The Race to Build the Private Ethereum

Zac Williamson argues that crypto is entering a race to build a “private Ethereum”: a fully programmable blockchain with strong privacy guarantees and no back doors, viewing keys, or trusted intermediaries at the protocol level. He says Aztec’s edge is that it offers genuine private smart contracts that can handle private data, identities, and credentials while remaining composable for applications and DeFi.

A major theme is that privacy becomes necessary when blockchain systems need to touch the real world. Williamson says tokenized bonds, mortgages, and other regulated assets cannot live cleanly on transparent ledgers because compliance data and user information would leak, but they also lose composability when pushed into siloed offchain or proprietary systems. On Aztec, that data can be encrypted onchain and queried privately, enabling identity checks, sanctions screening, and other compliance flows without exposing users.

He also frames AI as a catalyst: cheaper, more automated attacks make exposed web2 and public-chain data increasingly vulnerable. In his view, this strengthens the case for hardened, formally verified infrastructure. Near term, Aztec is focused on faster proving, lower costs, faster withdrawals, and applications like private DeFi, private inference, and private stablecoins.