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DATU Validator Onboarding Packet

Revision: 2025-10-12

Welcome to the DATU validator program. This packet consolidates the minimum artefacts a new operator needs to join the Phase 1 consensus network foundation safely. Share the packet internally with your operations, security, and compliance teams.

1. Contacts & Access

Role Name Contact Notes
Steering committee liaison Sofia Ramirez governance@datu.foundation Approvals, policy clarifications.
Validator operations lead Malik Okoro validators@datu.foundation Technical onboarding and runbooks.
Security incident commander Priya Chen security@datu.foundation Emergency coordination.
Compliance liaison Helena Ibarra compliance@datu.foundation Regulatory attestations and audits.

Access prerequisites:

  1. Submit operator details to the steering committee for KYC/KYB vetting.
  2. Provide SSH fingerprints for bastion hosts and list HSM custodians.
  3. Sign the validator participation agreement and confidentiality addendum.

2. Environment Setup Checklist

Step Description Artefact
1 Clone the DATU Stellar fork repository and review infrastructure/stellar-fork/README.md. Git clone instructions
2 Install Docker Engine 24+ and Docker Compose v2. Local environment
3 Request access to the private container registry (registry.datu.foundation). Credential request
4 Import the validator-specific stellar-core.cfg and Soroban overrides supplied separately. Secure file transfer
5 Validate outbound connectivity to Tier 0/Tier 1 peers (TCP 11625/11626). Network checklist
6 Configure monitoring endpoints to reach the shared Prometheus + alerting stack. Observability instructions

All secrets (passphrases, HSM credentials) must be stored in your organisation's approved secret management system. Do not commit secrets back into this repository.

3. Quorum Participation

  1. Bootstrap – Launch the container profile using ./scripts/stellar-fork/start.sh --with-validators. Confirm your validator's container logs show Loaded peer certificate and Participating in SCP.
  2. History Archive – Configure your S3 bucket or equivalent storage according to infrastructure/stellar-fork/config/history-archives.md (template provided). Validate stellar-core http-command history returns Success.
  3. Soroban Settings – Ensure soroban.toml values match those published in the Phase 1 execution brief.
  4. HSM Integration – Mount the HSM client libraries and expose the PKCS#11 URI or SIGNING_KEY_SEED_PATH via environment variables. Run scripts/stellar-fork/hsm-smoketest.sh to confirm the container can read your credentials and initialise stellar-core.

4. Compliance Requirements

Requirement Evidence Submission Path
Quarterly attestation Signed statement confirming controls were tested. Upload to compliance tracker under your validator ID.
Incident reporting Notify within 1 hour of suspected compromise. Email security@datu.foundation and page incident commander.
Data retention Follow the artifact retention policy. Quarterly audit review.
Public transparency Provide status updates for inclusion in public reports. Governance liaison collects updates monthly.

5. Support & Escalation

  • Operational issues – Open a ticket in the validator support desk (https://support.datu.foundation) and page the on-call engineer via Opsgenie if SLA breach is imminent.
  • Security incidents – Engage the security incident commander immediately and follow the Validator Key Rotation Playbook if keys are impacted.
  • Documentation gaps – Submit pull requests or file an issue tagged docs in the repository. The documentation team reviews weekly.

6. Checklist for Go-Live

Item Owner Status
Connectivity to peers validated Validator operator ☐
History archive catchup successful Validator operator ☐
HSM signing smoke test passed Security engineer ☐
Compliance attestation submitted Compliance liaison ☐
Monitoring dashboards accessible Observability team ☐

Once all items are marked complete, notify the validator operations lead to schedule your inclusion in the next quorum rehearsal.

Document Control – Store the signed acknowledgement page with your internal compliance records. Proposed updates should be submitted via pull request with approvals from validator operations and compliance leads.