Edward Snowden Helped Create Zcash Privacy Coin

Josh Swihart, senior vice president of Zcash developer Electric Coin Company, said Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee and "Prismgate" leaker, was involved in the launch of the privacy public chain Zcash in 2016. Snowden joined Zcash creator Zooko Wilcox, Bitcoin core developer Peter Todd, Coin Center's Peter Van Valkenburgh and two others to launch the Zcash blockchain. In a process known as "trusted setup," the six participants each received a sliver of the private key needed to create the cryptocurrency. And Snowden had previously used the pseudonym "John Dobbertin" to hide his role. Although Snowden was reportedly involved in the creation of Zcash, he did not receive any cryptocurrency or other material compensation.