Ground-breaking Web3 technology in zero-knowledge cryptography
May 2023
Zero-knowledge cryptography, also known as zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs), allows a “prover” to convince a person of the validity of a computation without leaking any information; it is hence referred to as zero-knowledge cryptography. It is seen as a breakthrough technology impacting Web3, a decentralised online ecosystem based on blockchain, because it enables data privacy protection, efficiency improvement and scalability of transparent systems such as blockchain.
Zero-knowledge cryptography is important to foster trust and promote widespread adoption of decentralised applications, which in turn is crucial for the growth of Web3. It also facilitates the development of innovative solutions for privacy-preserving data sharing and collaborative computation. A variety of industries including financial services, healthcare and supply chain management would benefit from the application of this technology.
A major challenge for real-world adoption of ZKPs, particularly for applications at scale, is the high computation cost. In addressing this issue, the PolyU research team focused on enhancing the efficiency and scalability of Plonk, a popular ZKP system. The team delivered this achievement by leveraging GPU acceleration to achieve computation speedup and distributing the workload evenly across multiple servers to improve scalability.
This new implementation can generate a proof in less than one hour for a circuit of size 228 gates, which is the largest circuit with reported successful plonk proof generation. The research team’s solution has achieved a significant computation speedup of over 40% on a single machine. With the new distribution approach, the team was able to improve the overall proof generation process by a factor of 10 compared with existing method.
This ground-breaking technology has won the ZPRIZE in the Plonk-DIZK GPU Acceleration prize category for innovative solutions in empowering zero-knowledge cryptography. ZPRIZE is a collaborative effort across the blockchain industry that involves over 32 global partners and sponsors who contribute time, effort and resources to this industry-wide competition, with the aim of increasing the practicality and awareness of this technology.
