Enhancing Bitcoin Ordinals’ Efficiency with Zero-Knowledge Proofs
In response to the mounting network congestion and soaring transaction fees on the Bitcoin blockchain, the integration of zero-knowledge proofs presents a promising avenue. According to insights from a recent CoinTelegraph article, this innovative technology could significantly streamline the verification processes, potentially alleviating the current bottlenecks and reducing costs for users.
Bitcoin has been grappling with significant challenges, driven by increased demand for Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens recorded on the blockchain.
This surge in transaction congestion and fees has led to frustration within the Bitcoin community, especially considering the billions of dollars flowing into some BRC-20 tokens, including memecoins, in recent weeks.
In contrast, the Ethereum ecosystem has seen improvements in network capacity and processing capabilities due to the development of scaling solutions, with zero-knowledge proofs gaining attention. Several projects have adopted this scaling technology.
To explore whether zero-knowledge proofs could address Bitcoin’s challenges, CoinTelegraph conducted an exclusive interview with Eli Ben-Sasson, co-founder of StarkWare, a company focusing on Ethereum and the pioneer of zero-knowledge Scalable Transparent Argument of Knowledge (zk-STARKS).
Zero-knowledge proofs are cryptographic protocols that enable a party to prove the truth of a statement or data without revealing any information. This technology ensures privacy and security while enhancing blockchain capacity by reducing the computational load needed to verify transactions and other on-chain data.
According to Ben-Sasson, Bitcoin, the initiator of his exploration into validity, cryptographic proofs, and zero-knowledge proofs, could benefit from the potential of zero-knowledge proofs:
“Validity proofs and STARKs enable you to efficiently use mathematical integrity to expand the coverage of integrity that a blockchain provides, inviting anyone to participate and contribute more capacity to the network.”
While Bitcoin’s blockchain remains the core source of integrity, zero-knowledge proofs extend its reach and increase capacity, creating a “positive flywheel” effect, according to Ben-Sasson:
“The more capacity you bring, the more social functions can be utilised, whether it’s facilitating micropayments or enabling smart contracts. This, in turn, builds trust in the system and adds more value.”
Ben-Sasson believes Bitcoin can achieve greater integrity and efficiency through the mathematical benefits of validity proofs. He mentioned that Bitcoin developers Greg Maxwell, Gavin Andresen, and Mike Hearn were early proponents of zk-STARK transparent proofs, which do not require trusted setups and remain quantum secure.
The discussion about incorporating zero-knowledge proofs into Bitcoin stems from market demand for additional functionality driven by BRC-20 tokens:
“For BRC-20 tokens to truly possess the level of integrity offered by Bitcoin, a hard fork is required to allow their verification and validation, ensuring Bitcoin’s integrity. This is a significant decision and a point of extensive debate.”
As reported, the startup ZeroSync Association is developing tools powered by zero-knowledge proofs, allowing users to validate the state of the Bitcoin network without downloading the blockchain or relying on third-party verification.
ZeroSync’s validity proof enables users to instantly verify Bitcoin’s chain state, eliminating the need to download over 500 gigabytes of blockchain data required to sync a Bitcoin node.
According to Robin Linus, co-founder of ZeroSync, their chain state proof does not directly solve network congestion but eliminates the need for users to download inscriptions causing congestion on the Bitcoin blockchain.
However, zero-knowledge proofs still hold promise in addressing the current network congestion. Linus noted that ZeroSync has developed zkCoins, a Bitcoin client-side validation protocol processing up to 100 token transactions per second. This protocol utilizes inscriptions but has a significantly lower on-chain footprint compared to BRC-20 tokens and does not contribute to the bloat of the UTXO set.
Linus also emphasized that implementing a zero-knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Argument of Knowledge (zk-SNARK) verifier on Bitcoin’s main layer could enable various scaling solutions, including ZK-rollups, trustless bridges to sidechains, and the potential to peg BTC onto zk
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