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Title: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: a63ntsm1th on July 25, 2011, 09:51:26 AM Quote Bitcoin is not inherently anonymous. It may be possible to conduct transactions is such a way so as to obscure your identity, but, in many cases, users and their transactions can be identified. We have performed an analysis of anonymity in the Bitcoin system and published our results in a preprint on arXiv. Reactions from those knowledgeable in related fields? Headline: An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System http://anonymity-in-bitcoin.blogspot.com/2011/07/bitcoin-is-not-anonymous.html (http://anonymity-in-bitcoin.blogspot.com/2011/07/bitcoin-is-not-anonymous.html) Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: Gabi on July 25, 2011, 09:54:24 AM Nothing new...
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: phatsphere on July 25, 2011, 09:54:53 AM erm, it never stated to be, it's pseudonymous.
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: bittersweet on July 25, 2011, 09:58:38 AM erm, it never stated to be, it's pseudonymous. "it" maybe didn't state it, but many people did and it's repeated by media. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: jackjack on July 25, 2011, 09:59:18 AM ZOMGBBQ breakin news!!
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: a63ntsm1th on July 25, 2011, 10:17:58 AM ZOMGBBQ breakin news!! :P I was surprised at the amount of information they were able to gather from "passive" analysis. I'm assuming all they used was the block chain. And google? Anyway after reading it I will take even further steps to protect anonymity. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: titeuf_87 on July 25, 2011, 10:22:21 AM Pretty graphs :)
And yes, for the rest, nothing new. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: kokjo on July 25, 2011, 10:29:07 AM we have always known that bitcoin is not anonymous. we can see all the transactions, and track the ownership of all coins.
there is no news. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: Seraphim401 on July 25, 2011, 10:29:19 AM Ok everyone nothing to see here,move along.
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: natman3400 on July 25, 2011, 02:27:54 PM The part of bitcoin that is anonymous is that, in most cases, a bitcoin address can not be attributed to a name unless its published.
In this respect, it is as anonymous as this board. All I would have to do to get a 'new identity' is reset my modem and make a new account (in this metaphor, hitting the 'new address' button). Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: kokjo on July 25, 2011, 02:36:39 PM The part of bitcoin that is anonymous is that, in most cases, a bitcoin address can not be attributed to a name unless its published. sad to disappointing you, but...In this respect, it is as anonymous as this board. All I would have to do to get a 'new identity' is reset my modem and make a new account (in this metaphor, hitting the 'new address' button). have you ever heard of tracking cookies Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: Anonymous on July 25, 2011, 02:43:54 PM The part of bitcoin that is anonymous is that, in most cases, a bitcoin address can not be attributed to a name unless its published. sad to disappointing you, but...In this respect, it is as anonymous as this board. All I would have to do to get a 'new identity' is reset my modem and make a new account (in this metaphor, hitting the 'new address' button). have you ever heard of tracking cookies Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: natman3400 on July 25, 2011, 02:45:04 PM The part of bitcoin that is anonymous is that, in most cases, a bitcoin address can not be attributed to a name unless its published. sad to disappointing you, but...In this respect, it is as anonymous as this board. All I would have to do to get a 'new identity' is reset my modem and make a new account (in this metaphor, hitting the 'new address' button). have you ever heard of tracking cookies I'm sorry to disappoint you, but have you heard of metaphors? It's an example, not how it should be done. And what about the 10,000 live CDs I have? I can easily reboot into one of those. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: natman3400 on July 25, 2011, 02:47:59 PM The part of bitcoin that is anonymous is that, in most cases, a bitcoin address can not be attributed to a name unless its published. sad to disappointing you, but...In this respect, it is as anonymous as this board. All I would have to do to get a 'new identity' is reset my modem and make a new account (in this metaphor, hitting the 'new address' button). have you ever heard of tracking cookies Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: TraderTimm on July 25, 2011, 03:11:43 PM They have no way of associating a given public key with a client's wallet. Nice graphs though, but not really 'proving' anything worthwhile.
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: jackjack on July 25, 2011, 03:15:13 PM As everybody said the graphs were nice, I finally open the link
They are definitely nice Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: evoorhees on July 25, 2011, 04:15:35 PM Bitcoin is as anonymous as the user would like to make it.
One can make it completely anonymous by simply swapping coin ownership in physical form - such as with Bitbills. These transactions never appear on the Block Chain, and as such using the Block Chain to determine ownership becomes highly problematic. I think it should be understood that Bitcoin doesn't provide -automatic- anonymity. However with a bit of effort it can be effectively anonymous. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: bitplane on July 25, 2011, 04:34:31 PM I also like the graphs. Would be nice if blockexplorer looked like that.
Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: Jaime Frontero on July 25, 2011, 04:44:32 PM I also like the graphs. Would be nice if blockexplorer looked like that. ! +1 Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: evoorhees on July 25, 2011, 05:05:31 PM The author of the OP's cited article posted this in his own follow-up comments, and I think it describes whether Bitcoin IS or IS NOT anonymous very well...
"It is possible to use Bitcoin in a way that is almost certainly anonymous, in the same way it is possible to get almost certain anonymity on the Internet, by using encryption, onion routing, and never associating your identity with your actions. Our point is that you don't get this anonymity automatically, and that most casual users of Bitcoin may not be anonymous, even though many of them may believe they are." I think people should start using the phrase, "Bitcoin is not automatically anonymous." Indeed, saying that Bitcoin "is anonymous" or "is not anonymous"... both of these statements are untrue and misleading. Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: Trader Steve on July 26, 2011, 12:25:52 AM Quote This, and if this is to complicated, just send some coins to another wallet through a mixer and if anyone asks, just say somebody you were selling something to gave you the mixer input address as there payment address. Did you mean to say: "...and if this is too complicated, just send some coins to another wallet through a mixer and if anyone asks, just say somebody you were buying something from gave you the mixer input address as their payment address." ?? Title: Re: Bitcoin is not anonymous Post by: fergalr on August 30, 2011, 10:26:40 PM ZOMGBBQ breakin news!! :P I was surprised at the amount of information they were able to gather from "passive" analysis. I'm assuming all they used was the block chain. And google? Anyway after reading it I will take even further steps to protect anonymity. Hi a63ntsm1th, The analysis was done almost exclusively with the block chain, and googling addresses, and scraping addresses from the web. We also looked a little at the faucet service, as a proof of concept. I'm one of the authors, if you have any further questions. (see also discussion here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=31662.0) |