Bitcoin Forum

So as we all know, Satoshi intended Bitcoin to be p2p cash through the internet (its on the whitepaper!). I still do not understand how this concept is compatible with the public ledger, unless, we use the notion of mixing inputs and outputs. I am not an expert or a coder, but I think the CoinJoin thing is pushing on this direction and have the right idea.

Of course technologies like Darkwallet sound even cooler, but, CoinJoin seems like a more simple approach and I think it could easily be implemented in Core.

My point is, everyone must be able to send a transaction anonymously if they want to, including the most average Joe of Joes out there. Therefore, a check/uncheck button next to "send" that says "send this transaction anonymously" must be added. All this would do is automate the whole process of the CoinJoin thing, so it would send your coins mixed with random people's coins in the same transaction so there is no way to know who is sending what from A to B. This coupled with confidential transactions which hide the amount of BTC moved could reach a very respectable level of anonymity for everyone and then we would be able to start talking about actual p2p cash.

We must push for a decentralized Bitcoin and as anonymous as it gets for the whole family.

P2P cash isn't a synonym for anonymous cash. You can remain anonymous or avoid being traced/having your multiple identities connected if you use Bitcoin correctly. I think anonymity is a good feature and the pseudo anonymous nature of Bitcoin is the best of both worlds, in my opinion. Bitcoins has its usefulness in being able to trace funds to known addresses too... :)

Automating the whole process of the CoinJoin thing in Bitcoin would change the fundamental nature of what Bitcoin is. New code would need writing which decides which coins get mixed with other coins. That code could make Bitcoin illegal in some jurisdictions, either now or in the future. Currently third part mixer services provide mixing functionality for those that want it, and it may be better to leave it to third parties to avoid legal issues.

P2P was never standing for being anonymous at all

Anonymity is what has caused so many of the "mishaps" in the crypto world that i really don't see development of such features to be beneficial. We should be working to build a better public image and increase adoption rather than hiding the traces of our use of such technology. I understand that in some jurisdictions there is little to no privacy protections and that use of such "disruptive" technology can cause complications however that is only the case for a minority and it is the majority that we should develop things further.
Until we can get passed this whole "obsession" with anonymity then we will not see huge growth in adoption.

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So as we all know, Satoshi intended Bitcoin to be p2p cash through the internet (its on the whitepaper!). I still do not understand how this concept is compatible with the public ledger, unless, we use the notion of mixing inputs and outputs. I am not an expert or a coder, but I think the CoinJoin thing is pushing on this direction and have the right idea.

Of course technologies like Darkwallet sound even cooler, but, CoinJoin seems like a more simple approach and I think it could easily be implemented in Core.

My point is, everyone must be able to send a transaction anonymously if they want to, including the most average Joe of Joes out there. Therefore, a check/uncheck button next to "send" that says "send this transaction anonymously" must be added. All this would do is automate the whole process of the CoinJoin thing, so it would send your coins mixed with random people's coins in the same transaction so there is no way to know who is sending what from A to B. This coupled with confidential transactions which hide the amount of BTC moved could reach a very respectable level of anonymity for everyone and then we would be able to start talking about actual p2p cash.

We must push for a decentralized Bitcoin and as anonymous as it gets for the whole family.

Mixing services aren't a solution, they are centralized and they keep logs, plus it's annoying as it gets to have to send your funds somewhere, then get them back, then buy or pay whatever. It should be just a single click like a regular transaction, otherwise it's a waste of time.

This is a good idea.  DASH has this functionality already.  The funds are pre-mixed at any time prior to sending.
https://dashtalk.org/ (https://dashtalk.org/)

P2P was never standing for being anonymous at all

I'm not grasping your idea yet.  Does it hide any information from the public network?  What is the advantage?

If at least 50% of nodes validated transactions enough that old transactions can be discarded, then everyone saw everything and could keep a record of it.

Can public nodes see the values of transactions?  Can they see which previous transaction the value came from?  If they can, then they know everything.  If they can't, then they couldn't verify that the value came from a valid source, so you couldn't take their generated chain as verification of it.

Does it hide the bitcoin addresses?  Is that it?  OK, maybe now I see, if that's it.

Crypto may offer a way to do "key blinding".  I did some research and it was obscure, but there may be something there.  "group signatures" may be related.

There's something here in the general area:
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hopwood/crypto/rh/

What we need is a way to generate additional blinded variations of a public key.  The blinded variations would have the same properties as the root public key, such that the private key could generate a signature for any one of them.  Others could not tell if a blinded key is related to the root key, or other blinded keys from the same root key.  These are the properties of blinding.  Blinding, in a nutshell, is x = (x * large_random_int) mod m.

When paying to a bitcoin address, you would generate a new blinded key for each use.

Then you need to be able to sign a signature such that you can't tell that two signatures came from the same private key.  I'm not sure if always signing a different blinded public key would already give you this property.  If not, I think that's where group signatures comes in.  With group signatures, it is possible for something to be signed but not know who signed it.

As an example, say some unpopular military attack has to be ordered, but nobody wants to go down in history as the one who ordered it.  If 10 leaders have private keys, one of them could sign the order and you wouldn't know who did it.

Yes, it should be part of the protocol itself.   DASH does this right now.  In the wallet you can choose to send funds "anonymously" or "non-anonymously" with a single click.  The mixing is facilitated by the full nodes, so there is no need for a 3rd party mixing service.

This is a good idea.  DASH has this functionality already.  The funds are pre-mixed at any time prior to sending.
https://dashtalk.org/ (https://dashtalk.org/)

This reddit discussion from a few months ago gives insight into how long darksend mixing should/could take:


link: https://www.reddit.com/r/dashpay/comments/3etq0y/what_is_the_point_of_darksend_mixing_in_the/

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How is cash anonymous?

In every store there is over 90000 cameras they can trace you by face, body if they need to.

Stop smearing your name one the bills while shopping.

Tracing funds is incompatible with "cash", and somewhat incompatible with the definition of money (fungiblity).

Well he has a good point tho, sure cash has no public ledger and whatnot, but you need to physically move it, this is counter-productive privacy wise since as he pointed there are cameras everywhere nowadays, so you can kiss goodbye to privacy unless you meet up in the middle of a forest or somewhere bizarre like that which is not very attractive customer wise.

Of course this is not a problem if you just get inside a house, but you would still trust that the other party hasn't placed a hidden minicamera recording you or something. So the ultimate form of cash for me would be anonymous and online, because you wouldn't need physical presence.

Even though there are cameras in many shops... from you describe you are probably from the UK, so lets assume there are cameras everywhere that is not private. So, cameras everywhere, you pay cash. How exactly do they get your name? Cash is anonymous not because you cant get filmed while you use it, but because it has no record of who used it.

I don't know if that was the poster's original point, but one way in which cameras can destroy supposed anonymity of cash is the following:  Suppose you are an activist and want to uncover some illegal situation happening in a big corporation.  For that, you buy a camera you are going to install to produce video evidence.  Unfortunately, the camera is detected by the owners before you are able to retrieve it afterwards.  Police is now able to trace the stores in which such a camera has been sold recently (even worse if there's any kind of serial number involved), and may use the purchase information provided by the stores to get CCTV footage of you buying it.  No matter whether you paid by cash or credit card.

This is of course not directly related to breaking anonymity of the payment, but it does not matter in the end.  I am aware that such a process actually happened to animal-right activists in Austria.  Apparently police even raided some homes of people who just happened to have bought the same camera at a similar time and paid by card but were not involved in any activism at all.

Even though there are cameras in many shops... from you describe you are probably from the UK, so lets assume there are cameras everywhere that is not private. So, cameras everywhere, you pay cash. How exactly do they get your name? Cash is anonymous not because you cant get filmed while you use it, but because it has no record of who used it.

-snip-
Yea, but cash does have serial numbers on them and if a camera can pick that up then you are most definitely going to get tracked or caught.

Yeah this was more or less my point, the actual transaction may be anonymous, but it's pointless since there is evidence of the actual persons involved, which is even more revealing than using Bitcoin as it is today to be honest. If you have all the cam footage and authorities can have it of all places and angles, they can reconstruct your path and eventually find out who was involved, so the cash transaction would need to happen in physical isolation from any cameras which is just a pain in the ass for any normal person not doing anything illegal that just wants to remain anonymous.

P2P does not mean anonymous though...

ENHANCE![1] Sorry, but I can not take you serious with that point. Just turn the bill around and the serial is no longer seen by the camera that hardly has the resultion to make identify a person[2].


Sorry, but where the hell do you live that you have problems not getting filmed by a camera when in public? I know central london is a problem[3], but even their system was unable to do what you suggest in a murdercase[4,5].



[1] https://i.imgur.com/Zy1xXJ8.jpg
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzdv4FUHqP8
[3] https://thecctvmap.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/shoreditch2.jpg
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bViveOxeHQ0
[5] http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-34284385

It's not really about that, the main thing here is you needing to physically move to exchange your coins, isn't it obvious that it defeat's Bitcoin's purpose? We want digital cash, if we have to meet in person, well, you might as well exchange actual physical cash..

The goal is to have the same function cash has but decentralized and online, with all the features of an internet app, without needing to meet in person. Of course, if you want fiat, there's no way around it, but crypto to crypto should be as anonymous as possible by default.

I agree, the point about "FIAT bills & CCTV can be used to track your payments" is bullshit though. Bitcoin allows you to stay anonymous. Its just hard and complicated. CoinJoin build into core or other common local wallets would be a great way to make things easier. AFAIK it can work without the need for a central server. I have not seen a working implementation yet though. Bc.i is one central server, dark wallet most likely stuck in alpha.

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Isn't CoinJoin already working? There's this JoinMarket thing, but it's still very archaic, not user friendly, and therefore not a lot of people use it yet, that's why we need this sort of stuff to be implemented within the actual wallets and working in a seamless "click there and send anonymous" way where the user doesn't necessarily even know what is going on in detail, he just knows his transaction is safely sent.

The JoinMarket stuff is too complicated imo, everything that isn't "click to send anonymously" is a hassle for the end user, and the end user is ultimately all that matters. At the end of the day, what we want is an anonymous transaction, that mixes the coins in a decentralized way, and that doesn't display the amount sent (this part is mostly solved by the nice work of Gmaxwell with CT). We combine both features in an easy way and then we can start talking about e-cash like the Bitcoin whitepaper said.

I will read more on JoinMarket, from the little I read about it on git I would consider it alpha as well.

If you want 'anonymity', you have to use Tor like everyone else.

If you want 'anonymity', you have to use Tor like everyone else.

Yeah, that's the point, Tor alone will never solve the underlying issue. Greg Maxwell has addressed this and he is also concerned with the current model, you can watch the video where he explains the elements project and he addresses CI, and also points at the need to mask the movement of coins, because for example, your landlord could see that you got a raise in your salary, and then decide to raise your rent.. there are all kind of ways that prove we need better privacy without anything illegal involved.

It seems obvious to me that the necessary changes are not going to happen to btc. 

why do some people delete the posts again? get an anonymous nickname and post your thoughts. just thoughts and work are valuable not the person itself.

it was a thought that a landlord could increase the rent if he will find out through your salary payment address that your boss increased your salary. and that is true. by the public ledger we don't have the private environments as banks have it. and therefore we need special mechanisms to grant usual privacy as banks have it too except in the case the government want to know it but this is then not possible by Bitcoin.