💡 Fact of the Week
Did you know? Zodl does not currently have an official desktop wallet.
Zodl is currently distributed through official mobile channels, including the Apple App Store, Google Play, F-Droid, and GitHub. Any desktop application claiming to be Zodl should be treated as a scam
📩 In today’s edition
🚨 Zebra 6.4.2 Fixes High-Severity Remote Crash Vulnerability
• Zebra 6.4.2 fixes a high-severity vulnerability that could allow a remote peer to crash affected nodes, with operators running 6.4.0 or 6.4.1 advised to upgrade.
🌐 Nym Mixnet Goes Live in Zcash Wallets
• Nym completed its ZCG-funded network privacy work, with Zingo and Zkool now integrating the mixnet to help protect users’ network metadata.
🌸 Zakura Launches NU7 Monitoring Dashboard
• Zakura launched a dashboard for monitoring NU7, alongside a testnet faucet and tools for participating in the staging network ahead of the official testnet activation.
🦓 Zcash Foundation Engineering Update | Sep. 7–20
• The latest engineering update covers faster mining, lower transaction fees, node reliability, security improvements, and early work toward NU7.
🔄 Proof-of-Concept Demonstrates Trustless Shielded ZEC-to-EVM Swap
• A new proof-of-concept demonstrated a trustless atomic swap between shielded ZEC and an EVM chain without a centralized intermediary or new Zcash signing primitives.
🛡️ Shielded Zcash Activity Hits Four-Year High
• ZODL reported 62,379 shielded transactions in a single week, marking the highest weekly level of shielded activity on Zcash since 2022.
Zebra 6.4.2 Fixes High-Severity Remote Crash Vulnerability
This Monday, the Zcash Foundation released Zebra 6.4.2 as an emergency security update after discovering a high-severity vulnerability that could allow a remote peer to crash affected Zebra nodes with a malformed network message.
The issue affected Zebra 6.4.0 and 6.4.1, which have since been recalled. The vulnerability could disrupt node availability but did not affect user funds or Zcash consensus. Node operators running either affected version are strongly encouraged to upgrade directly to 6.4.2.
Nym mixnet now live in Zcash wallets
On September 24, Nym announced the completion of its ZCG-funded work to bring network-level privacy to Zcash wallets through the Nym mixnet. Zingo & Zkool have already integrated the technology, helping hide network metadata such as a user’s IP address when interacting with Zcash infrastructure.
The integration complements Zcash’s on-chain privacy by protecting the network layer underneath shielded transactions. Nym also released open-source tools and documentation that allow other wallet developers to route Zcash traffic through the mixnet, with additional wallet integrations now being explored.
Zakura Launches NU7 Monitoring Dashboard
Zakura has launched a new dashboard for tracking NU7 as Zcash prepares for its next network upgrade. The dashboard currently monitors a staging testnet, giving users an early look at 25-second blocks ahead of the official NU7 testnet activation on October 6.
Alongside the dashboard, Zakura released a testnet faucet for obtaining TAZ and a simple guide for joining the staging network with a Zakura node. The dashboard will transition to monitoring the official NU7 testnet once it goes live.
Zcash Foundation Engineering Update | September 7–20, 2026
This engineering update covers work on faster mining, lower transaction fees, node reliability, security, and early NU7 development. Several Zebra improvements that were still in development during the reporting period have since shipped in the 6.4.x release series.
Zebra now precomputes block templates in the background to reduce miner wait times, uses a first-seen rule when choosing between competing chains with equal work, and supports a lower conventional fee of 1,000 zatoshis per logical action, down from 5,000. New shielded-pool metrics were also added to improve compatibility with existing monitoring tools.
The team also restored several transaction validation checks that had been lost during development work involving shared Zcash libraries. These issues affected development code only and were never present in published Zebra releases. Additional work improved peer handling, testing, monitoring, and compatibility for operators still relying on zcashd wallet functionality.
Since the update was published, much of this work has shipped in Zebra’s 6.4.x release series. Development is now continuing toward NU7 support ahead of the planned November 5 network upgrade.
Proof-of-Concept Demonstrates Trustless Shielded ZEC-to-EVM Swap
A new proof-of-concept has demonstrated a trustless atomic swap between shielded ZEC and an EVM chain on the Zcash and Ethereum Sepolia testnets. The prototype enables the exchange without a centralized intermediary or new Zcash signing primitives, while keeping the ZEC side shielded.
The approach combines properties of Zcash transaction IDs with SPV-style verification to enable programmable swaps across the two networks. The project remains experimental, with further work underway on finality and zero-knowledge verification before the design can be considered ready for production use.
Shielded Zcash Activity Hits Four-Year High
Shielded activity on Zcash reached its highest weekly level since 2022, with 62,379 shielded transactions recorded between September 14 and 20. ZODL highlighted the milestone on September 22, with the week ranking among the highest periods of shielded activity in Zcash history.
The figure represents the fourth-highest weekly total in Zcash history. The data covers activity across Zcash’s shielded pools, including Sapling, Orchard, and Ironwood, providing a broader picture of privacy-preserving transaction activity across the network.