Zengo

ZenGo is a self-custody cryptocurrency wallet that removes the traditional seed phrase from the security model entirely. Founded in 2018 and operating under the legal entity KZen Networks Ltd, the Tel Aviv-based company was built around a straightforward observation: most crypto users do not lose funds to sophisticated exploits, they lose them because a twelve-word recovery phrase was written down incorrectly, stored insecurely, or simply forgotten. ZenGo addresses this structural weakness by replacing private key ownership with threshold cryptography.

The Problem With Seed Phrases

In a conventional software wallet, a single private key — or the seed phrase that derives it — is the only thing standing between a user's funds and an attacker. If that key is exposed, stolen, or lost, there is no recovery path. This single point of failure has been responsible for billions of dollars in losses and continues to prevent mainstream adoption of self-custody.

ZenGo argues that the solution is not to make users better at storing secrets, but to architect a system where no complete secret ever exists on any single device or server.

How MPC Signing Works

ZenGo's security model is built on Threshold Signature Schemes (TSS) with Distributed Key Generation (DKG). When a user creates a wallet, the system generates two cryptographic secret shares rather than one complete private key. One share lives on the user's mobile device, protected by biometric authentication. The second share is held on ZenGo's secure infrastructure. Neither share is a usable private key on its own.

When a transaction needs to be signed, both shares participate in a joint computation that produces a valid on-chain signature without either share ever being transmitted to the other party or combined into a single key. The full private key is never constructed — not during setup, not during signing, and not during recovery.

For Bitcoin and EVM-compatible chains, ZenGo uses two-party ECDSA on the secp256k1 curve. For Solana and TON, the system implements EdDSA TSS on the ed25519 curve, which matches the native signature scheme those networks use.

The underlying cryptographic library — a Rust implementation of threshold ECDSA — is published open source on GitHub under the ZenGo-X organization, allowing independent review of the core protocol.

Recovery Without a Seed Phrase

Because no seed phrase exists, ZenGo built a three-factor recovery system. Users register an email address, generate an encrypted backup stored in their cloud provider (iCloud or Google Drive), and enroll a biometric 3D FaceLock scan. All three factors must be verified to restore wallet access on a new device. None of the three factors individually contains enough information to reconstruct signing capability.

This design means a user who loses their phone can recover their wallet without ever having written anything down. It also means an attacker who compromises one factor — the cloud backup, the email account, or even ZenGo's servers — cannot unilaterally move funds.

Key Features and Products

ZenGo Free provides full self-custody access, buy and swap functionality through integrated third-party providers, fiat onramps via credit card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, and bank transfer, and WalletConnect support for interacting with decentralized applications.

ZenGo Pro, available by subscription at approximately $19.99 per month or $199.99 annually, adds the Web3 Firewall (marketed as ClearSign). This feature simulates a transaction in a sandboxed environment before the user signs it, flagging transfers to known malicious contracts, approval transactions that grant unlimited token access, and other common attack vectors used in wallet drain campaigns.

ZenGo Card is a Mastercard-linked crypto debit card that allows users to spend wallet balances at conventional merchants.

ZenGo Business, launched in September 2025, extends the MPC model to corporate treasury management. It adds role-based permissions, multi-user approval workflows for transaction authorization, batch transaction processing, and audit-ready reporting designed for finance teams.

Solana Support

ZenGo added Solana support in April 2025. The integration uses the ed25519 TSS implementation, making the signing scheme compatible with native Solana transaction formats. Users can hold SOL and Solana-based tokens, and the app supports in-wallet staking of SOL directly, allowing users to earn staking rewards without leaving the ZenGo interface. ZenGo Business also lists Solana payment acceptance as a supported use case for merchant and treasury operations.

Security Track Record and Audits

ZenGo has undergone seven cryptographic and application security audits over its first five years of operation. Kudelski Security, a Swiss firm specializing in cryptographic protocol analysis, conducted a comprehensive review of the MPC protocol in 2020. CertiK has also reviewed ZenGo's systems. The company holds multiple patents issued by the United States and European patent offices covering its MPC and key management techniques.

Since launch, no user wallet has been successfully compromised through an attack on ZenGo's security model. The company has maintained a public bug bounty program.

In February 2025, Tether made a strategic investment in ZenGo, signaling institutional confidence in the wallet's security approach.

Team and Background

ZenGo was founded in 2018 by Ouriel Ohayon, Omer Shlomovits, Tal Be'ery, and Gary Benattar. The wallet launched publicly in 2019 and has grown to serve more than two million users worldwide, with over $20 billion in digital assets protected under its MPC model.

Fit in the Solana Ecosystem

For Solana users specifically, ZenGo offers a path into self-custody that does not require managing a seed phrase — a meaningful onboarding simplification for users coming from centralized exchanges. The native SOL staking integration removes the need to connect to a separate staking interface. The Web3 Firewall provides a layer of protection against the phishing and malicious approval attacks that remain prevalent across Solana's DeFi and NFT ecosystem. The trade-off is a dependency on ZenGo's server infrastructure for co-signing: transactions cannot be signed fully offline, and service availability is a prerequisite for access.