Zero knowledge proof-based blockchain network Mina goes live

Mina Protocol, a privacy-oriented blockchain network based on zero-knowledge-proof technology, has gone live.

The development means Mina's mainnet has been launched and it now lets developers build decentralized applications, known as Snapps, in this case.

Snapps, or SNARK-powered applications, deploy recursive zero-knowledge (zk)-SNARK technology to enable user privacy, data ownership, and verifiability.

Put simply, zk-SNARKs enable users to prove that they know something without divulging any private information.

The first application to integrate with Mina is the decentralized lending protocol Teller Finance. With the move, Teller's users won't have to share their actual credit score or their social security number with a requesting party. Instead, they will just be able to prove that their credit score is above the required number of 700.

"Mina can simply connect to a credit score reporting website, produce a proof on the user's local machine (e.g., passing the credit threshold), and then share that proof with the requesting party," said Mina.

Like Teller, there are "many other exciting applications in the works" for integration, Evan Shapiro of the Mina Foundation told The Block.

"We currently also have a joint RFP [request for proposal] with the Ethereum Foundation to enable recursive SNARK applications on the Ethereum blockchain," he said.

Mina claims to have created the world's lightest blockchain, retaining a size of 22 KB even as it scales. The zk-SNARKs technology enables Mina to build "very small proofs" of the whole blockchain.

In a separate development, Mina today also announced its partnership with CoinList for a token sale. Mina is looking to raise $18.75 million via the sale, Shapiro told The Block. There are 75 million tokens available in the sale at a $0.25 per token price.

Mina has previously raised a total of $29.4 million in various rounds. Its investors include Coinbase Ventures, Paradigm, Three Arrows Capital, Polychain, Naval Ravikant, and several others.

Mina Protocol was formerly known as Coda Protocol and had been under development since June 2017 by O(1) Labs.