Interactions between a prover and a verifier falls under ZKP as long as the following conditions are met:
Looking at the three conditions above, completeness and soundness are common traits for methods of interactive proof systems. Only by the addition of zero knowledge do the interactions become ZKP. (Read more about ZKP in this .)
The verifier picks a question and asks the prover to answer
Where can it be applied?
By combining ZKP and the technology, use cases where data privacy plays an important role can benefit most.
Authentication systems. These are the systems where a user needs to prove its identity to a second user employing secret information, such as a password, while keeping the secret information itself undisclosed.
Confidential transactions. Typical transactions in public blockchains, such as , will record detailed transfer information. Having the knowledge of specific transaction addresses or user addresses is enough to pinpoint and trace transactions. Using ZKP, critical details such as sender, receiver, what and how much was sent, can be hidden for certain transactions, while still allowing to recognize them as valid.
Anonymous transactions. Some businesses may want to keep transactions anonymous. This includes hiding user identities for both single and multiple transactions. (Hyperledger Fabric v1.2, which supports a special ZKP-based protocol called , is such a .)
At Protofire we started looking at the Aztec Protocol (). They say they are building an efficient zero-knowledge privacy protocol that enable private transactions on . This enables the logic of transactions to be validated, whilst keeping the values encrypted.
We hope to start contributing anytime soon with developers tools, sample applications, and other things to bring massive .
ZKP may just be another method of verification, but its use in is ideal for businesses that require strong data privacy. For more on ZKP and how it can work with , read the .
Published at Mon, 11 Feb 2019 01:39:50 +0000
