The Ethereum Foundation Is Rebuilding Its Core with ZK-Proof Technology

Key Points

1. The Ethereum Foundation announced a plan to integrate zk-proof technology directly into Ethereum’s Layer 1, aiming to improve network scalability and efficiency.

2. The project involves changes to validators and the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), allowing validators to verify a single zk-proof per block instead of re-executing all transactions.

3. Upgrades like EIP-2537 are planned for the Pectra hard fork to optimize the execution layer for zk-proof generation.

4. The rollout will begin with optional zk-enabled clients, with initial adoption expected to be low but increasing over time.

5. Performance benchmarks include generating 99% of block proofs within 10 seconds, keeping hardware costs under $100,000, and limiting proof size to under 300 KiB.

6. The proposed model shifts more responsibility to specialized 'builders,' which could pose risks if not implemented carefully.