a16z Crypto updates Jolt zkVM and questions the industry's misuse of the "ZK" concept

The venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz's A16z Crypto recently published a blog post providing a technical update on its open-source Jolt zkVM, while also pointing out the widespread misuse of the "ZK (zero-knowledge)" concept in the current industry.

A16z stated that many so-called zkVMs do not actually possess true zero-knowledge properties unless an additional costly "wrapping" process is performed. This process typically requires recursive proofs to re-verify the zkVM's proofs in another proof system that genuinely has zero-knowledge characteristics, which not only incurs high computational costs but often necessitates the introduction of a "trusted setup," thereby sacrificing system transparency.

The article noted that in many developer contexts, "zk" has gradually been used as a synonym for "succinctness," meaning small proof size and fast verification speed, rather than true zero-knowledge privacy protection. A16z believes that as the industry's demand for privacy protection increases, this conceptual conflation is becoming problematic. True zero-knowledge proofs should focus on safeguarding the sensitive data privacy of the prover, rather than merely providing an efficient verification mechanism.

Meanwhile, A16z also announced the introduction of the NovaBlindFold folding scheme for Jolt zkVM to enhance its privacy capabilities, making the virtual machine more suitable for privacy-related application scenarios.