# Base Layers Absorb Privacy Plumbing

Core protocol changes keep pulling privacy infrastructure such as relayers and gas sponsorship into the base layer, removing trusted intermediaries from confidential transactions and shifting the censorship contest from applications to protocol parameters.

- Conviction: 31 / 100 (weakening)
- 7-day move: -7
- Horizon: Emerging (watchlist)
- Tracking since: 2026-09-03T00:00:00.000Z
- Last updated: 2026-09-14T14:04:09.447Z
- Canonical: https://polylog.news/crypto/trends/protocol-absorbs-privacy-infrastructure
- Publisher: Polylog
- Affected regions: Global

## Recent score history

- 2026-09-13: 33
- 2026-09-14: 31

## Recent evidence

- [confirms] Miden Pitches Private Finance With a USDC-Backed Token as Ethereum Coalition Pushes to Encrypt the Mempool (2026-09-10): An Ethereum coalition is pressing to encrypt the mempool so transactions stay private before inclusion, alongside Miden's private-by-default launch. Encrypting pre-inclusion at the protocol level removes builders and relays as trusted observers, moving the censorship and ordering contest from application-layer relayers into base-layer parameters exactly as the thesis holds.
- [confirms] Ethereum Developers Extend EIP-8141 Frames to Carry Expiry, Aggregation and Privacy Proofs (2026-09-07): The extended EIP-8141 frame format includes native carriage of privacy proofs alongside expiry and aggregation, per Ethereum core developers. Making proof payloads a first-class field of the transaction type reduces confidential transfers' dependence on external relayers and moves the censorship question to protocol parameters.

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