StarkWare, an organization specializing in zero-knowledge (ZK) know-how, a approach of verifying data with out revealing the particular contents of that data, stated it created a ZK verification of the Bitcoin (BTC) blockchain that may run on cellular units.
The proof accommodates all of the Bitcoin block headers from the genesis block till the current, however not the complete and detailed Bitcoin blockchain historical past, which is over 680 gigabytes in dimension.
Every block header contains the model variety of the Bitcoin software program used to mine the block, a reference to the earlier block within the chain, a timestamp, the block dimension and the nonce — the random quantity the miner has to search out so as to add the block to the ledger.
StarkWare’s BTC ledger proof is available in at simply 1 megabyte (MB) in dimension, to supply customers with a approach of verifying transactions in beneath 100 milliseconds, Abdelhamid Bakhta, head of ecosystem at StarkWare, advised Cointelegraph.
The light-weight consumer builds on Simplified Fee Verification (SPV), an idea outlined in Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper, which permits smaller light-weight nodes a approach of verifying funds with out having to obtain the complete ledger.
StarkWare’s announcement is critical in that it’s going to permit any consumer to confirm Bitcoin funds with out organising a full Bitcoin node, which might price between $300 to $1,000, and could also be too technically complicated for the common consumer to correctly set up.
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Node storage necessities and ledger dimension develop into factors of rivalry within the BTC group
The necessities to run a Bitcoin node are comparatively simpler than these of different blockchain networks, which can require tens of hundreds of {dollars} to run.
Bitcoin nodes can run on retail private computer systems because of the relative simplicity of the Bitcoin protocol, which has generated solely 680 gigabytes of knowledge since 2009.
This relative simplicity and accessible {hardware} necessities are key to preserving decentralization of the protocol and sustaining Bitcoin’s consensus mechanism, which is enforced by impartial node runners.
If nodes develop into too costly due to mounting {hardware} necessities, the community turns into centralized beneath massive service suppliers with the sources to run the required {hardware}, going in opposition to Bitcoin’s core worth proposition.
Inscriptions, ordinals, and different types of non-monetary knowledge storage on the blockchain create this centralization threat by rising the scale of the ledger and requiring node operators to retailer important quantities of non-monetary knowledge, critics say.
In Could, Bitcoin Core, the builders of the software program utilized by about 80% of BTC node runners, introduced that the upcoming Bitcoin Core 30 replace, slated for launch in October, will take away the OP_Return restrict, which caps the quantity of non-monetary knowledge that may be embedded in Bitcoin transactions.
The OP_Return restrict is at present 80 bytes, far too small to retailer the vast majority of photos and multimedia content material in the present day, and the proposed change has prompted a historic surge in customers operating Bitcoin Knots nodes.
Bitcoin Knots is another Bitcoin node software program and options extra customizable parameters, together with choices for the node runners to restrict the quantity of OP_Return knowledge they are going to retailer of their reminiscence swimming pools and relay to different nodes.
Knots nodes now account for almost 20% of the community in 2025 — an nearly vertical improve from the tip of 2024, when Knots nodes accounted for about 1% of the full market share.
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