ConsenSys-Backed Linea Slams Matter Labs’ Energy Seize Over ‘Zero-Information’ Tech

ConsenSys-backed Layer 2 community – Linea – has prolonged help to StarkWare’s assertion denouncing Matter Labs’ makes an attempt to trademark the time period “zero-knowledge” (ZK) in 9 nations.

Matter Labs, the entity behind zkSync, goals to say unique management over this foundational cryptographic idea, sparking outrage throughout the trade. Notably, Matter Labs has additionally pursued the registration of a token below the ticker image “ZK” with exchanges in a bid to additional their declare over the know-how they didn’t create.

Linea Backs StarkWare: Condemns Matter Labs’ Transfer

Zero-knowledge (ZK) know-how is essential for privateness and safety in blockchain, because it allows people to show claims with out revealing underlying information.

StarkWare, together with different figures like Turing Award winner and StarkWare’s Scientific Advisory Board member Shafi Goldwasser, condemned Matter Labs’ actions as an try and privatize a public good. In a public assertion, StarkWare mentioned,

“An organization exploiting the authorized system to annex a public good violates the crypto ethos, the Ethereum ethos, and the tutorial ethos. It even goes towards Matter Labs’ personal ethos, which states: “We are able to make this world higher by rising individuals’s freedom.” If the corporate goes by way of with this, it is going to be separating itself from the very neighborhood it claims to be a part of.”

StarkWare, a software program firm that develops ZK-proof know-how, urged the neighborhood to take motion towards Matter Labs whereas highlighting the irony within the latter’s actions. The agency famous that its acknowledged rules advocate for collective motion within the face of “oppressive conduct.”

Weighing on the matter, Linea additionally asserted that utilizing a authorized framework to monopolize a department of cryptography integral to constructing permissionless and decentralized L2 execution environments contradicts Ethereum’s ethos.

Linea even went on to level out the collaborative nature of Ethereum’s improvement, the place researchers contribute to scaling options like zkEVM Layer 2 networks. The try to say possession over ZK know-how inhibits progress in direction of a extra inclusive and censorship-resistant community, as per Linea’s assertion on Could thirty first.

Matter Labs Addresses Controversy

In response to the controversy surrounding trademark functions, Matter Labs’ asserted that ZK know-how belongs to the neighborhood and clarified that the transfer goals to make sure the time period “ZK” can be utilized freely within the context of their initiatives like “ZK Sync” and “ZK Stack,” utilizing logos as the one out there authorized device for such safety.

The corporate additionally addressed the misunderstanding that logos grant unique possession over a phrase or phrase, including that rights solely prolong to particular items or companies.

Polygon Labs’ Chief Authorized and Coverage Officer, Rebecca Rettig, responded to Matter Labs, questioning the need of the trademark functions and suggesting that if exterior challenges compelled them to use for the trademark, transparency could be important. The exec even went on to dismiss the necessity for a framework to grant permission for using the time period “zk,” appropriately freely out there to everybody with out permission.