Zcash co-founder joins SEC roundtable to discuss privacy and digital rights
Zcash co-founder Zooko Wilcox participated in a U.S. SEC roundtable focused on privacy, user protection, and the role of zero-knowledge technology in modern financial systems.
The discussion signaled a clear shift from previous years, when U.S. regulators viewed privacy coins primarily through a compliance lens.
The new SEC leadership invited Zcash developers to explain how privacy technology actually works and why it matters in a democratic society.
Zooko’s mother: mass surveillance violates the Fourth Amendment
In one of the most notable moments, Zooko shared the remarks of his 77-year-old mother, who framed the issue not as a crypto debate but as a constitutional one.
According to her, mass surveillance turns ordinary citizens into subjects of experimentation.
She emphasized that the Fourth Amendment guarantees protection from unreasonable searches, and digital surveillance without warrants violates this principle.
Her message underscored a key argument: privacy is a constitutional right, not a crime.
SEC shifts from allegations to dialogue
Under former SEC chair Gary Gensler, Zcash’s founders were accused of fraud, and many crypto companies received subpoenas that strained the industry with legal burdens.
The tone today is different.
Instead of enforcement-first tactics, the SEC is now seeking to understand privacy technologies and their role in modern financial systems.
This shift reflects growing policy recognition that privacy and compliance can coexist.
The central question: who gets to choose what to reveal?
Zooko highlighted that the true debate is not “privacy versus transparency.”
The real question is: who controls the choice?
In traditional financial surveillance systems, third parties decide what is monitored, stored, or shared.
In Zcash, only the user controls the decision to reveal or share transaction data.
The owner alone can choose to disclose information to an accountant, a friend, or in response to a court order.
This restores personal agency and moral responsibility to the individual rather than external authorities.
Zero-knowledge proofs move from theory to real-world adoption
Zooko noted that over the past decade, zero-knowledge proofs have evolved from an academic concept into a widely deployed technology.
They enable selective transparency: the ability to share only the necessary information without exposing the full financial history.
Zcash demonstrates how this can work at scale, across real-world use cases.
Everyday usability: even buying a burrito with Zcash
The co-founder also pointed out that Zcash is not just a research project.
It can be used in daily life — for example, to buy a burrito at Chipotle.
Zcash transactions support memo fields, which function similarly to writing a payment purpose on a paper check.
This creates a financial tool that is familiar, practical, and privacy-preserving.
BTCUSA Insight
The SEC roundtable signals a meaningful policy shift. For the first time, privacy advocates and regulators are openly discussing constitutional rights, user agency, and technological solutions rather than framing privacy as inherently suspicious.
Zcash’s model of user-controlled transparency offers a framework regulators may adopt more broadly as digital financial systems expand.
BTCUSA Outlook
We expect increasing government interest in privacy-preserving technologies, especially as zero-knowledge proofs gain mainstream adoption.
Zcash is positioned to benefit from this trend due to its strong technical foundation and clear philosophical framework.
Over the next year, privacy will likely become a major regulatory topic, not as an obstacle but as an essential component of digital rights.
