Cardano Partners Google and Fortune 10 on Privacy Tech

• Cardano has been working with the Linux Foundation and global giants like Google on a project called Nightstream that’s focused on privacy technology.
• Hoskinson also attacked Ethereum’s use of zero-knowledge tech, which he says is limited and is threatened by the rise of AI.

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Cardano has been working on a new project with the Linux Foundation and Google, and some of the world’s ten largest companies are joining the initiative, founder Charles Hoskinson has revealed.

Speaking on the Mr. M podcast, Hoskinson revealed that the new project is named Nightstream and it’s focused on privacy technology. The partners are “systematically implementing Lattice-based cryptography into a folding scheme, and that’s going to be the long-term engine of Midnidght,” Hoskinson noted.

As we have reported, Midnight is Cardano’s privacy sidechain and since its launch late last year, it has seen an explosion in international cooperation from developers.

BREAKING NEWS

HOSKINSON TEAMS UP WITH GOOGLE, FORTUNE 10 AND LINUX FOUNDATION 😱😱😱@IOHK_Charles is working alongside Google, Fortune 10 companies, and the Linux Foundation on Nightstream a cutting-edge zkVM based on lattice folding schemes, set to power Midnight’s privacy… pic.twitter.com/H0yGXpbby1

— Mintern (@MinswapIntern) January 19, 2026

Currently, Midnight relies on “safe engines” – Halo 2 and PLONK. These two have been powering the network’s verification and private computation, with PLONK as the zero-knowledge proof system and Halo 2 as the scaling mechanism.

So, we have phenomenal privacy guarantees, but it’s the classical crypto. As we upgrade the system, we can roll out a universal primitive. There’s a lot of future proofing that we’ve thought about.

Hoskinson didn’t reveal any further details about the Nightstream partnership, including the role of Google, the Linux Foundation or the other Fortune 100 companies in the initiative. However, both Google and the Foundation are industry leaders in developing next-generation cryptography technology. Their focus in recent years has been on post-quantum cryptography, which as we reported, is becoming a rising concern within crypto.

Cardano Founder: Ethereum Bet on the Wrong ZK Tech

Hoskinson further blasted Ethereum for its application of zero-knowledge (ZK) technology, which he says is narrow in scope and will end up pitting the network against tech giants, a battle it will inevitably lose. According to him, Ethereum initially introduced ZK tech purely to scale its network.

“They weren’t thinking about how to give users the freedom of association, commerce and expression,” he stated.

After realizing that they had made an error in their approach, the Ethereum developers invented rollups and recursions. However, despite these solutions, the underlying infrastructure is still built on hash-based crypto primitive, which “doesn’t have rich algebraic properties.”

Cardano, on the other hand, has bet on lattice-based cryptography. This gives the network universal primitive that can do everything Ethereum can do, but can also do much more. Additionally, this cryptography allows Cardano developers to translate the lattices to work with the chips that have been designed to power artificial intelligence.

He stated:

I’m sorry, but I don’t care how big Ethereum is; it’s not currently bigger than Nvidia and AMD and this entire AI revolution. And Microsoft’s not going to buy a hundred billion dollars of custom chips for their encryption.

Beyond Cardano, Hoskinson expressed confidence that Bitcoin will hit $250,000, driven by adoption by institutions and governments. He added that BTC DeFi, especially non-custodial yield products secured by the Bitcoin network, could catapult Cardano to the top of crypto adoption.

Bitcoin currently trades at $91,250, dipping 2% in the past day, with the looming US-EU trade wars still casting a dark shadow over assets like BTC, as we reported. ADA trades at $0.3595 and has dropped over 8% in the past week.