7. Address Formats

Kortana supports two address formats transparently, allowing the chain to bridge Ethereum tooling while supporting modern cryptography.

7.1 Secp256k1 Addresses (0x…)

• Format: 20-byte hexadecimal, prefixed with 0x.
• Validation: Enforces EIP-55 mixed-case checksums (using Keccak-256).
• Usage: Used by all EVM contracts, MetaMask, and standard Web3 wallets.

7.2 Ed25519 Addresses (ktn:)

• Format: Base-encoded, prefixed with ktn:.
• Usage: Native to Kortana's core CLI, staking architecture, and KVM module deployments, providing higher security and faster signature verification than ECDSA.

7.3 Address Derivation

Addresses are derived from the public key. For secp256k1, it is the last 20 bytes of the Keccak-256 hash of the public key.

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