I want to recognize the events of the past few weeks in the United States and around the world. Crucially, it’s important to recognize that Black lives matter. These protests underscore the need for change, the need for new equitable power structures, and the need for technology that protects human rights and dignity. In times of historic change and global crisis, we believe it is more important than ever to empower people and build an alternative system, which is what our work has always stood for.
Here are the updates from this week:
- Kevin Owocki wrote a guest blog post on ECC discussing the upside of Quadratic Funding for Zcash.
- Zcash Foundation welcomed two new team members – Jane and Teor. Congrats to ZF and welcome Jane and Teor!
- Deidre Connolly has an excellent write up on E2EE web apps. The blog breaks down key challenges for successful end-to-end encryption on web apps.
- ICYMI – here is the recording from the Gardening club this past week
- Ecosystem Alert: Developers can now integrate moonpay as a fiat on ramp. Got questions? Ask @aserrano
Mark your calendars,
- Wed, 6/10: Open sourcing zECC wallet source code.
- Fri, 6/12, Nuestra Privacidad – Protégela: Aprende sobre la crisis de privacidad en América Latina y cómo proteger sus datos”. Registrarse. Originally this call was scheduled for this Friday, the event has been postponed to next week.
- Mon, 6/15, ECC is partnering with Gitcoin for the Protect Privacy Hackathon. Developers are invited to compete for $6000 in bounties. Register here.
- Tues, 6/30, Zeal Call: We’re spotlighting hackathon submissions and Presidio Principles with special guest Sheila Warren from the World Economic Forum. More info here. Register here.
Community Shout Outs – Shout out to Garreth Davies for updating the latest numbers on shielded txns, Mario Laul and Peter Van Valkenburgh for joining Zooko on the Messari Mainnet panel, to Kevin Owocki for the guest blog post, and lastly to oxarbitrage, rex4539, dannywilliams, solardiz, adityapk00 for contributing community PRs.
Documentation updates:
- Added markdown support: works side-by-side with .rst pages
- Added wallet threat model page
- Updated mining page
- First-pass left hand organization of pages
DevInfra updates:
- Completed testing and release processes for v3.0.0-rc1 and v3.0.0
- Fixed/Updated Lightwalletd instances
- Completed initial Android AAR Tekton builder
Core updates:
- Produced the 3.0.0 Release, Heartwood mainnet activation will occur at a block height of 903000 (mid-July)
- Finalized all the NU4 ZIPs in preparation for the specification audit which started Monday, June 1st
- Added TZE support to Transaction Builder, getting close to having a branch ready for BOLT to test using Testnet-in-a-Box!
- Made good progress on Rust refactorings
Security updates:
- Wallet assessment complete, report in draft! → will go on blog
- Reviewed fuzzer automation with devinfra
- Fuzzing challenge prep material done → Kick-off on Monday!
Wallet updates:
- Security finished the wallet audit, addressing security concerns
- License review and remedied all conflicts
- Intermediate reorg testing done on iOS and almost done on Android
- Lightwalletd and Darksidewalletd working reliably
- Published custom BIP 39 implementation
This week in privacy, messaging app Signal now lets you blur faces in photos. Every photo app should have this feature. Google is getting sued for possibly violating federal wiretap laws. Brave browser now has end-to-end encrypted video calls. Newly released documents show that the Department of Homeland Security has been monitoring Black Lives Matter members since Ferguson.
In crypto news, leaked EUROPOL report shows growing concerns for Wasabi wallet and dark market activity, Coindesk reports . The Blockchain Association summarizes the RAND report detailing common misconceptions about Zcash and illicit use. Calibra, originally the wallet for Facebook’s Libra has rebranded . Some Tornado Cash users might be compromising their own privacy based on how they use the app, The Block reports.
