Zcash Shielded News | Vol.46
Decentralized Off-Ramp in Zashi, ZF Q2 Transparent Report, FROST 2.2.0 Release, Shielded Aid Initiative, Crosslink Workshop #3, ''The Magic Cup'' ECC Updates + Tutorial of the Week
Zcash Shielded News is a community article format based on the weekly Zcash Ecosystem Digest Newsletter.
Providing insight on current events and informing the community about important news in the Zcash ecosystem.
Check out the best Highlights below!
This year we’ve had many exciting integrations, such as Brave x Shielded ZEC announced in April, Metamask Snap last month, and now decentralized Off-Ramps for Shielded ZEC on Zashi, closing August on a high note.
With this new tool, you can swap ZEC for ETH — for example — easily and conveniently with Zashi & NEAR. Even better, the process is straightforward and extremely user-friendly, making it ideal for crypto beginners.
How does it work?
Open your Zashi (download it if you don’t already have it) and go to “More” → Swap
Enter the amount of Shielded ZEC 🛡️
Add the wallet address of the cryptocurrency you want to receive/swap into
Check that the information is correct and confirm
Why is it important?
Since you’re swapping from a shielded address, your address, balances, and transaction history remain fully protected, giving you greater control over your data, money, and sovereignty.
For any questions, and to make your experience smoother, we’ve published a step-by-step tutorial on our social channels.
If you find any bug or run into a related issue, the ECC/Zashi team is actively present in the Zcash Global Discord server → ⚡┊zashi, along with the community ready to help you. ☺️
For more details → https://x.com/zashi_app/status/1961060025964667311
The Zcash Foundation’s transparency reports aim to update us on the foundation’s contributions to the Zcash ecosystem in recent months. In them, you’ll find the executive director’s note, expenses, developments, and detailed work.
If you’re not up to date with the latest from the Zcash Foundation, dive in:
Development
Zebra
In Q2, the Zebra team advanced efforts toward Zcashd deprecation by fixing bugs, improving stability, and enhancing RPC methods to align with Zcashd. Key updates included support for negative heights and better transaction reporting, ensuring a smoother transition for ecosystem partners.
The team also prepared for NU6.1 and the audit of frost-tools, while prioritizing collaboration with other Zcash organizations through active reviews and issue resolution.
FROST
The FROST project incorporated final audit recommendations, improving code clarity and error handling, and strengthening its reference implementation for future wallet integration.
This quarter also saw key performance gains through sighash context caching and RPC usability updates. Additionally, Zebra was enhanced to support shielded addresses in mining configurations.
DevOps
From a DevOps perspective, the team improved CI reliability by streamlining Docker management and speeding up automated tests, enabling faster, more consistent developer feedback.
ZF | Use of Funds
During Q2 2025, ZF's monthly operating expenses averaged approximately $259,096 USD. The breakdown of resource allocation is as follows:
General overhead covers non-labor costs (e.g., accounting, HR, banking, insurance, legal, operations, website, trademarks).
Team compensation includes all pay and benefits for ZF staff and contractors.
Unaudited, subject to change.
ZF Programs
This table and the chart on the following page explain what type of programs ZF invested in during Q2.
Q2 Financial Snapshot
Blog Posts:
Video Playlist
Still on the topic of the Zcash Foundation, on August 28 they published another update for FROST, which includes:
Security Fix:
This release adds validation for the min_signers parameter in frost_core::keys::refresh. Previously, lowering min_signers didn’t reduce the threshold, causing failed signatures and potential security risks.
To prevent this, min_signers is now validated. Anyone who refreshed shares with a smaller value should migrate to a new key.
Other Changes:
MSRV is now 1.81, with all crates no-std except frost-ed448. New DKG refresh functions were added, along with serialize_whole / deserialize_whole for VSS commitments.
A post_generate method in Ciphersuite enables more flexible configs. Docs and test coverage were also improved.
For full details, please refer to the release notes.
From day one, Zcash has stood for a simple truth: privacy is a human right.
Today, the Zcash Foundation is bringing that mission to humanitarian aid through the Shielded Aid Initiative (SAI) a program designed to protect vulnerable communities where privacy isn’t just technical, it’s lifesaving.
Traditional blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum may offer transparency, but in humanitarian contexts they expose sensitive data, putting recipients at risk of exploitation or harm. Zcash solves this with privacy-preserving technology powered by zero-knowledge proofs, allowing aid organizations to deliver secure, compliant, and censorship-resistant assistance.
The initiative is built on three pillars:
Privacy = Protection from surveillance and abuse.
Privacy = Compliance with humanitarian data standards.
Privacy = Sustainability for long-term, secure aid programs.
The Shielded Aid Initiative helps NGOs integrate privacy into their systems, ensuring aid delivery strengthens both safety and dignity. The message is clear: in humanitarian aid, privacy must be the norm, not the exception.
OBS: This is just a summary of the full message published by the ZF. We encourage you to read it for more details (important).
Shielded Labs has finished Milestone 3 on time 🎉! This phase focused on building the “Crosslink”, a bridge that connects Proof-of-Stake (PoS) and Proof-of-Work (PoW) blocks so they can talk to each other.
The zebra-crosslink prototype now:
Connects PoW ↔ PoS blocks through special header fields
Shows these connections in a built-in visualizer
Lets the roster be manually edited (add, remove, or change voting power)
The team also set up an early persistent testnet, which soon anyone will be able to join as an observer.
Next milestone: permissionless BFT roster management and staking tokenomics. A detailed blog post is coming soon.
The workshop took place on August 27 at 5pm UTC in the Zcash Global server and featured participation from several community members.
On Sunday, Josh shared a great message with the community. We highly recommend your read on this one.
Here are the ECC's updates from the last week.
Zashi
Progress made: ✔️
Swap from ZEC with NEAR Intents released to production.
Progressing on CrossPay flow. Nearly ready for internal testing
First iteration of Swap to ZEC designs in review.,
Upcoming: ➡️
Finish CrossPay, test, gather feedback.,
Focus: NEAR -> ZEC, Maya, Multi-Account.
🍎 │ IOS Analytics:
📈Unique Installs: 9.71k (prev. 9.39k )
⬇️Total Downloads: 11.6k (prev. 11.5k)
⭐AppStore Rating: 4.9*
🤖 │ Android Analytics:
📈Total Install Base: 3.93k (prev. 3.86k)
⬇️Total Installs (incl. Open Beta): 22.1k (prev.21.9k)
⭐PlayStore Rating: 4.31* (prev.4,304)
Zcash Core 🦓
Progress made: ✔️
Merged in-memory wallet backend.,
Merged zcash_script#253,
Reported Zebra bugs.,
Drafted NU timing ZIP,
Fixed ''expired unmined'' transaction issue,\
Finished ''send max'' for Zashi.
Upcoming: ➡️
Getting close to the release of Zallet alpha.,
Finishing NU6.1,
Review other users' bug reports.
Others 🌐
Josh participated in an X Space with Juan & Nillion, which had over 800 attendees between X & Discord
Submitted ECC's coinholder grant application to Adjy for design.
Worked with Transak on the upcoming grant proposal for ZEC support.,
Voted in Coinholder Poll to Ratify Retroactive Program (20k ZEC Weiht),
Scheduled next week's Privacy WG meeting: Treasury RPC on illicit activity, EU AMLR & CEX privacy coins, Privacy Tech Fly-in (10/17),