What exactly is SilentPay and how does it differ from a mixer?
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SilentPay is a non-custodial, trustless privacy protocol built on Solana. Unlike centralised mixers,
there is no operator who holds your funds. Your deposit goes directly into a smart-contract-controlled vault,
and withdrawal requires a valid zero-knowledge proof — no one can steal, censor, or trace your transaction.
The math enforces privacy, not a trusted third party.
What is a "secret note" and why is it so important?
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When you deposit, a secret note is generated entirely inside your browser — it never touches any server.
The note contains a secret scalar and a nullifier that cryptographically prove you own a deposit in the pool.
If you lose the note, your funds are permanently inaccessible — the program has no recovery mechanism by design.
Save it to a file, print it, or store it in a password manager. Never share it.
Can my deposit be traced on-chain?
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The design goal is that the on-chain link between deposit and withdrawal is computationally infeasible to find,
because the zk-SNARK proof reveals only that the withdrawer owns some valid leaf in the Merkle tree —
not which leaf. The larger the anonymity set (number of deposits in the pool), the stronger the privacy guarantee.
Note: metadata privacy (IP address, browser fingerprint, timing correlation) is outside the scope of the protocol — use Tor or a VPN for full operational security.
Is KYC required? Does SilentPay collect any data?
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No KYC. No accounts. No email. The protocol is entirely wallet-based — you connect a Solana wallet and interact
directly with the on-chain program. The only data stored is what you save locally (your deposit history and secret notes).
The relayer sees the proof and destination address but has no way to link them to your deposit wallet.
Why are deposits fixed denominations only?
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Fixed denominations are fundamental to the privacy model. If deposits could be arbitrary amounts,
an observer could correlate a deposit of an unusual amount (e.g. 3.7182818 SOL) with a matching withdrawal.
Standardised amounts mean every deposit in a pool is indistinguishable from the others — maximising the anonymity set.
What is the relayer and do I have to trust it?
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The relayer is an optional service that submits withdrawal transactions on your behalf so your destination wallet
never needs SOL to pay fees. The relayer cannot steal funds — it only submits your pre-signed proof,
and the program verifies the proof independently. At worst, a malicious relayer can refuse to relay (censor), but
you can always fall back to submitting the proof yourself directly.
Is the code audited? Is it safe to use on mainnet?
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A comprehensive internal audit was completed in February 2026. Several critical and high-severity issues
were identified and are currently being remediated. SilentPay is not yet deployed on mainnet —
you are using devnet only. Do not send real funds until the mainnet launch is officially announced.
The audit report is available for review.
What is the zk-SNARK proof scheme used and how fast is it?
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SilentPay uses Groth16, compiled with Circom 2.0 and proved with snarkjs.
Proof generation runs entirely in the browser using WASM and typically takes 1–8 seconds depending on your device.
Proof verification on-chain is constant time (~200k compute units on Solana) regardless of tree depth.
The trusted setup was generated with pot12_final.ptau and withdraw_final.zkey.