Oliver Gale, co-founder of Panther Protocol, discusses introducing zero-knowledge technology to multi-chain

privacy coins and zero-knowledge technology, used by some to obfuscate the sender/receiver’s identity and transaction amount, has gained enormous popularity in recent years due to the increasing number of Regulatory Oversight Against the cryptocurrency sector.but although they Rapid rise in market value, critics continue to scrutinize such assets as an enabler to cover up illicit activity.

In an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph, Oliver Gale, CEO and co-founder of Panther Protocol (ZKP), details the technology behind his privacy-focused decentralized finance or DeFi solution and why it’s necessary for today’s crypto space :

Computed Tomography: How much have you raised from the most recent token sale and what does your roadmap look like from here?

and: In total, we raised over $30 million. For the Panther protocol, we had several rounds of private sales, followed by a 90-minute public sale on November 23rd, during which we raised over $20 million. The second question revolves around the roadmap itself, so Panther Protocol is a multi-chain privacy protocol with several zero-knowledge, data disclosure tools built into it; what we delivered in January was our Minimum Viable Product (MVP).

We have multiple deployments this month. This will provide an MVP allowing staking on Polygon and transfer of ERC-20 tokens to ZKP tokens. Then, I estimate 30 to 60 days later; we will deploy the full v1.0 MVP, which will have a multi-asset privacy pool and a multi-asset staking pool, which are shielded tools where Panther assets can be traded privately. This will also come with a ZK reveal version, which is a mechanism by which users can voluntarily disclose their transaction data for compliance purposes or tax reporting purposes. So that’s what to expect throughout the first quarter.

We have over five EVM-compatible partners that can deploy Panther v1 on Near, Flare, and more. These shielded pools are being deployed on different chains. Our team is then building a ZK-powered exchange across other chains, with the goal of enabling these assets to be exchanged securely, with low fees, and low and high transaction throughput.

Computed Tomography: What is the underlying cryptography behind these assets?

and: So the multi-asset shielded pool is based on ZK-SNARKS. So you have a combination. You know, shielded pools are a version of mixer technology that splits connections and transfers assets. Then we use ZK snarks to prove ownership. So, in essence, transactions take place in a multi-asset shielded pool. The mechanics of the data breach then revealed another ZK snark circuit that was set up to allow essentially trusted providers to provide evidence that could be verified on a network of growers that met certain data conditions. While it has been applied to compliance, this is our first use case, and it has been revealed in ZK and put into production and rolled out, which is essentially rollout, and that’s what it sounds like.

Computed Tomography: Skeptics would say that private networks using zero-knowledge cryptography could be an enabler of illicit transactions. What is your opinion on this matter?

and: In my opinion, if you develop technology and do not intend to facilitate aiding and abetting or enabling crime, then you are not committing crime. But why is privacy needed? Our white paper has this; the bottom line is that monitored actors behave differently than unmonitored actors. In other words, the exact behavior of our society is influenced by surveillance. So inevitably there will be bad actors.

But I’ve never seen a gun on trial. You don’t try tools; you put people on trial. With all the tools and technologies we use, the overwhelming consensus in our global society is that if the device is better for the majority than the few who abuse it, then you use it. If that’s not the case, then I’m not sure we’ll have any kitchen knives, as knives are used by a handful of people for criminal activity. Therefore, any attempt to put privacy technology or blockchain technology in the experimental stage because a few people abuse the system is an argument that can be extrapolated to anything in life.