Security researcher Taylor Hornby, who recently exposed a critical vulnerability in Zcash (ZEC) with the help of Anthropic’s Opus 4.8 AI model, has confirmed plans to audit the privacy coin Monero (XMR). Hornby made the announcement on social media, stating he will "absolutely" add Monero to his queue of projects to review.
The Zcash flaw was discovered on May 29. The bug, hidden in the blockchain's Orchard privacy pool, had remained undetected since May 2022. According to Shielded Labs, the nonprofit developer behind Zcash, the vulnerability could have allowed an attacker to mint unlimited, untraceable counterfeit coins. An emergency fix was deployed by June 1, but during that time, the price of ZEC plummeted by 38% within 24 hours amid fears that funds might already have been stolen without leaving a trace.
Hornby, who was hired by Shielded Labs in April specifically to hunt for protocol bugs, reported the flaw instead of exploiting it. He explained that the Zcash developers were "like family" and he could "not live with that kind of betrayal." He now plans to seek a Zcash coinholder grant to continue his work.
When asked on X whether he would investigate similar issues in Monero and other privacy-focused cryptocurrencies, Hornby replied: "Absolutely! I'll add Monero to my queue of things to audit." Monero, unlike Zcash, hides all transaction details by default, while Zcash offers both transparent and shielded addresses. This development puts the leading privacy coin under the microscope of a researcher who has already demonstrated the ability to find years-old flaws using AI.
For the crypto community, the planned audit raises both hope for stronger security and concern about what might be uncovered. It underscores the growing role of AI-assisted vulnerability research in maintaining trust in complex blockchain protocols.
