Starknet Advances to Fourth Phase with Enhanced Privacy and Bitcoin Integration

StarkWare has announced that Starknet has officially entered its fourth phase, aiming to create a faster, more decentralized, and private network while strengthening its connection with Bitcoin. According to Odaily, this phase highlights the introduction of the STRK20 framework, which supports ERC20 privacy features, and the strkBTC asset, enabling privacy-focused transactions with native Bitcoin exchange options. Additionally, Starknet v0.15.0 will introduce decentralized block verification, and Staking v3 and v4 will gradually achieve full network decentralization. Starknet is also advancing the Bitcoin OP_CAT upgrade to enable trustless settlement and exploring additional Bitcoin bridging solutions such as BitVM and ColliderVM to foster Bitcoin DeFi development on Starknet. The S-two validator will further optimize client proof verification, enhancing network scalability and privacy protection. Starknet is committed to achieving comprehensive quantum security, preparing for the post-quantum computing era in blockchain and Bitcoin.