Midnight Summit 2024: Privacy, Zero-Knowledge, and the Future of Decentralized AI Agents
Editor’s note:This article is based on a direct conversation with Nicolás Arqueros, Co-founder of Shinkai, following his participation in Midnight Summit 2024 in London, where privacy, Zero-Knowledge, and the future of cryptographic infrastructure took center stage.
The First Midnight Summit: Energy of a Major New Ecosystem
Midnight Summit 2024 marked the very first edition of an event fully focused on privacy, Zero-Knowledge, and next-generation blockchain infrastructure. Nicolás attended with curiosity, especially considering the current state of the crypto market.
Contrary to expectations of a smaller gathering, the atmosphere was highly energetic. Hundreds of participants were present, keynote sessions were full, and the hackathon space was packed with developers actively building. The organization reflected the scale of the initiative: Midnight is not a small experiment, but a large, ambitious project supported by a major team and strong partnerships.
Midnight is being developed as a new blockchain centered on selective privacy, designed to interoperate with multiple providers without forcing builders to rebuild from scratch. This is reinforced by the work already done by the Mina Foundation and the partnerships announced around the ecosystem.
What Stood Out Most: A New Token Model and Cross-Chain Integration
One of the most surprising aspects of the event was Midnight’s token usage model. Users will be able to interact with Midnight from Ethereum, Bitcoin, and other networks without directly acquiring the Midnight token.
Instead, computation can be powered using “dust” generated from existing assets. This creates a deeply embedded cross-chain integration without functioning as a traditional Layer 2 model—an entirely new structural approach for blockchain interoperability.
Post-Quantum Security, Lattices, and Faster Zero-Knowledge Proofs
A central topic throughout the summit was post-quantum security. While large-scale quantum computers are not yet fully operational, they are no longer purely theoretical. As a result, cryptographic systems are beginning to adapt.
Here, lattice-based cryptography plays a key role. Lattices rely on matrix multiplications, the same mathematical foundation used by AI models today. This overlap creates a powerful opportunity: not only enabling post-quantum-secure cryptography, but also dramatically increasing the speed of Zero-Knowledge proofs.
This makes it possible to generate cryptographic proofs extremely fast—even from mobile devices—without long wait times or hardware strain.
Expectations Surpassed: A Community Moving at Full Speed
Before attending, Nicolás expected a more exploratory environment. Instead, he found:
- Teams working at full speed
- Clear technical tracks
- Well-defined execution goals
This confirmed that Midnight is not only innovative in vision but also structured in execution.
Institutional Presence at a Privacy-Focused Event
Two institutional participations stood out:
- A representative equivalent to the UK Treasury
- The former Director of MI5
Both emphasized a critical distinction: they are not opposed to privacy itself, but to criminal misuse such as terrorism and money laundering. They reinforced that privacy remains a fundamental right—a notable shift in how high-level institutions engage with privacy-focused technologies.
Academic Collaboration and Zero-Knowledge Research
Several key technical exchanges took place with researchers from the University of Edinburgh, leading to the creation of internal discussion groups to further advance Zero-Knowledge technologies.
This work connects directly with NightStream, a system being developed in collaboration with the Mina Foundation. NightStream focuses on new proof systems built on UTXO models, lattice cryptography, and post-quantum security.
What This Means for Shinkai
From Shinkai’s perspective, the summit highlighted key structural challenges in today’s AI systems. While private inference already exists, true decentralized AI agents still face limitations in:
- Privacy of tool usage
- Privacy of web interactions
- Verifiable execution of agent actions
Centralized AI platforms operate in closed environments that do not interoperate. Decentralization, by contrast, enables open collaboration between independent teams, where components connect like Lego blocks.
This openness, combined with verification and privacy, is what will allow AI agents to scale into a truly decentralized and interoperable ecosystem.
Private Payments, Layer 2, and Economic AI Agents
Shinkai is currently working with the Mina Foundation on a Layer 2 for Midnight, a key part of its roadmap and a foundational element for private, verifiable payments.
Today, blockchain payments are fully transparent. Wallet activity, transaction flows, and revenue streams are publicly visible. While this is acceptable for some use cases, it is problematic for businesses whose competitors can analyze their entire operation.
With privacy-preserving payments, AI agents will be able to operate economically without exposing sensitive business data, unlocking new categories of autonomous agent-driven services.
A Message to the Shinkai Community
Shinkai’s participation in Midnight Summit confirms its alignment with one of the most important technological transitions in crypto today:
privacy, Zero-Knowledge, and verifiable decentralized computation.
Shinkai is already actively building within the Midnight ecosystem through two parallel initiatives and will be sharing concrete progress with the community in the near future.
Midnight Summit in One Message
If Midnight Summit had to be condensed into a single idea, it would be this:
The next major evolution of crypto will be driven by privacy and Zero-Knowledge.
Bitcoin introduced digital store of value. Ethereum enabled smart contracts. The next phase addressed scalability, interoperability, and governance. Now, the new frontier is cryptographic privacy and verifiable computation.
And Shinkai is already building for that future.
