Zcash Sets July 28 Deadline for Ironwood Upgrade

Core developer Sean Bowe confirmed the rollout will proceed despite earlier concerns from Shielded Labs regarding the readiness of exchanges and wallet providers. Many industry participants are currently navigating a transition from the legacy zcashd software to the newer Z3 stack, which includes the Zebra, Zaino, and Zallet implementations. By implementing an accounting checkpoint, the network requires users to move funds into a newly created private pool, a process designed to expose any illicitly minted coins that may have been generated before the vulnerability was patched in June.

While Shielded Labs previously noted no definitive evidence that the flaw was exploited, the migration forces a choice upon any potential attacker: move fake assets and risk immediate exposure, or abandon them entirely. Following the initial disclosure of the bug on June 3, ZEC experienced a significant market correction, dropping from $602.68 to $299.25. The token has since seen a partial recovery, trading at $492.61. Simultaneously, the network reached a supply milestone this week, with over 16.8 million ZEC issued, surpassing 80% of the cryptocurrency’s 21 million maximum supply.