A brief history
Zcash is an experimental blockchain-based ecosystem. It was created by founder Zooko Wilcox and a group of scientists and was launched in October 2016. The impetus behind the formulation of Zcash was to offer users stronger privacy guarantees. It bridges the existing transparent payment scheme used by Bitcoin by implementing an additional shielded payment scheme secured by zero-knowledge succinct non-interactive arguments of knowledge (zk-SNARKs). Between 2016 and 2018, Zcash released a series of early upgrades known as the “Sprout series” to resolve the limitations that became apparent as the network matured. Thanks to extensive collaboration with JP Morgan (who had an interest in zk-SNARK technology), Zcash’s last update in the series was launched in October of 2018.

ZEC in practice
Zcash supports four transaction types: public, shielding, deshielding, and private. A public transaction happens between two “transparent” addresses or “t-addresses''. Just like bitcoin transitions, the amount transferred between these two types of addresses is publicly visible on the Zcash blockchain. Shielding and Deshielding transactions happen between a t-address and a “z-address.” Lastly, a private transaction happens between two z-addresses. The balance of both z-addresses and the amount transferred between them is private. These z-addresses are protected by the zk-SNARK security protocol to ensure the parties involved in a transaction are verified without revealing any information to each other or the network- adding anonymity that is not present in other transactions. Like Bitcoin, Zcash is a mined cryptocurrency, which means that new ZEC is created each time a block is added to the Zcash blockchain. New blocks are created roughly every 75 seconds, with a maximum total supply of 21 million ZEC.