Zcoin is not a clone of Zcash in anyway. They're both based on different academic papers. Zcoin IMPLEMENTS the Zerocoin technology and is the first coin to do so. Zcash implements Zerocash technology which built on the Zerocoin paper and sought to address some of its usability shortcomings but because of that introduced its own set of issues such as high computational cost and more risk in the trusted setup since you can't absolutely determine supply. Zerocoin (which Zcoin implements) takes up more storage space in exchange for lower computational costs when creating private transactions and also doesn't obscure amounts since it uses fixed denominations to mint the coin (1,25,50,100 etc).

The trusted setup mechanism is also not the same in Zcoin and doesn't involve the founders destroying keys. Full details here which you can also independently verify:
https://github.com/zcoinofficial/zcoin/wiki/Parameters-in-set-up-phase-for-Zerocoin-in-ZCoin

Gary Le and Poramin Insom are the devs of this project with Poramin doing most of the coding.

The Zerocoin implementation works (you can try it for yourself) and it is indeed supported by Roger Ver

https://news.bitcoin.com/zero-knowledge-zcoin-launching-soon/

Check the disclaimer:
"Disclaimer: Bitcoin.com owner Roger Ver is invested in ZCoin. "

Not a fork of anything.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ZCoinProject/comments/59tefn/zcoin_is_not_a_zcash_fork_get_it_right/

Well I guess it's a Bitcoin fork like most other alt coins too but has Zerocoin technology built on it. The Zerocoin tech was not forked from Zcash.

Also until I hit the 30 post mark, my images on the OP won't show due to BCT guidelines. I'll talk more

Hi Jeremy, do contact me on Slack on #mining and we can see if we can help you out. The block height parameter is going to be capped soon and we're testing code before pushing it.

Those who think spinning up a coin with a Zerocoin implementation is a simple task, I think the fact that Zerocoin being so widely cited by academics yet this is the first and only implementation of it speaks volumes. There were many scaling issues that needed to be overcome for it to be even a working implementation.

With a much smaller budget, focus was more on getting the working implementation up and even then there are still hurdles to overcome. I think for the most part, Zcoin has achieved this.

I think anyone who has been involved with many other good quality coin projects with smaller budgets have seen how it takes time for what outsiders may see as basic marketing info. This is rapidly being worked on.

With the Vertcoin history, when Poramin founded Vertcoin he was joined by Boris and Erik who came in as core-devs and therefore Poramin took a back seat. Boris and Erik were subsequently replaced by Adam and James and the last release was a couple of months ago in 17 June 2016. James is now studying in MIT and Adam is working on his own startup. Poramin did consider coming back to Vertcoin to help develop EVM and that is still a possibility in the future when things settle down with Zcoin but his priority and focus now is with Zcoin and the investors who backed the project. The MTP algorithm change is quite an urgent piece of work.

For updates on github, only code that has undergone some testing goes on github. For e.g., Poramin's work with the temporary algo fix is not pushed until it's tested (which he is testing right now). Similarly MTP algo work is only pushed when there is something working.

As for Poramin's meetup with the professor, this clarified certain issues with the implementation of MTP as certain things were not properly notated in the paper and thus was confusing. Once that was clarified, the path to implementing MTP is much clearer and should be done faster than originally planned.

The official stand is that we are continuing to work on it and some people have agreed to help out however we have not made any statement on whether it will be added or not although of course we remain positive.

Volume has only recently tapered off and it was holding close to 100 BTC volume daily (and not even during the 'hype' phase). Even when it was on Nova exchange, volume was pretty healthy.

Many people have questioned on "What's the status of listing and why aren't u doing anything for Poloniex?" hence the answer above.

Zcash and the paper it's based on Zerocash (http://zerocash-project.org/media/pdf/zerocash-extended-20140518.pdf) is pretty cutting edge tech but a lot of people have expressed concerns about it's trusted setup or that if it's compromised, someone can invisibly mint coins.

This is where Zcoin which is based on the earlier Zerocoin paper (http://zerocoin.org/media/pdf/ZerocoinOakland.pdf) steps in and plays a role which is based on much more proven and understood technology and provides comparable levels of anonymity.

For further reading:
https://github.com/zcoinofficial/zcoin/wiki/A-layman's-explanation-on-how-Zerocoin-works
https://www.reddit.com/r/ZCoinProject/comments/59tefn/zcoin_is_not_a_zcash_fork_get_it_right/
https://github.com/zcoinofficial/zcoin/wiki/How-does-Zcoin-compare-to-other-anonymity-methods%3F

Hi all and thanks for all your feedback.

First of all some correction on the terminology as there's a great deal of confusion here. Zcoin is the coin, Zerocoin is the paper that outlines the technology. Zcash is the coin, Zerocash is the paper.

Despite the similar names they're not forks of each other and rely on different cryptographic principles and code. Zcash was never formerly known as Zcoin.

The site zerocoin.org is owned by Ian Miers @imichaelmiers one of the authors in both Zerocoin and Zerocash papers (and now is a Zerocash co-founder hence the link to Zerocash).

Zcoin implements the Zerocoin paper (http://spar.isi.jhu.edu/~mgreen/ZerocoinOakland.pdf), Zcash implements the Zerocash paper (http://zerocash-project.org/media/pdf/zerocash-extended-20140518.pdf).

Different papers with different cryptographic implementations though the papers share common authors. Zerocash's paper indeed begins with an introduction of Zerocoin as well.

Our coin has a working implementation of Zerocoin minting (meaning anonymity feature is working) and you can already do this within our wallet and test it our for yourself!

Although Zerocash is a development from Zerocoin meant to address certain perceived shortcomings of Zerocoin, they are not simple forks of each other and rely on different protocols.

Zerocash was meant to improve on Zerocoin on these issues:
a) Zerocoin still requires a basecoin to convert back before being allowed to spend. Zerocash has no more basecoin
b) Zerocash's proofs are much more efficient and smaller than Zerocoin's
c) Zerocoin uses fixed denominations to mint (1, 25, 50, 100) while Zerocash is not subject to such limitations
d) Greater anonymity with Zerocash since sender/receiver/amount are all obscured.

However Zerocoin's advantage over Zerocash are as follows:
a) While still retaining the basecoin and a lot of the Bitcoin core code, it is a lot easier to integrate to existing Bitcoin merchants/etc.
b) Although Zerocoin's proofs are larger and occupies more storage space, the computational requirements to generate a private transaction are many times faster. Zcash requires large amounts of RAM and minutes of computational time. Zerocoin requires seconds to use and is not memory intensive. Basically Zerocoin uses more storage space but is computationally much less intensive.
c) Parameter generation for both Zcoin and Zcash requires a trusted setup but Zcoin's parameters are arguably less controversial. (https://github.com/zcoinofficial/zcoin/wiki/Parameters-in-set-up-phase-for-Zerocoin-in-ZCoin). A zero trust parameter setup is also within our roadmap.
d) Most importantly is that in Zcoin, total supply is still visible so if there's a flaw and someone is secretly creating coins for themselves, this can be much more easily detected. With Zcash, if a flaw is exploited, it may be almost impossible to detect as someone can mint coins for themselves without being detected.
e) Zerocoin's tech is much more reviewed and better understood than Zcash's. Zcash's use of zero knowledge proofs uses ZK-Snarks is much more experimental and only a handful of people understand it.

Here at Zcoin, we believe that multiple zero-knowledge cryptocurrency implementations is a blessing to society. Like Zcoin, Zcash is also enabling individual freedom and open commerce to the world by increasing financial privacy. We applaud the work that the Zcash team is doing. With that in mind, it is important to understand the inherent tradeoffs between the Zerocoin and Zerocash protocols. Zcoin has some major advantages over Zcash, as well as significant disadvantages. By increasing awareness of these tradeoffs, privacy-centric users can more effectively use either coin tailored to their concerns and specific use cases.

You may also read more at our blog post. https://zcoin.io/zcoin-and-zcash/

Zcoin is not a fork of Zcash. Zcoin uses the Zerocoin paper while Zcash uses the Zerocash paper.

A quick comparison of the papers even if you're not technical would show you that they're very different.
Zerocoin: http://zerocoin.org/media/pdf/ZerocoinOakland.pdf
Zerocash: http://zerocash-project.org/media/pdf/zerocash-extended-20140518.pdf
Both these papers have common authors and Zerocash built on Zerocoin.

For more info: http://blog.zcoin.tech/zcoin-and-zcash/

Implementing an academic paper into a working implementation is not so simple. Why do you think Zcash took so long?

A previous post has also dealt with this: https://www.reddit.com/r/ZCoinProject/comments/59tefn/zcoin_is_not_a_zcash_fork_get_it_right/


I don't know why you say Zcoin has anon devs. They're pretty clear in their website who they are. Poramin Insom and Gary Le.

https://zcoin.io/about/


Indeed.
Examine the source information instead of relying on third party postings. The source information has been provided to you above.

For a layman's explanation of how it works. Taken from our Wiki.

Most cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin rely on public ledgers. This means that all transactions are public, and the history of a coin can be traced from its inception, and all the transactions that it has been involved in.

Although the ownership of addresses are not known, through advances in statistical analysis and other meta-data (such as IP, time, use of exchanges), researchers have managed to reasonably accurately tie ownership of addresses to a real life identity.

As the blockchain forms a permanent record, they can be endlessly analyzed and once the identity is revealed, all the history of the coin is also tied to the identity.

This can be problematic for example if someone used Bitcoin to do some illegal activity and that particular Bitcoin somehow ended up in your hands, you may be implicated just by virtue of being in possession of that Bitcoin. Furthermore, if you are business or merchant, you may not want competitors to have knowledge of your transactions. With a public and transparent blockchain like Bitcoin's, this may be problematic to achieve.

Some have tried to make it harder to do this by using coin mixers/tumblers. However, this involves trusting that the mixer/tumbler will not steal your money and also is not secretly recording how the coins are being mixed.

Zerocoin technology, which Zcoin uses allows the anonymization of coins that doesn't require you to put your trust in a mixer.

The easiest way to visualize Zerocoin tech is a black box, where everyone who wants to anonymize their coins places their coins in it. When they are ready to spend the coin, they produce a proof that they did place coins in the box, but the proof does not state which coin they placed. The proof could refer to any of the millions of coins in the box, and nobody knows which coin the proof is referring to. The proof simply states that the creator of the proof has placed a coin in the box, without giving any specific information about which coin it is. When other people see this proof, they have no idea who created this proof but are mathematically convinced that it is a valid proof. If the proof is valid, the proof entitles the proof creator to create a new coin with no transaction history and not related to any of the coins in the box, provided that it is of the same value. This means there is no linkage between the deposit transaction into the box and the redemption transaction whereby a coin is taken from the box.

The innovative part of Zerocoin is how this proof is generated where although you deposited the money into the box (and this transaction is recorded in the blockchain), you are somehow able to prove that you deposited into the box, without revealing which 'deposit' transaction was originally yours, hence the term 'zero knowledge proof'.

Just to keep you updated on what's going on behind the scenes:

The current mining algorithm is Lyra2 with T=2, R=Block_Height_Number and C=256. This was meant to be a stop gap solution to make the coin ASIC resistant until a better mining hashing algorithm is found.

We believe we have found that in the form of MTP (Merkle tree based proof of work): https://arxiv.org/pdf/1606.03588v1.pdf

MTP was devised by the same guys who came up with Equihash (used in Zcash) but offers some benefits over Equihash.

First if solves the 'progress-free' issue on Equihash:

Extract from the paper:


Secondly, we believe it has a faster verification than Equihash based on this paper
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity16/sec16_paper_biryukov.pdf

This is of the utmost importance now especially for pool operators which require a lot of memory to run it successfully hence the frequent crashes on mining pools. This doesn't affect exchanges or users.

Today we overcame a technical difficulty that was holding development back a bit on MTP but are now back in full swing in implementing this and hope to complete before our estimated time of 4-5 months barring unforseen difficulties.

For further details, visit our Roadmap which will be updated from time to time.

There was the reindex issue but that had been fixed very quickly.

They're quite different in cryptographic principles but both used Zero knowledge proof and are anonymous.

https://zcoin.io/zcoin-and-zcash/

Check this out for more details

Let's focus more on Zcoin but just for accuracy:

From wikipedia:

They have a tail emission.

Its main emission curve will issue about 18.4 Million coins to be mined in approximately 8 years.[8] [9] (more precisely 18.132 Million coins by ca. end of May 2022[10] [11]) After that, a constant "tail emission" of 0.6 XMR per 2-minutes block (modified from initially equivalent 0.3 XMR per 1-minute block) will create a sub-1% perpetual inflation (more precisely [see ref. above] starting with 0.87% yearly inflation around May 2022) to prevent the lack of incentives for miners once a currency is not mineable anymore.[12] The emission uses a smoothly decreasing reward with no block halving (any block generates a bit less monero than the previous one, formula: Emission per 2-minutes block = max(0.6, floor((M − A)×2−19)×10−12) XMR, with M = 264 − 1 and A = 1012 times the amount of XMR already emitted).

Notice a few questions coming up:

"Loads of new coins are being issued each day"

Zcoin follows the same release schedule as Bitcoin's.

"Why another privacy and anonymity coin? What additional benefit does Zcoin offer over existing anonymity solutions?"

Bitcoin and preceding alternative cryptocurrencies have attempted to solve this problem through the use of transaction mixers or ring signatures. However existing methods do not score that well on the traceability set. The traceability set is a key metric to understanding how private a cryptocurrency is. The traceability set in formerly proposed solutions is limited by the size of the mixing cycle or ring signature. Each mixing cycle or ring signature is limited by the number of transactions per cycle, which is transitively limited by the the block size of the cryptocurrency. Thus, the traceability set in previous attempts at privacy tends to only be a few hundred.

With ZCoin, the traceability set is on a dramatically higher magnitude. Instead of having a traceability set limited to the few hundreds, ZCoin has a traceability set that encompasses all minted coins in the ZCoin system. Thus, the magnitude of the traceability could be in the order of millions, rather than hundreds. So its privacy level is magnitudes higher than all previous cryptocurrency.

The other problem is that tumbling methods are only secure under the assumption of a lack of topological analysis and pre-existing network data, which is an incorrect threat model. There are multiple research papers demonstrating that taking a separate network topology like Facebook can be used to de-anonymize a cryptocurrency as long as a long chain of transaction history exists. With all previous cryptocurrencies, a long chain of transactions is publicly viewable on the blockchain and prone to topological analysis.

With ZCoin, this long chain of transaction history simply does not exist, and there is zero information leakage about the sender and receiver of a transaction, so it is not prone to topological analysis and so the link between the sender and receiver disappears.

ZCoin uses zero-knowledge cryptographic proofs. A zero-knowledge proof  is a method in which one person can prove to another person that a given statement is true, without conveying any information apart from the fact that the statement is indeed true.

"Where are the bounties going to?"

The great majority of the coins being spent from the founder's reward is going towards bounties, some of which may be cashed out. We are considering releasing general categorization of how the bounties are spent.

Of the bounties we're looking at right now that are open to the public:

• Get a top DNM to accept Zcoin: 1000-5000 XZC (depending on size of DNM)
• Assistance with implementation of MTP mining algo: Contact us.

"Your coin is being mined by botnets!"

Our Lyra variant is meant to be CPU friendly until we can implement the MTP protocol which is more RAM intensive and therefore less friendly on botnets. From information on the pools and in fact many of the largest miners are public and open about their mining, the vast majority of them are using AWS via cheap AWS credits (https://aws.amazon.com/awscredits/) which can be obtained from attending certain events, webinars, or using some Quick Starts or buying from other people who have the AWS credits. They are not mining 'for free' but are spending their money and time to get a return. Although we haven't looked at the AWS TOS in detail, this may or may not be a breach of their TOS and there are some early indications that some of them are having their credits removed.

Hi all, the original post has been updated with more information. Will continue to update this but the roadmap and some common questions on Zcash vs Zcoin are all there now.

Please see our note regarding bounties: https://zcoin.io/note-regarding-bounty

Multisig transactions actually are possible with Zerocoin.

Please see point 2 in this blog: https://zcoin.io/zcoin-and-zcash/