Zcash is built On the idea that Bitcoin falls short on offering privacy guarantees. In the Zcash white paper, the authors detail how all of the transactions on a Bitcoin Network are recorded and visible for all to see. Zcash has formulated something called Decentralized Anonymous Payment Schemes in which one user can pay another user privately and directly.Using a DAP Scheme, the transaction hides the payment origin, the total amount of the transaction, as well as the destination of the transaction. Zcash launched by the Zerocoin Electric Coin Company in 2016. Since its launch, the project has been overseen by a team of researchers at MIT, Johns Hopkins University, the Technion, and Tel Aviv University.  initial research for the program was funded by research from the United States Air Force, the Navy, and DARPA. ZEC is the native token similar to how ETH is the native Ethereum token.