Understanding Privacy: How Anonymous Can Bitcoin Payments Be?
Since its inception, Bitcoin as a payment medium has a cemented an impression of being anonymous and privacy-centric. So much so that the currency has been glorified by the masterminds behind the doomed Silk Road, and advocated by recognized influencers such as German politician Franz Schäffler, celebrity Ashton Kutcher, famed author & economist David Friedman, and finance guru Kevin O’Leary to name a few. Kutcher in particular said that, “I think the fact that you can buy drugs and ammo with [bitcoin] is actually a validator of the currency itself.” The downfall of Silk Road, however,....
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Bitcoin is often advertised as an anonymous digital currency that offers a high level of user privacy. People can hide their identities behind a wallet address, and generate additional addresses if needed. But is Bitcoin as anonymous and privacy-centric as uneducated people assume? The answers might surprise you. Right now, there is a decent level of customer privacy in business. But it only exists on a conditional basis. In the current financial infrastructure, any bank can and will disclose any personal information if the government requests it. While this may not be of great concern for....
Maybe some people still believe it, but Bitcoin isn’t really anonymous. Indeed, isn’t anonymous at all: all the transactions in this currency are recorded in a public —and widely-available-online— ledger. Tracking the funds and the parties behind them isn’t that hard, and that’s why privacy coins were created. The privacy coins are cryptocurrencies with in-design […]
Bitcoin is not anonymous, but, rather, pseudo-anonymous. By now, most Bitcoin veterans know this. It's less obvious to many, however, why Bitcoin is not really anonymous by default, and what can be done to de-anonymize Bitcoin users - and what Bitcoin users can do to reclaim their privacy. Below is an advanced beginners guide to get a better understanding of the nuances of Bitcoin and anonymity. How do Bitcoin transactions work? To better understand Bitcoin's anonymity, it's necessary to first understand how Bitcoin works on a basic level. Most importantly, the Bitcoin protocol effectively....
If there is anything the internet loves these days, it’s privacy. From the boom in VPN use to anonymous accounts and encrypted websites, maintaining privacy is certainly appealing to the average internet user. This interest in privacy has also coincided with the rise in blockchain technology, a concept that thrives on the idea of privacy. […]
Can blockchain micropayments be fast, decentralized and private? That question arguably forms the core of a new white paper penned by researchers at Johns Hopkins University that explores methods for bringing greater anonymity to off-blockchain micropayment networks. In the paper, researchers Matthew Green and Ian Miers explore privacy in the context of micropayment channels and outline a new scheme for blind off-chain lightweight transactions, or Bolt, which they believe will provide "private, instantaneous [and] anonymous payments". The proposal comes at a time when privacy....