Polygon’s ZK solution aims to slash current layer 1 Ethereum network costs by 90%

Polygon, the Ethereum layer 2 scaling network, Wednesday said it is launching the testnet of its highly-anticipated zero-knowledge (ZK) rollup dubbed Polygon zkEVM, in what it called “a giant leap forward for Ethereum scaling and ZK innovation.”

Fast facts

• In a series of tweets on Wednesday, Polygon said zkEVM inherits the security of Ethereum while increasing throughput and reducing fees.
• “Even more exciting is the EVM [Ethereum Virtual Machine] equivalence of Polygon zkEVM,” the infrastructure builder wrote in a separate blog post on Wednesday. “You can build on Polygon zkEVM the same way you would on Ethereum … It’s Ethereum, but with ZK scalability.”
• A zero-knowledge protocol is a cryptographic algorithm based on the mathematical concept of zero-knowledge proof that allows validators to verify data without decrypting it.
• “If you see in the ZK space, we acquired (ZK cryptography-based scaling project) Hermez to make our tech sec[urity] very solid. And for them, we’re expanding the team a lot,” Jaynti Kanani, cofounder of Polygon, told Forkast in March.
• Polygon said its testnet for the new rollup will go live soon, and the project’s open source code will be made available on GitHub.
• The scaling network previously rolled out a major upgrade in January, incorporating Ethereum’s London hard fork.
• Despite a 14% pullback in the past 24 hours, Polygon’s token MATIC is up 152% since June 18, according to CoinMarketCap data.