Zero-Knowledge Proofs: Privacy and Law in Crypto
Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto team says zero-knowledge proofs (ZK-proofs) could protect user privacy while still helping law enforcement fight crime.
ZK-proofs let someone prove information is true without showing the details. For example, they can confirm that money isn’t from crime without revealing a person’s full transaction history.
This comes after Tornado Cash’s co-founder, Roman Storm, was convicted for running a service that hid the origins of crypto, which authorities said criminals used. ZK-proofs could be a middle ground: privacy for users but checks against illegal money.
The technology isn’t only for finance. It could also help in daily life, like proving citizenship without showing a passport.
While ZK-proofs were once slow and hard to scale, new improvements are making them faster and more practical. Even big players like JPMorgan are already using them in private blockchains.
Experts believe privacy tools like ZK-proofs, homomorphic encryption, and multiparty computation can help strike a balance: keeping personal data safe but still allowing compliance checks.
