Bitcoin Forum

Let's say I regularly send BTC back and forth between wallet #1 and wallet #2.  I'm receiving BTC and I don't want the sender to link me to wallet #1 and its transaction history.  Is my privacy increased at all by having him send to wallet #2 instead of wallet #1 or will I be linked to wallet #1 for sure no matter which wallet he sends to?

A wallet may have several addresses. Maybe you mean address instead of wallet? :)

If you do, and if you send coins back and forth, address/wallet 1 will always be linked to 2 and vice versa. That's why you should always generate a new address for each payment!

Generating a new address doesn't protect you from the addresses being linked together though.  As soon as you spend BTC from the wallet which generated the two address, they may be linked together.

you should be fine as long as you don't send btc from wallet #2 to wallet #1 too frequently. though if you want to be sure that you won't tracked, you can always use an exchange or a dice site to completely hide your track.

and multiple wallets "privacy" is not very different than multiple address.

When you say "wallet", do you mean "address"?  I can't truly make sense of this question as written and this seems like the most natural fix.

If you do mean address then the answer is "yes".  No amount of sending back and forth between addresses conclusively proves that the addresses are controlled by the same person.  The sender (to whom you have revealed a link between yourself and address #2) will be unable to link you to address #1 with certainty.

Note that the corresponding gain in privacy may well be negligible.

Correct, if you generate a new address for EVERY transaction you ever receive, then when you spend BTC, it is possible that a few of those address will be linked together (though not necessarily all of them).  You can use a wallet that allows coin control to gain better control over exactly which addresses get linked together during the send.  You can improve your privacy substantially more if you use a "CoinJoin" system, where your inputs are blended with the inputs of other users in the same transaction.


If you are using multiple wallets, then you eliminate the chance that outputs received in one wallet will be used as inputs in the same transaction as outputs from one of the other wallets.  However, if you "regularly send BTC back and forth", then it may become clear that the owners of the two wallets have a VERY close personal relationship.  They may even be able to infer that it is the same person.

 

This would be true.  If you want to keep them separate if you mine it's easy just point miners to a new address and you have "clean" btc not linked.   This method you control every aspect really.

Another is to use a mixer.  I personally don't as I don't trust any enough to send significant amount to.  But some do and have good luck.

I think those are two main and most likely best ways to get "clean" btc.

Because you sent bitcoins between address #1 and #2 those will forever be linked.
You would need to ask the sender to send to address #3.

And then never send any bitcoins from #3 to either #2 or #1 ever.
Also make sure that bitcoins from #3 are not used together with bitcoins from either #1 or #2 when you make a payment yourself.
Some wallets let you control this.

I don't think it'll make any difference to receive BTC using either wallets. If you wish not to be linked to the addresses, your best bet is to install a 3rd wallet client or create an online account just to receive the coins. You can use addresses generated by the 3rd wallet for inbound transactions only.

What's the best online account to use?

You can solve it quite easily you just gotta create wallet #3 and always when depositing to that adress you will run your coins throught mixer and it will make it quite untracable.
Viola.

blockchain.info, you can add a mixer for more privacy but you will not get 100% anon

a good strategy for a good anonimity, would be to start with an amount that is already splitted among many adresses

then you proceed with the usual ramification

The wallet/address distinction is important here.  If the 3 addresses referenced above are in the same wallet, there exists the possibility that they will be linked when spending coins in the wallet.

And blockchain.info has a built-in mixer-esque utility called SharedCoin (or maybe it's SharedSend, I get them mixed up).

Use a bitcoin mixer for more privacy ;)

What about using a mixer? I've thought about using one like Bitmixer, but would that cut the trace of your original coins?
And what if the origin of the mixed coins you got are criminal coins? (coins that are linked to for example Silk Road or something).
I dont know if you get my point, let me know please. Im willing to learn how to do this, but I dont want to get in trouble, I just want privacy.

Just wondering. Do you know of a website or etc that can determine if addresses come from the same wallet?

I'd be interested to know if something like that exists yet too.

You'll be linked to wallet 1 if in the future you send an amount of coins exceeding what's in wallet 2, which would cause your client to send from both 1 and 2. So if the sender of coins to 2 is watching forever, they may eventually discern that you control wallet 1 as well

If you use multiple inputs while sending a tx then it'll be linked of course.
let's say wallet A has 5 different addresses and
add1 has 0.1 btc
add2 has 0.3 btc
add3 has 0.1 btc
and if you want to send 0.5 btc to wallet B's address
if you don't use coin control and choose inputs seperately they'll be in same input, so those 3 addresses will be linked.

But is there a script online that takes a couple addresses as input and tells you if they're linked after analyzing the blockchain?

Yes. Good mixers will help you to gain more privacy. The chances for that to happen is very low. You can also use a reputable site where you can depoit Bitcoin and then withdraw it after some hours or next day. If you are doing this, you must ensure that:

 • deposit address isn't used for sending coins withdrawn.
 • deposit address isn't public enought to know the name of exchange.


It can't be done unless the wallet you put a backdoor. The wallet will be marked negatively pretty faster by others if they do something suspicius. So the chances are very low.

Edit:


You can use Blockchain.info's "Taint analysis" tool.

https://blockchain.info/taint/putaddresshere

Does a dice site deposit... Then withdraw, act as a true mixer? I would think the taint would be rather high... Perhaps even some of the withdraw coming back from the original deposit address

Just curious. 

Strato

Answer is sbove. ;)

I think the best way, in my view, to truly mix coins would be to deposit BTC to an exchange, say Bittrex... Buy Doge or another coin thats high volume low volitility.  Withdraw Doge. Deposit Doge to different exchange... Say poloniex... Sell for BTC. Withdraw.

Strato

That's what "coin control" is.

Both Blockchain.info and Electrum only supports us to choose two options when sending: "any" or "an address". So you can't choose inputs as you like, only address to send from.