Smart Contract Audit

<p>A smart contract audit is a comprehensive review and analysis of a smart contract’s code and functionality to identify potential vulnerabilities, security flaws, and logical errors.</p>

<p>An audit helps to enhance the security, reliability, and trustworthiness of smart contracts, reducing the risk of data and financial loss or other adverse consequences resulting from vulnerabilities or exploits.</p>

Given the immutable nature of <a href=/dev-blog/578-blockchain-attack-vectors>blockchain technology</a>, once a smart contract is deployed, it cannot be easily modified or reversed. Therefore, it’s crucial to ensure that the smart contract’s code is secure and free from any potential weaknesses that could be exploited by attackers. Submitting your smart contracts to an unbiased third-party audit helps you reach an array of goals:
<ul class=apriorit-list-markers-green>
<li>Get a clear understanding of the cybersecurity posture of your project</li>
<li>Plan future security improvements and product updates</li>
<li>Demonstrate compliance with relevant legislation</li>
<li>Promote the reliability of your product to end users</li>
</ul>

Generally, all projects that rely on smart contracts can benefit from an audit that helps improve contract’s security, performance, and reliability. In Apriorit’s experience, smart contract auditing services are most often requested by companies that deliver:
<ul class=apriorit-list-markers-green>
<li>Decentralized applications</li>
<li>Decentralized finance projects</li>
<li><a href=/dev-blog/770-blockchain-nft-for-businesses>NFTs</a></li>
<li>Crypto tokens</li>
</ul>

A project typically needs a smart contract audit in the following cases:
<ul class=apriorit-list-markers-green>
<li>Before a product release</li>
<li>Before releasing significant updates</li>
<li>Before integrating third-party contracts and elements</li>
<li>After detecting of any malicious activities</li>
<li>During regulatory compliance audits</li>
</ul>
Some Apriorit’s clients also used the results of a smart contract audit as marketing materials to gain the trust of their users.

The duration of a smart contract audit process depends on its complexity: the number of submitted smart contracts, amount of code, types of analysis to run, etc. At Apriorit, the duration of an audit starts at 1-2 weeks.

The <a href=/dev-blog/blockchain-app-development-cost>cost of a smart contract</a> audit depends on factors like:
<ul class=apriorit-list-markers-green>
<li>The size and complexity of a contract</li>
<li>Smart contract’s programming language and target network</li>
<li>Activities to include in the audit</li>
<li>The timeframe for an audit</li>
</ul>
The cost of Apriorit’s smart contract audit starts at around $5,000.

To get a comprehensive assessment of your smart contacts, make sure to:
<ul class=apriorit-list-markers-green>
<li>Formulate the goal and expected deliverables from the audit</li>
<li>Choose an experienced auditor that can prove the quality of their work with client feedback</li>
<li>Discuss the scope of the audit</li>
<li>Provide your contractor with all the information they need</li>
<li>Request a secondary audit after you fix all the issues discovered during the first one</li>
</ul>
These steps allow you to get professional audit for your smart contract and make sure that audit results actually help improve their security.