Dash has moved evolution piece of work on the v0.17 update of its platform to the testnet phase, according to an announcement released on Wednesday. Back in July 2020, Cointelegraph reported that the Dash Core Group was looking to release the platform testnet earlier the end of the twelvemonth.

Equally role of the announcement, Dash revealed that the testnet surround is 5 times larger than Evonet, which is well-nigh exclusively owned by the Dash Core Group. According to Dana Alibrandi, head of product at Dash:

"This is the biggest deployment of Dash Platform, and consequently, this release marks the about pregnant milestone in the realization of Dash'due south long term vision for mainstream adoption."

Detailing the protocol upgrades contained in the v0.17 update, Nuance revealed that it has patched an space credit minting vulnerability. The v0.17 release also includes features to improve full light client support.

With v0.17 now in testnet, Dash said the release of v0.18 is the next item on the calendar. This new upgrade slated for late January or early February will feature more than protocol improvements for light clients as well as enhanced functionality for iOS and Android apps within the Dash platform.

Dash likewise announced the release of DashPay to the public alpha phase. DashPay is a social crypto payments wallet with human-readable addresses via the Dash Platform Name Service layer.

While some other crypto businesses offer human-readable usernames for transactions inside a airtight wallet ecosystem, Dash has previously claimed that its service is native to the blockchain itself.

Other features besides include contact lists and avatars, which the company said will amend payment convenience. The total public launch of the social payment wallet is scheduled for later in 2021.