Hey everyone,
Posting my retroactive grant application for CipherPay. Requesting $35,000 for work shipped between February and May 2026.
What CipherPay is
Non-custodial Zcash payment processor. Merchants bring their viewing key, we detect payments in real-time via Orchard trial decryption, they receive ZEC directly in their shielded wallet. No node required, no custody, no KYC.
Live at cipherpay.app.
What’s shipped (six open-source repos)
- CipherPay backend (Rust) — Orchard trial decryption, sub-second mempool detection via CipherScan WebSocket, subscriptions, billing & settlement, event ticketing, x402 facilitator, agent sessions, restricted API keys, AES-256-GCM encryption at rest. Self-hostable single binary.
- CipherPay web (Next.js) — merchant dashboard, hosted checkout, donate pages, payment links, docs, landing page. English, Spanish, Portuguese.
- Shopify app — full OAuth integration, checkout UI extension, in app review.
- WooCommerce plugin — accepted to the WordPress plugin directory.
- @cipherpay/x402 — npm middleware for HTTP 402 AI agent payments. x402 v2, MPP, prepaid sessions,
/.well-known/paymentdiscovery. v0.6.0 on npm. - @cipherpay/mcp — MCP server for Claude, Cursor, Windsurf. 8 tools, 2 resources. v1.2.1 on npm.
All MIT-licensed (WooCommerce is GPLv2 per WordPress convention). ~42,500 lines of code across Rust, TypeScript, and PHP.
Real usage
- A Wave for Saleh, donation campaign for a displaced child in Syria, ~$1,549 raised in shielded ZEC.
- jonsarkin.com, Jon Sarkin art estate, accepting ZEC for artwork.
- Ipê Village 2026, event tickets and conference passes via CipherPay (“Pay with Zcash” on their ticket page).
Privacy note
CipherPay (hosted) sees incoming payment events, amount and memo, via the merchant’s IVK. It never sees sender identity, spending keys, merchant balances, or buyer transaction history. No data is shared with third parties.
For merchants who want zero hosted visibility: the entire stack is self-hostable from a single binary. Same code, your infrastructure only.
Full privacy disclosure in the application.
Full application
Happy to answer questions.
Kenbak