Zcash Completes 'Most Ambitious' Network Upgrade as ZEC Resumes Recent Surge
Zcash Foundation said it urgently patched a critical flaw in Zcash’s Orchard transaction circuit, the privacy-focused pool introduced in 2022. A researcher found the bug on May 29, and developers quickly confirmed it could have enabled unauthorized spending. They responded with a confidential five-day mitigation: first disabling Orchard transactions with an emergency soft fork, then coordinating with miners and exchanges, and finally deploying NU6.2, a network upgrade that restored Orchard using a corrected cryptographic circuit. Because zero-knowledge proof systems require updating a verifying key, a hard fork was necessary. Officials said no funds were lost, the total ZEC supply was never at risk, and there is no evidence of exploitation. Node operators were told to upgrade to Zebra 5.0.0. Block explorer glitches briefly made the network look stalled, but blocks continued producing normally. ZEC’s price remained strong, rising alongside a broader rally.
