Introducing Zenith: Zano's move to pure Proof of Stake
-
Zenith looks like a major improvement for Zano, particularly in confirmation speed, removal of the PoW dependency and preservation of private staking.
My main concern is whether HF7 is also being used as an opportunity to begin Zano's post-quantum preparation.
Microsoft now targets a scalable quantum computer by 2029, while US Executive Order 14412 has already turned post-quantum migration into a current engineering programme. This does not mean that Ed25519 will necessarily be broken in 2029, but designing, reviewing, deploying and completing a blockchain migration takes years.
Zano has a specific custody exposure: every unspent output publishes a one-time public key P = xG. The permanent wallet address may remain hidden, but if elliptic-curve discrete logarithms became tractable, the corresponding one-time spending secret x could be recovered directly from the output. Faster blocks and confirmations do not remove that exposure.
I am not suggesting that a complete post-quantum version of Zarcanum and Zenith must be finished before HF7. A more realistic first step would be to use HF7 to introduce:
- explicit cryptographic-domain versioning;
- support for a hybrid custody output requiring both classical and post-quantum authorization;
- wallet migration and backup foundations;
- and a clearer separation between Zenith's consensus semantics and its current elliptic-curve eligibility proof.
Zenith is not the problem. It may be the best opportunity to make an orderly cryptographic transition possible before it becomes an emergency.
-
Balance privacy isn't the only concern for PoS, it is secondary to the issue of consensus.
PoS allows anyone with capital to purchase a large stake and this influence and eventually control the platform. This happens over time, usually slowly. Any mainstream financial institution or interested party can buy Zano and thus become a dominate stake holder, which is contrary to the privacy and freedom goals of what Satoshi Nakamoto invented blockchain tech for in the first place.
-
-
Balance privacy isn't the only concern for PoS, it is secondary to the issue of consensus.
PoS allows anyone with capital to purchase a large stake and this influence and eventually control the platform. This happens over time, usually slowly. Any mainstream financial institution or interested party can buy Zano and thus become a dominate stake holder, which is contrary to the privacy and freedom goals of what Satoshi Nakamoto invented blockchain tech for in the first place.
@fbirde If this was intended as a response to my comment, I should clarify that this is not primarily a question of balance privacy. The risk I described concerns ownership and custody: if the current elliptic-curve assumptions fail, an attacker may be able to recover or reproduce the witness material required to spend outputs or forge protocol proofs.
PoW versus PoS is a separate consensus debate. Retaining PoW would not remove the need for an orderly post-quantum migration of Zano’s transaction and custody mechanisms.
-
@fbirde If this was intended as a response to my comment, I should clarify that this is not primarily a question of balance privacy. The risk I described concerns ownership and custody: if the current elliptic-curve assumptions fail, an attacker may be able to recover or reproduce the witness material required to spend outputs or forge protocol proofs.
PoW versus PoS is a separate consensus debate. Retaining PoW would not remove the need for an orderly post-quantum migration of Zano’s transaction and custody mechanisms.
@Yep balance visibility was the main point I took away, sorry if I failed to grok the larger issue of encryption integrity.
I tend to believe the "quantum computing threat" is more fearmongering than actual reality, and I live accordingly, especially since I can't do much or anything about it personally.
I started out in crypto 13 years ago on a PoS project (BitShares & its' successors) and I came to realize the inherent flaw of PoS systems as a tool to provide financial freedom. "He who owns the gold makes the rules" is an ancient maxim that applies. PoS based consensus is corruptible by external inputs (mainstream finance) from the very institutions and forces that Satoshi Nakamoto invented blockchain tech to oppose.
-
@Yep balance visibility was the main point I took away, sorry if I failed to grok the larger issue of encryption integrity.
I tend to believe the "quantum computing threat" is more fearmongering than actual reality, and I live accordingly, especially since I can't do much or anything about it personally.
I started out in crypto 13 years ago on a PoS project (BitShares & its' successors) and I came to realize the inherent flaw of PoS systems as a tool to provide financial freedom. "He who owns the gold makes the rules" is an ancient maxim that applies. PoS based consensus is corruptible by external inputs (mainstream finance) from the very institutions and forces that Satoshi Nakamoto invented blockchain tech to oppose.
@fbirde Thanks for clarifying. Since this thread is specifically about Zenith, your broader concerns about Proof of Stake are certainly relevant. I was the one who introduced the post-quantum dimension because Zenith itself will eventually need to operate under different cryptographic assumptions.
Recent theoretical advances have substantially reduced the estimated quantum resources required to solve the elliptic-curve discrete-logarithm problem on comparable 256-bit curves. That does not mean that a practical attack exists today, but it does reduce the planning margin available for redesigning, reviewing, deploying and completing a protocol migration.
There is also a broader and worthwhile question about which consensus model is better suited to the quantum era. My own view is that a private Proof-of-Stake system such as Zarcanum and Zenith may ultimately be better positioned than Proof of Work, provided that its ownership, authorisation and eligibility mechanisms are migrated in time.
That comparison probably deserves a separate thread of its own. Ideally, HF7 should already introduce hybrid authorisation. At minimum, it should establish the transaction formats, wallet support and architectural boundaries required for an orderly post-quantum transition, rather than leaving Zano to improvise an emergency migration later.
-
@kwibs
"PoW emission gone, 21,600 $ZANO a month that no longer gets partially sold by miners"Is it safe to assume that those ZANO will now be PoS rewards?
-
When this thread started, Zenith was expected to be HF7, following HF6 and the introduction of Gateway Addresses.
Now that HF7 has instead become the emergency recovery fork and Gateway Addresses are temporarily disabled, could Zenith become the next hard fork, effectively HF8?
If Zenith is already sufficiently advanced, would there be advantages in deploying the new consensus first and then reintroducing Gateway Addresses v2 on top of it?
That would allow Gateway v2 to be designed, tested and audited directly against Zano's long-term pure-PoS consensus, rather than against the current hybrid model shortly before another major consensus change.
The obvious downside would be timing: if Zenith still requires substantial implementation and testing, this could delay Gateway v2, ZEL and the integrations that depend on them.
How is the team thinking about that trade-off at this point?
-
When this thread started, Zenith was expected to be HF7, following HF6 and the introduction of Gateway Addresses.
Now that HF7 has instead become the emergency recovery fork and Gateway Addresses are temporarily disabled, could Zenith become the next hard fork, effectively HF8?
If Zenith is already sufficiently advanced, would there be advantages in deploying the new consensus first and then reintroducing Gateway Addresses v2 on top of it?
That would allow Gateway v2 to be designed, tested and audited directly against Zano's long-term pure-PoS consensus, rather than against the current hybrid model shortly before another major consensus change.
The obvious downside would be timing: if Zenith still requires substantial implementation and testing, this could delay Gateway v2, ZEL and the integrations that depend on them.
How is the team thinking about that trade-off at this point?
Yes, that's right. Since HF7 was used for the network recovery, Zenith is moving to HF8. The numbering change shouldn't affect the work already done, and we hope progress continues as planned.
It's still too early to give an ETA. After what happened, we won't rush anything. Gateway Addresses will stay disabled until we've fully reassessed and audited that code without time pressure, and we're applying the same standard to Zenith and ZEL. The goal is to have everything fully audited, including by third parties, so it's as solid as we can make it before anything goes live.
You've laid out the sequencing trade-off well: Gateway v2 built against the long-term PoS consensus versus the delay that could mean for ZEL and the integrations that depend on it. We're not in a position to commit to an order yet. We'll share how that plays out, and what it means for the roadmap, in an official update rather than guessing here.
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login