Pirate Chain monthly update | February 2026

February brought something we’ve been eyeing for a long time: the Orchard public testnet is now live. Alongside that, we’re heading into a busy stretch of events in Mexico, crowdfunding on real-world utility, and the unified wallet continues to level up with serious privacy-by-default features.

Monthly update meeting

Orchard Public Testnet Is Live

Available via the Pirate Chain blog and Pirate Chain Github Network. This is the public testing phase for our next major protocol upgrade, built on Halo 2 / Orchard and it’s a major step forward for Pirate Chain’s long-term privacy and future capabilities.

Why Orchard matters

Orchard removes the lingering criticism around the older zk-SNARK “trusted setup” ceremony used for Sapling. Once Pirate Chain migrates to Orchard, that topic becomes irrelevant. Orchard also opens the door to stronger scalability foundations and new technical possibilities.

How to participate

• Join the Orchard Public Testnet channel on Discord.
• Download the release and read Forge’s instructions carefully (the correct flags matter).
• Need coins? Ask Forge or Øswald for testnet ARRR so you can start sending transactions and stress testing.

Important safety note

If you already run Treasure Chest mainnet on the same machine, be extra careful. Always secure your seed phrase first, follow the guide precisely, and avoid mixing testnet/mainnet data.

Events: Monerotopia + Anarchapulco

We’ve had back-to-back privacy-heavy events in Mexico, and Pirate Chain was active at both:

Monerotopia (Mexico City) | Feb 12–15

Pirate Chain had a booth all week, and DaJohns appeared on a Saturday panel. It’s a rare event where you can actually use privacy coins in person, a marketplace vibe, vendors, peer-to-peer swapping, and plenty of privacy-minded people.

Anarchapulco (Puerto Vallarta) | Feb 16–22

Pirate Chain also had a booth and multiple team members present. DaJohns gave a talk titled: “Privacy is not a feature. It’s the foundation of digital money.”
The focus was not just “why privacy is nice,” but why privacy is required for sound digital cash (fungibility, censorship resistance, and money fundamentals).

Komodo Classic: dPoW Support Is Solid

The transition of Pirate Chain’s Delayed Proof-of-Work to Komodo Classic continues to go smoothly. Notarizations to Litecoin are intact, 51% protection remains strong, and the ecosystem around Komodo Classic is actively rebuilding tools, especially DEX functionality.

If you want to support the people supporting Pirate Chain, check out their wallet and WebDEX at Komodo Classic (KMDCL).

Community Crowdfunding

The Pirate Chain crowdfunding page remains live and transparent, with each crowdfunding is still live at piratechain.com/crowdfunding, and the main push right now is funding Pirate Chain integration on AnonBazaar, a privacy-coin marketplace that already supports Monero and other privacy coins.

Instead of fragmented “one-coin marketplaces,” Anonbazaar brings multiple privacy communities into one place, better for vendors, better for buyers, and more realistic for adoption. They also claim:

• No marketplace fees from buyers/sellers
• No custody of funds
• An optional “bond/insurance” system to increase seller trust
• Paid boosting for listings (visibility)

You can donate in ARRR, XMR, or LTC. View keys are posted for ARRR/XMR transparency.

AnonBazaar online marketplace ARRR donation address:

zs1m6t28gfep59dg84pvpqm7dx8w9jw4nk42acm8mt5c4llf2j9d5rr00w04l9gkqtpglttucvgl2l

ARRR on AnonBazaar Monero (XMR) donation address:

44CNoS4hd9uFBE3DKohrapWiyztCYe5Faio3x7hrveHFADzr3pZWpUUA5RoaVtkcSAhpWPAjHqc8YNinNAe7aAMjRckSMYG

ARRR on AnonBazaar multisig Litecoin (LTC) donation address:

ltc1qrmtwjshqu2s53z63eetcgpn27c0umxvxh5t4lw7qvm77xzxu4n8sdjnn35

Subversive Spectrum Sponsorship

The Subversive Spectrum / Sal the Agorist sponsorship fundraiser remains open as well. The idea behind this sponsorship is to maintain consistent visibility from someone already aligned with privacy and decentralization, and already talking about Pirate Chain organically.

If you support it, contribute. If you don’t, share feedback: this one is intentionally community-decided.

Unified Light Wallet: Milestone 2 Complete

Øswald and team finished milestone 2 on the unified light wallet, and it’s a big one: network privacy improvements built directly into the wallet.

What’s new

• Tor built-in across desktop + mobile (default connection)
• I2P support on desktop
• Snowflake (Tor censorship bypass) on desktop (slow but works where Tor is blocked)
• OBFS4 bridges on desktop (manual bridge entry, faster than Snowflake)
• Optional direct connection or SOCKS5 proxy, including self-hosted light servers

Wallet usability + safety features

• Address rotation (default on): helps prevent address-linking (especially in KYC exchange edge cases)
• Sweep & consolidation tools: manual + optional “auto consolidate with your next send”
• Screenshot protection on sensitive screens (seed, password where supported)
• Clipboard auto-clear after copying seed words
• Biometrics support: Face ID / Touch ID / Windows Hello (optional)
• Duress / panic mode: reverse passphrase by default, shows zero balance (configurable)
• BIP39 word suggestions during restore (reduces spelling mistakes)
• VirusTotal checks in CI (Windows may false-flag due to bundled Tor/I2P)

Reproducible builds

The team is implementing reproducible builds (unsigned binaries verifiable by anyone), with signing performed transparently in CI. This is a serious trust and security upgrade, and still uncommon even among “open-source” wallets.

Internal builds are already being tested; public testing will come after more internal QA.

In closing

Here's what you can do this month

Test Orchard: Join the Discord channel, run testnet, try to break things, report bugs.

Support real-world utility: Donate to the AnonBazaar integration if you want more places to spend ARRR.

Join the community calls: Sundays 1 PM ET, and monthly updates happen the second Monday of each month.

This is the kind of month that moves Pirate Chain forward: real testing, real utility, and real community builders.

Article credits

☑️Krysler ☑️ AmyV ☑️ QuirkyRobots