Benson Oak Ventures, Samsung, Elron invest USD 4 mln in crypto wallet ZenGo

In private beta, ZenGo’s goal is to accelerate mainstream adoption of cryptocurrencies by addressing the process of writing down private key and storing it safely. It leverages a unique cryptographic protocol to ensure security and ease of use. ZenGo uses open source threshold cryptography to replace the private key, as well as the issues related to securely managing non-custodial wallets. The solution eliminates the typical friction points of onboarding and backup.

Moreover, ZenGo is easy to backup, simple to recover, while guaranteeing that only the customer has control of their funds. Also, instead of using a traditional private key, the message is signed using a public key and multiple secret shares held by the participating parties. In order to send a transaction, ZenGo’s system uses a ‘two-of-two’ signature system, which requires two ‘shares’: one from the user and one from ZenGo. Further, the encrypted copy of a share is stored on ZenGo’s server and the decryption code on the user’s iCloud account.

However, all this happens in the backend, as users who wish to send transactions only need to scan their face via Apple’s FaceID feature to approve a transaction.