Expert foresees ZK proofs on Ethereum mainnet

ZK proofs could enable private transactions on Ethereum mainnet.

A privacy feature secured by zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP) could be applied to the Ethereum mainnet. The claim is made in исследовании by Salus Security co-founder Mirror Tanga and his colleagues.

The document explores ways to use ZK-SNARK to enable private transactions using the Solidity programming language.

According to Tanga, implementing the solution’s functionality at a basic level could eliminate the need for L2-networks.

“If we can use computational optimization to incorporate ZKP technology into Solidity, we could significantly reduce gas fees on Ethereum itself,” the study states.

As a result, transaction activity would be concentrated on the mainnet rather than in disparate L2 ecosystems, Tanga explained.

The document cites technical barriers to deploying ZK-SNARK on Ethereum.

For example, Solidity currently executes one transaction at a time, which will require finding ways to implement multi-threading.

There will also be a need to enable auditing of the solution to verify its security.

ZK-SNARK relies on verifiers who submit precise proofs to external verifiers without disclosing information, which implies additional storage requirements at the verification stage.

According to Tanga, in the absence of these barriers, integrating the solution into Solidity could enhance privacy and resilience to MEV, enabling private transactions and voting on existing Ethereum projects.

Expedited verification would improve blockchain performance overall, he noted.

If the research progresses, the authors will disclose the source code. The co-founder of Salus Security expects that the community and venture capital firms will take an interest in the initiative.

The Iron Fish launched its mainnet after two years of development. The network uses the consensus mechanism Proof-of-Work and ZK-SNARK technology.