Bitcoin Forum

What legitimate reasons are there for wanting one's bitcoin 'mixed' or 'anonymized?' 

Privacy
National Security

Apparently some people feel that Bitcoins are not all equal, for example a Bitcoin that was once involved in illegal activities is 'tainted' and in their eyes worth less than a 'clean' Bitcoin. Personally I think the whole concept is nonsensical, I couldn't care less about where my Bitcoins come from, my conscience is clear and that's good enough for me. I think it would be unfortunate for Bitcoin if this were to become the norm.

Privacy is obviously the most important reason. And privacy can have multiple reasons:

Most people immediately think about illegal activities, but this doesn't have to be the case. Maybe you bought coins in RL from somebody and you don't want them to find out how much coins you have in cold storage. Mixing can help prevent them from following the coins. Especially if they know a lot of details about you, this can be important.

• You have a legitimate job that pays you with bitcoins.
• You rent an apartment from someone that allows you to pay your rent with bitcoins.
• You do not do any "mixing".
• Your landlord can see exactly how much you are getting paid from your employer by looking at the blockchain every time you pay him.
• Your landlord sees that you get a raise from your employer, so he raises your rent.

If you had protected your privacy better, the landlord might not have been so eager to raise your rent (since he wouldn't know if you could afford it and wouldn't want to risk losing a reliable tenant.

How can you tell if a Bitcoin is dirty? What about those that the US government grabbed from Silk Road.

the mainly reason for reaching their privacy but I'm not naive if that's can be used in a bad way anytime and one of example just like for using washing your money because it's come from the bad way, this s fact and that's already giving contribution into the legitimate reason for washing your money.

Or you could just whip up your Bitcoin debit card and give some cash to him without covering your tracks every month? If I need to do this procedure every time I am spending coins then hell no.

I'm surprised that someone asks this in a Bitcoin forum. To any Bitcoiner it should be pretty clear that we live in a world of constant surveillance and financial oppression. The government and its bootlickers brazenly invade your privacy in any way they can. They adopt immoral laws and regulations that constantly reduce human rights and freedom. And increasingly, law enforcement doesn't even care if their actions are lawful or not...

In my view, protecting one's privacy is becoming important to ensure survival. Unfortunately, Bitcoin does not yet offer sufficient provisions for privacy protection (i.e. confidential transactions). Therefore users have to resort to alternate methods.

There is zero reason to justify using a mixing service. You don't need to provide justification for exerting your basic human rights. Usage of mixing services should be encouraged and promoted as good practice until Bitcoin itself improves in the privacy field.

ya.ya.yo!

To protect privacy is the main and most important reason. I'm not obsessed with some conspiracy theories or government surveillance fear but why revealing some of your private data if this is not necessary. And that is completely legitimate. Hiding some illegal activities is totaly different story.

Once bitcoins go out from your hand, then don't know what purpose people use that bitcoins. If someone uses those for illegal purpose and people can trace back to the original owner. So people would like to mix and avoid any issues in the future meaning privacy. 

Why mixing is good/bad is the same question as: Why do you fear government invigilation if you have nothing to fear and are law abiding citizen?

And we have good answer for that:

"Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say." -E.S.

I don't have to share my reasons for mixing my coins, it is my choice.

Privacy and security are the top reason why you want your transactions washed,because there are a lot of tools and softwares and research can trace the owner of a particular address ..

Or you could just whip up your Bitcoin debit card and give some cash to him
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Which is just another way of "mixing" your bitcoins and hiding their source, and which results in fees for both you and your landlord as you convert bitcoins to local currency and your landlord converts the local currency back into bitcoins.  Furthermore, it may be difficult to send the cash to your landlord if he lives far away or isn't around much, while bitcoins are quite easy to send.


You don't "need to". It's up to each individual to decide how important their privacy is to them, and how much responsibility they want to take for controling their own wealth.

Anyone that wants the true concept of Bitcoin should do it. You also go further to the root and use an unique address each time you do a transaction, but that's still harder.

If you have ever uploaded your ID or any personal information to an exchange or website where you have used a bitcoin address then the exchange could use that to track down exactly what you have done with any bitcoins. If you have nothing to hide then there is no reason to wash bitcoins.

Privacy is not just for criminals. You should read gmaxwell's post on coinjoin here
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=279249.0

... Your inlaws don't see that you're buying birth control that deprives them of grand children, your employer doesn't learn about the non-profits you support with money from your paycheck, and thieves don't see your latest purchases or how wealthy you are to help them target and scam you. Poor privacy in Bitcoin can be a major practical disadvantage for both individuals and businesses.

There are many but some i think that could be reasons are.
- To add more privacy to normal bitcoin transactions
- To clean the source of funds.
However i don't think mixing services are much needed for normal level of anonymity and privacy which normal bitcoin transaction can provide itself.

That concept completely gives no sense that the coins once involved in a illegal activity they are not the same as they were before or they are not considered as clean as they were before being used in that way, all the coins you have are the same, whether you got them from a criminal or from someone who earned them in a legal way, once they are kept together they are the same.

Well if you are going to use their services then you have to follow their rules.  If you don't want better find other site to do business or use their service.  At some point i would I agree to this kind of rulings.  We all know that bitcoin had been invovled in different illegal trades right before the day merchants accept them.  In my opinion, this is a move to clear doubts of those new people who wants to get in bitcoin, that the one they are using does not came from illegal activities.

We are in a time where we do not know what the future holds for bitcoin when it comes to regulation and rules,so keeping as much cloaking as you can has to be the best way to proceed for the future. I also limit myself to social media that has no real details and go looking to make sure I do not have to much personal details floating around the net.
As much as we control it is really just a attempt. I google myself from time to time and recently came across a problem. My email,cell number and location where all there to be seen for like a week until it suddenly disappeared. The problem being that only government had all those details when I opened a business and so some one that worked there leaked it knowingly or its just standard practice for them to air it out like that.
Was a shocker but it is not the first time I have come across issues and I try to keep all my details offline as much as possible.

Should be in every ones interest to limit exposure for when the potential crack down happens,they will most likely not see a difference in current and past users.

I could write about several “legitimate” reasons but the most important is simply because you can, there is nothing wrong in itself to want your coins washed, so it should not be a suspicious thing at all.

I think the person who receives the coin should not be held countable for the coin received if it were a stolen or hacked one, because the receiver can offer a service or product and they are paid with that coin.
In this instance, the receiver earned the coin legitimately even if the coin was stolen or hacked.

Just not wanting people to follow your finances if you use a single wallet, or mixing them because you believe they might have come from an unsavory source and might have someone else trailing them are legitimate reasons for mixing your Bitcoin.

To enable a person to make a donation be it large or small to remain anonymous to the recipient.

If you want to stay anonymous or private. For example, when doing an illegal transaction you don't want anybody to find about. It would become very hard to be traced, so you will have your transaction anonymous.

That is a mistake the quantity of bitcoin cannot go down but it goes up every day with the bitcoins that are mines, the only moment when the amount of bitcoins will no longer go up is when all the 21 million bitcoins have been mined.

You want a legitimate reason to get your Bitcoins tumbled? Fungibility. Some online services like Coinbase are starting to block Bitcoins used in online gambling from entering their services. If more and more services and exchanges start doing this practice then this will affect the value of the coins. One coin that went thru the darknet market or thru a gambling site would potentially become less valuable compared to the clean coins.

This is not a flaw in Bitcoin per se but some centralized services have a choice to accept certain inputs or not depending on their rules and policies.

panju1 nails it, IMO.

Your BTC are no one else's business.  I don't do illegal things, but I sure as hell don't want casual (or not so casual) thieves eyeing me or my family as a target.  And if you count Landlords and Employers, it is none of their business either.

Mixing BTC protects those your SEND BTC to as well, particularly businesses.  Were I running a business, I would offer a discount vs. cash (the only business I send BTC to is Provident Metals, and I send them mixed coins -- alas, Privident charges 1% more for payment by BTC).

you are quoting something and replying something else which is irrelevant to the argument above it!

and just FYI, bitcoin quantity can go down and has gone down. yes it is being mined everyday and new coins are created everyday so the total is increasing but also there have been so many losses like lost passwords to encrypted wallets, or lost wallets because of HDD malfunction, or even some burnt coins which are no longer spendable .

Of course for there are not people who can track my transaction because as we know bitcoins is not realy anonimous, some time we need bitcoins mixing services.

Im curious about sites doing this in attempts to play ball with government in the future. Could we not start washing every coin we come across in a gambling site?
This would make it near impossible for people to use coinbase due to a large segment of the coin being connected in this manner.
Or they just stopping direct connections from gambling sites?

Its crazy seeing sites manipulate us into playing ball.

I also don't care where my bitcoins came from but it bugs me if someone from the government would knock my door and question me some day because of the illegal activies that the older owner of my coins have done. They may find my pirated software stash and i can be in trouble out of nothing!

"Legitimate" or in other words "legal". See, when one puts it like that, why would one need a legal reason for needing to 'wash' their own bitcoin.

Yes, I am aware that some ill-gotten coins are washed on mixers and such, which is what gives the act of 'washing/mixing' a bad impression, but still, for those who actually cares about their privacy, that shouldn't stop them.

Still, I get that some are turned away/scared of using a mixer because they might get accused of being involved with some 'shady' business. Can't be helped. In the end, it's still up to an individual to weigh the pros and cons for themselves.