Annenkov, Mikkel Milo, Jakob Botsch Nielsen, and Bas Spitters. Extended abstract. The Coq Workshop 2021.

Cite paper
``` @article{annenkovextending, title={Extending MetaCoq Erasure: Extraction to Rust and Elm}, author={Annenkov, Danil and Milo, Mikkel and Nielsen, Jakob Botsch and Spitters, Bas}, year = {2021}, url = {https://dannenkov.me/papers/extraction-rust-elm-coq-workshop2021.pdf}, location = {Coq Workshop 2021} } ```
"Extracting Smart Contracts Tested and Verified in Coq". Danil Annenkov, Mikkel Milo, Jakob Botsch Nielsen, Bas Spitters. CPP'21.

Cite paper
``` @inproceedings{ConCert-extraction-testing, author = {Annenkov, Danil and Milo, Mikkel and Nielsen, Jakob Botsch and Spitters, Bas}, title = {Extracting Smart Contracts Tested and Verified in Coq}, year = {2021}, isbn = {9781450382991}, publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery}, url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/3437992.3439934}, doi = {10.1145/3437992.3439934}, pages = {105–121}, numpages = {17}, location = {Virtual, Denmark}, series = {CPP 2021} } ```
"Verifying, testing and running smart contracts in ConCert". Danil Annenkov, Mikkel Milo, Jakob Botsch Nielsen, Bas Spitters. Coq Workshop 2020.

Cite paper
``` @article{annenkovverifying, title={Verifying, testing and running smart contracts in ConCert}, author={Annenkov, Danil and Milo, Mikkel and Nielsen, Jakob Botsch and Spitters, Bas}, year = {2020}, url = {https://cs.au.dk/fileadmin/site_files/cs/AA_pdf/COBRA_Paper_-_Verifying__testing_and_running_smart_contracts_in_ConCert.pdf}, location = {Coq Workshop 2020} } ```
"ConCert: A Smart Contract Certification Framework in Coq". Danil Annenkov, Jakob Botsch Nielsen, Bas Spitters. CPP 2020.

Cite paper
``` @article{ConCert, title={ConCert: a smart contract certification framework in Coq}, ISBN={9781450370974}, url={https://dx.doi.org/10.1145/3372885.3373829}, DOI={10.1145/3372885.3373829}, journal={Proceedings of the 9th ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Certified Programs and Proofs}, publisher={ACM}, author={Annenkov, Danil and Nielsen, Jakob Botsch and Spitters, Bas}, year={2020}, month={Jan} } ```
"Smart Contract Interactions in Coq". Jakob Botsch Nielsen, Bas Spitters. 1st Workshop on Formal Methods for Blockchains, 3rd Formal Methods World Congress, October 2019.

Cite paper
``` @inproceedings{smart-contract-interactions, author = {Jakob Botsch Nielsen and Bas Spitters}, title = {Smart Contract Interactions in Coq}, booktitle = {{FM} Workshops {(1)}}, series = {Lecture Notes in Computer Science}, volume = {12232}, pages = {380--391}, publisher = {Springer}, year = {2019} } ```

Videos

A video collection, presenting various parts of ConCert can be found on YouTube.

Projects using ConCert

https://github.com/siimplex/ConCert Solana integration in ConCert
https://github.com/AU-COBRA/OVN A verified implementation of the Open Vote Network protocol, combining proofs of correctness in ConCert with proofs of cryptographic security in the SSProve framework
https://github.com/AStenbaek/ATPL-Project A verified implementation of an auction smart contract
https://github.com/FrederikVigen/ConCert Verification of the Wrap Protocol - a decentralized bridge between Ethereum and Tezos.
https://github.com/JosefGIT/ConCert Verified implementations of blind auction and e-commerce smart contracts
https://github.com/malthelange/CLVM/tree/master An interpreter for the DSL for financial contracts called CL, written as a smart contract in the ConCert framework.

AU-COBRA / ConCert

readme