Zcash Sprout Launch

Announcement

The Zcash genesis block will be mined on October 28, 2016. This is the launch of a decentralized and open-source cryptocurrency that offers privacy and selective transparency of transactions. Zcash payments allow for transactions to be published on a public blockchain, with the option of keeping the sender, recipient, and amount of a transaction confidential.

Zcash uses a type of zero-knowledge proof called a zk-SNARK, developed by our team of experienced cryptographers. zk-SNARKs allow the network to maintain a secure ledger of balances without disclosing the parties or amounts involved. Instead of publicly listing spend-authority and transaction values, the transaction metadata is encrypted and zk-SNARKs are used to prove that users are spending value they actually have ownership over.

The currency will be supported by many third party providers, including wallets and exchanges. Additionally, there are many open source miners available to the public; they can be found in this repository: https://zcashminers.org/submissions

About Zcash

The Zcash Company is a science-driven team; a combination of academic expertise in computer science and cryptography with security software engineering talent. We are developing the next generation of secure digital currency and blockchain technology through the use of zero-knowledge proofs, to guarantee privacy and confidentiality. We aim to set a new standard for privacy.

The Zcash protocol is a decentralized and open-source cryptocurrency offering total payment confidentiality. Unlike Bitcoin, Zcash transactions can be shielded to hide the sender, recipient, and value of all transactions on the blockchain. It is based on peer-reviewed cryptographic research, and built by a world-class, security-focused engineering team. However, as with any new technology, there is risk involved. Currently the team is focused on building and maintaining an open, permissionless system that is viable, robust, and justifiably reliable and secure for users.

The Team

The scientists, engineers, advisors, counsel, team, and investors can all be found on the Zcash team page.

Quote

Zooko Wilcox, CEO of Zcash says:

“Zcash is a new technology that lets you put encrypted data into a blockchain. Blockchains as they currently exist, don’t offer much (or any) control over the disclosure of the data that you put on the blockchain. Any data that you put in there is visible to all users of the blockchain. Zcash makes blockchains useful for a whole range of applications that the cleartext, fully transparent blockchains cannot be used for; including fintech, healthcare, retail (buying/selling goods or services), etc.

“This October 28th launch of the Zcash protocol is the first of its kind. It is the accumulation of years of academic research, hard engineering work, and diligent security work.

“Zcash is a group of scientists and techies who came up with a way to combine blockchains with data security. These two things are well understood, important, and widely used, and they’ve never been put together before now. That is the blockchain properties — append-only and immutable data; and the encryption properties — confidential and selectively-disclosable data.

“We encourage the Zcash community to experiment with us, and if you have the means, to mine, run a node, and contribute to the network by being a participant. This protocol is nascent; it is still an experiment that will continue to grow and get stronger. Zcash is a consensual currency, a community-based network, and developer-supported cryptocurrency; your active participation only makes this network stronger.”