Overview
Shildo is a privacy payment protocol for confidential transfers across EVM networks and Solana. Base is the primary settlement layer where zero knowledge proofs are verified and global state is anchored.
Problem statement
Public blockchains expose sender, receiver, amount, and memo on every transfer. For businesses, payroll, treasury operations, and consumer payments this creates surveillance risk, front running exposure, and compliance friction. Shildo separates value movement from metadata publication.
Users still settle on chain. Verifiers still enforce conservation of funds. Auditors can still inspect specific transfers when authorized. The difference is that payment metadata is encrypted before it reaches public mempools and only disclosed selectively.
Design principles
- Privacy by default for shielded routes. Plain sends remain available in the demo wallet for testing.
- Base anchored settlement so one verifier contract and one state root coordinate all routes.
- Modular delivery on outer chains using local liquidity instead of locking everything in a single bridge pool.
- Selective transparency through view keys for regulators and accountants.
- Developer first APIs with a small JavaScript surface and Supabase backed demo ledger.
System stack
| Layer | Role | Implementation |
|---|---|---|
| Client wallet | Intent creation, encryption, signing | Browser wallet at /access |
| Privacy vault | Off chain commit of sealed intents | Encrypted payload + commitment hash |
| Prover network | Groth16 proof generation | Prover nodes (Arcium powered in production) |
| Settlement core | Proof verification, state root updates | Base verifier contracts |
| Delivery relayers | Release on destination chains | EVM + Solana adapters |
| Demo ledger | Balances, explorer, signup credits | Supabase Postgres + RPC functions |
Three phase pipeline
Seal intent off chain
The sender constructs a payment intent: asset, amount, recipient, optional memo. The wallet encrypts the payload and publishes a commitment to the privacy vault. No plaintext fields appear on public chain mempools at this stage.
Prove on Base
A Groth16 zk SNARK proves the intent is valid: sufficient balance, correct asset, valid recipient format, and no double spend against the settlement root. Base verifies the proof in a single transaction and updates the canonical state root.
Release shielded
Relayers watch Base for delivery authorization events. Once confirmed, funds are released on the destination chain from local liquidity pools. Public explorers see settlement activity but not the link between sender identity and receiver endpoint for shielded paths.
What Shildo does
Shildo routes value through a shielded privacy layer. Payment metadata is stripped before public chain exposure. Settlement is anchored on Base with zero knowledge proofs. Outer chains consume proofs against the Base root rather than maintaining independent privacy state.
Core components
- Privacy vault encrypts and commits payment intents off chain.
- Settlement core verifies zk proofs and updates unified state on Base.
- Delivery layer releases shielded funds on destination chains.
- Wallet demo app for signup, send, shield, network explorer, staking UI, and node management.
Supported assets (demo wallet)
The demo wallet credits test balances on signup. These are ledger entries in Supabase, not real on chain tokens.
| Asset | Symbol | Signup credit | Decimals |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ethereum | ETH | 5 | 8 |
| USD Coin | USDC | 1000 | 8 |
| Shildo | SHILDO | 1000 | 8 |
| Bitcoin | BTC | 1 | 8 |
Demo wallet scope
The public wallet at /access demonstrates the product surface:
- BIP39 style seed generation and sign in (client side only)
- Portfolio view with fiat estimates
- Send with optional shield toggle
- Transaction history and network explorer
- Simulated staking and node deployment panels
Glossary
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Intent | Structured payment request before encryption |
| Commitment | Hash of encrypted intent stored in the vault |
| Settlement root | Merkle root of verified intents on Base |
| Shielded send | Transfer with masked amount and memo in public explorer |
| View key | Key that decrypts a specific transfer for audit |
The public wallet is a demo environment. Balances and transactions are stored in Supabase and are not real on chain funds. Never reuse demo seed phrases with real assets.
Next steps
Read Architecture for component boundaries and data flow, Privacy for cryptographic guarantees, and SDK for integration examples.