I started tracing how a TEE node becomes trusted because I assumed registration would simply record that the node exists. Instead, @OpenGradient requires an AWS Nitro attestation before the node can even participate. That broke my assumption right away. If hardware identity comes before registration, I wasn't sure anymore what registration was actually proving. The next step only made that worse. I expected an ordinary on-chain directory, but found a registry that checks PCR values, binds cryptographic keys, and matches the TLS certificate to the attested identity before it stores anything. By then it wasn't a list of nodes anymore — it was the place where trust gets built.
I kept following the chain to the user connection, still expecting the final layer of trust to come from a traditional certificate authority. Instead, users get their TLS certificate straight from the on-chain registry. The chain runs from AWS Nitro through the registry to the encrypted connection itself. That made me rethink where trust actually starts. I always assumed it started when a certificate was issued. Here it starts earlier — before the node even has a key, before any connection exists. I'm still not quite used to the certificate being the last step instead of the first. #OPG $OPG