It's been years now since I started hearing people building out zero-knowledge proof technology with crypto. Basic apps and script with this tech can be created really easily and I was hoping to see zero-knowledge proofs being utilized to fight spam on the internet, remove the need for captchas on the internet, verify online voting in elections, and much more cool stuff. What is holding it back?
The idea of zero-knowledge proofs for anyone not familiar with it can be easily explained with an example like this. Someone on the internet that you don't know and don't trust wants to verify that your first name is indeed "Frolo", as you tell him. You don't want to take a photo of your passport and give him, instead you upload the passport photo to an app that is open source and coded so that it can look at a passport and get the first name for anyone. After that it deletes the photo without storing any other information. It then gives that verified proof that your first name is "Frolo" to that guy on the internet and he trusts it.
