Changes are coming to Zcash, a privacy coin, and we’re ready for them.
On October 28th the Zcash blockchain will hard fork when block 419,200 is mined, providing the community with a significant network upgrade called Sapling.
You might’ve also heard that back in July we added multi-signature wallet support for the privacy coin, making BitGo the only institutional-grade wallet and custody solution for Zcash.
In preparation for the upgrade, our team has successfully updated our testnet Zcash network to Sapling. We test often and early because client experience, along with security, is a top priority for us at BitGo. While we can’t determine exactly how a network will behave during a hard fork, we can do everything in our power to prepare for possible outcomes.
This upgrade is a meaningful one for Zcash. The Zcash blockchain was developed to provide privacy by way of “shielded” transactions, and Sapling makes that a lot more feasible. The upgrade lessens the time it takes to construct a zero-knowledge proof, a variant of zk-SNARKs (zero-knowledge, Succinct, Non-Interactive Argument of Knowledge).
Zk-SNARKs is a type of cryptography that enables “shielding” of transactions by proving ownership of funds without revealing the transaction data publicly. This function provides verification that the necessary computations were executed correctly, without the information involved in computations being exposed. But in using Zcash, you also have options; you can choose to use either a “transparent” or “shielded” address on the network.
Sapling makes Zcash a more viable cryptocurrency as efficiency of these computations is massively increased.
Not only can these computations now be done exponentially faster (from ~40 seconds to ~3 seconds), while taking up less space (from ~1 GB to ~40 MB), but the upgrade also renders the network functions better suited to mobile use and thus greater adoption.
Zcash themselves describe the Sapling activation as a “culmination of years of research and development, bringing us one step closer to widespread adoption of an open, permissionless and private payment system.”
Josh Swihart, Vice President of Marketing and Business Development at Zash said, “BitGo is a respected and highly trusted custodian and institutional-grade service provider. Their strong support of the Zcash Sapling protocol upgrade and diligence in ensuring uninterrupted service for their customers is a testament to both their belief in the Zcash mission and their high level of professionalism.”
Cryptocurrency development is pushing adoption of blockchain technology forward, and we’re proud to be part of that movement. The work we’ve committed for Sapling has been published to an open-source library, we encourage the community to make use of it. At this time, BitGo supports transparent Zcash addresses which meet our multi-signature security requirements. We may support shielded addresses in the future as upcoming Zcash hard forks are planned to make multi-signature shielded transactions easier to implement.
Sign up for your BitGo multi-signature wallet and learn more about our newest offering, BitGo Custody, here.
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