#dusk @Dusk $DUSK transaction data on duskexplorer.com today. One number stopped me cold.
Out of 252 transactions recorded in the last 24 hours only 21 were Phoenix the shielded ZK-proof model that's supposed to be the actual privacy layer of this network. The other 231 ran through Moonlight, the fully public account-based model.
That's roughly 9% Phoenix adoption on a chain built around privacy.
Phoenix is a UTXO-based zero-knowledge transaction model that hides amounts sender-receiver links, and balance changes through cryptographic commitments and nullifiers. Phoenix 2.0 even went a step further enabling compliant privacy where sender identity is provable to the receiver without exposing anything to the public which is supposedly the institutional differentiator.
So what explains the gap? My honest read: Phoenix is heavier. Every Phoenix transaction carries a PLONK proof while Moonlight just uses a BLS signature check less compute, faster, cheaper. Most current users are probably just staking, converting tokens, or doing routine transfers. Privacy has a cost, and not everyone's paying it yet.
What I can't tell from the explorer whether the Phoenix transactions we do see represent actual privacy-seeking users or just wallet mechanics routing funds through the shielded pool for other reasons.
If Phoenix usage stays this low as institutional partners come onboard does the privacy pitch hold up or does it quietly become optional?
Out of 252 transactions recorded in the last 24 hours only 21 were Phoenix the shielded ZK-proof model that's supposed to be the actual privacy layer of this network. The other 231 ran through Moonlight, the fully public account-based model.
That's roughly 9% Phoenix adoption on a chain built around privacy.
Phoenix is a UTXO-based zero-knowledge transaction model that hides amounts sender-receiver links, and balance changes through cryptographic commitments and nullifiers. Phoenix 2.0 even went a step further enabling compliant privacy where sender identity is provable to the receiver without exposing anything to the public which is supposedly the institutional differentiator.
So what explains the gap? My honest read: Phoenix is heavier. Every Phoenix transaction carries a PLONK proof while Moonlight just uses a BLS signature check less compute, faster, cheaper. Most current users are probably just staking, converting tokens, or doing routine transfers. Privacy has a cost, and not everyone's paying it yet.
What I can't tell from the explorer whether the Phoenix transactions we do see represent actual privacy-seeking users or just wallet mechanics routing funds through the shielded pool for other reasons.
If Phoenix usage stays this low as institutional partners come onboard does the privacy pitch hold up or does it quietly become optional?