Zcash Team Plans January Rollout of Quantum Proof Payments

Developers behind Zcash want to introduce signatures that can hold up against quantum computers by January, although the network has no confirmed activation date. Roman Akhtariev, an engineer on the Zakura node software, said post-quantum signature opcodes are scheduled for that month. The new instructions let the network check hash based signatures.

Since forging one means beating the hashes themselves, a breakthrough against current wallet keys would not automatically crack the replacement. The plan follows Justin Drake’s “bunker mode” warning that AI might find a shortcut through wallet mathematics “in months, not years.” Ethereum aims to finish its own migration by December 2029, and no practical attack on wallet keys has been shown.

Zcash Transparent Pool Holds 70% of Coins

About 11.96 million of the 16.98 million ZEC issued sit in the transparent pool, which behaves like bitcoin with visible addresses. That is why the upgrade targets it first. ZEC close friday near $1,235, down roughly 4% on the week.

Private Balance Checks and Shielded Pool Risks

Fresh addresses can leak links between them when a wallet checks balances. Zakura’s lookup tool uses private information retrieval, so a server returns a record without knowing which one was requested. A test version runs in the Vizor wallet under “Private queries.” The shielded pool still needs separate work, because attackers could store encrypted records today and try decrypting them later.