Starknet has officially launched STRK20, a zero-knowledge privacy framework designed to bring shielded balances and private transfers to all ERC-20 tokens on its Layer 2 network. The announcement, shared with The Block, marks a major step toward built-in confidentiality without requiring separate privacy infrastructure for each asset.
STRK20 allows users to move assets between public and shielded states while keeping the same underlying token. Transactions are verified by zero-knowledge proofs, ensuring rule compliance without exposing balances or full histories. Assets are pooled in a shared privacy contract, preserving liquidity and avoiding isolated private tokens. To comply with legal requests, each participant registers an encrypted viewing key, enabling an independent auditor to reconstruct a single user’s activity while keeping others hidden.
The first live implementation is strkBTC, a wrapped Bitcoin token on Starknet. Users can shield and deshield strkBTC through compatible wallets like Ready X and Xverse, and the framework will soon support private swaps (via avnu and Ekubo), lending (Vesu), and staking (Endur). Some DeFi transaction components may remain visible when routed through public liquidity, but the direct link to a wallet is concealed.
Damian Chen, VP of Growth at Starknet Foundation, described the design as "practical privacy in the truest sense," balancing public confidentiality with necessary disclosure. StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson noted that zero-knowledge systems could allow future investigations to request narrower information. The framework was first previewed in March 2026 and builds on the v0.14.2 mainnet upgrade, adding native proof verification for encrypted balances.
