Overview
- The network activated the Ironwood NU6.3 upgrade at block 3,428,143 on Tuesday, July 28, retiring the Orchard shielded pool and opening a new Ironwood pool that began with zero ZEC.
- Ironwood enforces a protocol-level turnstile that limits withdrawals from Orchard to the amount verifiably deposited, which prevents value from leaving the old pool in excess of publicly recorded inflows.
- Researchers completed formal and machine-checked proofs for Ironwood’s proof circuits and added quantum-recoverable transaction records to reduce the risk of similar undetectable counterfeiting bugs in the future.
- On-chain trackers show thousands and, by some counts, tens of thousands of ZEC have migrated to Ironwood while roughly 3.6–3.7 million ZEC remain in Orchard, and exchanges, wallets and node operators must finish upgrades for a smooth migration.
- Users face short-term privacy and operational risks because migration is manual; developers advise moving funds carefully and using privacy tools such as Tor or NymVPN to avoid linking IP addresses to balances and to protect wallet privacy.