Private Cross-Chain Payments with Zashi CrossPay

Zcash Apps Zashi
1

1500×600 29.1 KB

Today, Zashi CrossPay brings Zcash’s mathematically provable, best-in-class privacy to crypto payments across blockchains. Anyone holding shielded ZEC can now send payments privately in any NEAR-supported cryptocurrency.

CrossPay is the most significant step yet in Zashi’s mission to normalize private payments.

The Problem:

Until now, sending crypto payments usually meant giving up privacy. Most popular blockchains only create an illusion of privacy. Wallet addresses may look like random strings, but they’re permanent identifiers: all past and future transactions can be traced and tied to wallet owners by blockchain surveillance companies and anyone with access to a free block explorer site. Payment details (who paid whom, how much, and when) are stored publicly forever. That data can be combined with off-chain information (like exchange records or IP addresses) to reveal your real-life identity and financial behavior. This is dangerous.

Zcashers have always understood the implications of using other blockchains, but if they needed to make a payment in a different cryptocurrency, they had only two options:

  • Buy the currency the recipient wants and transact on a public chain.

  • Or try to convince the other person to take shielded ZEC.

Neither option worked well. Buying the target coin typically involves using a centralized exchange, providing personal information, and then leaving a permanent trail on a public ledger to complete the payment. At the same time, asking someone to switch to Zcash can be a heavy lift, especially when the other side has fixed policies on preferred cryptocurrencies, e.g. stablecoins.

The Solution: Zcash + Zashi + CrossPay

Zcash is a blockchain that offers cryptographically guaranteed privacy. Zashi is a Zcash-powered self-custody wallet built by the privacy-obsessed developers of the Zcash protocol. We go out of our way to know as little as possible about Zashi users and minimize metadata leakage.

With Zashi CrossPay, that same privacy-first foundation now powers payments across chains:

  • Direct, frictionless payments from shielded ZEC to any popular cryptocurrency. No need to touch any other app or exchange.

  • Any cryptocurrency can be paid privately: stablecoins, BTC, ETH, SOL, or any other NEAR-supported cryptocurrency. Your privacy is protected regardless of the cryptocurrency your recipient prefers. Their choices don’t have to compromise your security.

How It Works:

  • Open Zashi and click the Pay button.

  • Choose the cryptocurrency your recipient wants to receive.

  • Enter the destination wallet address and the target token amount, review, and confirm.

Zashi and NEAR Intents will handle the rest: your shielded ZEC will be used to cover the payment and fees, NEAR will swap your ZEC under the hood, and your recipient will receive the exact amount you indicated in their chosen cryptocurrency.

Note: If you’re new to Zashi, start by downloading the app and funding it with ZEC. Use Zashi’s Coinbase integration to get ZEC in minutes using a debit card (USA only) or your Coinbase account.

1920×1313 92.3 KB

This release is a milestone for Zcash as its shielded technology continues to extend beyond our community, protecting anyone who wants to make a cryptocurrency payment without compromising their privacy.

Welcome to the next era of private payments. Shields up, everybody.

Happy transacting.

41 Likes
2

Another week, another Zashi update. Love to see that! :slight_smile:

Might be a bit of a dumb question from me, but could you clarify the difference between Crosspay and the Near swap function? Let´s say I want to pay someone in USDT. If I swap ZEC to USDT and use the payment address as destination, is that not the same as using Crosspay for the same transaction? I bet there are some nuances, but I just wanted to clarify.

4 Likes
3

You don’t have to calculate how much ZEC to use, it lets the user focus on just the payment.

8 Likes
4

This is very cool! Just did some swaps for fun. I am very exited for the day I get to pay using my favourite crypto and they can receive into there favourite!

3 Likes
5

yeah but that is a pretty important thing to know, isn’t it?

6

Yes, and Zashi tells you how much ZEC the payment amount corresponds to. See the second and third screenshots in the example image above.

CrossPay is similar to using your credit card overseas; in particular, it’s like when using one of those payment terminals where the till asks you to pay some amount in a foreign currency, you insert your credit card, and it shows on the screen how much you will be charged in your local currency after conversion.

3 Likes
7

Like @spectre asked, what is the difference with Near swaps? Is it the UI ?

8

It shows the conversion, but it does it in an automatic way. You could think of this like using a stick shift vs an automatic when driving a car. Both ways work, and some prefer the control of manual but most like auto.

2 Likes
9

You have the enter both values manually in the Near swap UI (please excuse my ignorance as I haven’t used either features)?

1 Like
10

as ive used it - the Near swap you can choose the ZEC or USD value/amount and then it calculates the sendable asset to be close to that.

in CrossPay you can choose whatever asset it supports to be exact amount. so if you would need to send exactly 0.1548654 BTC then it would be hard to get it right with the swap feature but it will be correct with CrossPay

but imo these features should be merged in future somehow into 1 so it makes sense to users.

4 Likes
11

I’m currently thinking that CrossPay will be merged into the Send flow rather than the Swap flow.

4 Likes
12

Good point. Even though they do the same thing I think they should probably be segregated and presented to the user as:

  1. DEX Trading Product
  2. Merchant Point of Sale Product

As a DEX trading interface it’s not ideal from a UX point of view that it’s a ZEC only wallet, but I can see how users / traders might use it on their phones if they have multiple wallets, like edge, to trade back and forth between ZEC and whatever. For that to succeed as a total product offering we need the maya onboarding (or equivalent) to facilitate XXX back to ZEC in the zashi wallet. The trade ticket could be prepared from the Zashi wallet and the user/ trader could use their other wallet to fulfil the trade. So I think that’s product 1.

As a merchant point of sale product it is great. We’ve just bootstrapped onboarding of every single merchant worldwide that accepts some form of crypto. This is massive and product 2 really is a game changer and should help promote ZEC being held as a base asset over time, similar to how people hold ETH or BTC.

Great job Zashi team! Keep up the great work.

4 Likes
13

Swap to ZEC in Zashi will ship in the next version.

6 Likes
14

Please, make also the f-droid release faster for next version… :slight_smile:

2 Likes
15

The delay is their review cycle which I believe can take up to two weeks

3 Likes
16
6 Likes
17

Made a ZEC <> BTC payment today. Just want to say this is truly a game changer. Thank you to everyone who worked on making this happen!

15 Likes
18

Unfortunately, my first attempt at making a transaction has failed. Could someone give some colour why this has failed? I don’t know much about near intents, but maybe also integrate maya for crosspay? Give the users two quotes (although I figure near intents should be using maya to fulfil this order because how else?)

Screenshot_20250919_164323_com.gbox.android
Screenshot_20250919_164323_com.gbox.android1080×2400 114 KB

2 Likes
19

We’re checking with the NEAR team on your issue. NEAR swaps natively.

Unfortunately Maya doesn’t currently allow for an exact output (necessary for CrossPay) but we are in discussions. Maya will be available for swaps.

4 Likes
20

Hi @joshs ,

It works perfectly. The error it threw up was correct. I assumed I was scanning a BTC QR code, but in actual fact it had the following “address?amount=0.00316597&label=Shopify%20-%20rSM9oVlKV1FKcxsu2Vdr” where the first and last character condensing made it look like on display that I had just scanned a Bitcoin QR code too. I didn’t save the address to my contact book as I figure this is a burner address I’ll never use again.

The order went through within a minute or so, very good experience. Maybe that’s totally my fault or there is some improvement to safeguard someone else making a similar mistake. Its probably just me though. Sorry about that.

2 Likes