Bitcoin Forum

Back in 2012-2013, I had a few Blockchain.com wallets, back then, no details were asked, there wasn't even an option to login via email. Recently, I received an email from them about a promotion. They were offering $5 in BTC, if you completed the KYC process, by providing your personal details, such as residence, uploading your driver's license, or other form of identification.

On top of that, they've now added a section about taxation of cryptocurrencies, providing you with the ability to export tax statements.



I'm starting to believe that even wallet providers and exchanges are shifting towards a centralization of cryptocurrencies, debunking previous theories about anonymity of funds and personal freedom.

What are your thoughts about this? Do you think more and more services will adopt similar techniques?

Web wallets like blockchain.com have always been centralized. If you use their website, then you are placing complete and total trust in them and all the third parties which they use, and are at the complete mercy of their closed source backend (which has had a number of critical vulnerabilities in the past). The same is true of centralized exchanges. You cannot have any personal freedom if you store your coins on an exchange, since the exchange can choose whether or not to let you spend those coins. As the old saying goes "Not your keys, not your coins." If you aren't storing your bitcoin in your own wallet, then you don't actually own any bitcoin. You have no freedom, no security, and no privacy.

This says nothing about the principles of bitcoin though. Bitcoin itself is still censorship resistant and allows complete freedom to do what you want with your own money. Hold bitcoin in your own wallet and you can enjoy these benefits. Let a third party hold your bitcoin for you and you are at their mercy.

because blockchain.com is not jsut a custodial wallet but an exchange.
your you can use fiat to buy bitcoin via blockchain.com.. that part of their business means customers using that service need to be KYC'd

the hint is in the topic post

its not saying"if you hold crypto. or if you use us as just a wallet
it clearly says if you exchanged or earned income then you probably need to pay tax on that fiat value

Blockchain.com is a non-custodial wallet and exchange.
Their wallet gives you the seed phrase and you have full control over your fund. Of course, I wouldn't recommend anyone to use blockchain.com. It's close source and we don't know whether the keys are stored on their server or not.

I thought Blockchain.com was a non-custodial web wallet. Can't you just take your seed phrase and import your wallet into another wallet, like Electrum?

edit: I just noticed that hosseinimr93 answered similarly as I was writing this.

I think that all the old members of the forum have used this wallet in their beginnings and before it turned from just a normal wallet to a trading platform that has its weight in the market. Identity proof procedures have been imposed since that time, but the mechanism of the wallet’s work has not been compromised, and then the wallet was developed to become in the form of an application on mobile phones, which is an application that appears to be decentralized, but it is not known about the mechanism of its servers factors.

Well, this is possible --you can export your blockchain.com seed to Electrum.
This is a non-custodial wallet if they will enforce to ask KYC if I were in OP case, I will transfer to Electrum. They are paying $5 for that? Well, I cannot change my personal data into a $5 which is can risk my privacy. It is good if you will use other wallet platforms that should open-source wallets and the only answer is Electrum for this question.

In exchange of your info, they will have a "bonus" of $5. Nope, better use electrum, free and no KYC. But with today's crisis, a lot will still avail of that 5 bucks in exchange of their KYC details. The electrum wallet is a user friendly as you don't need big storage to get one. And you also have the full control of your coins. If you are a crypto user, better limit where you send your info. Even if we say, they have good intentions, we will never know where will these big data end up with down the road.

Regulation will come into play. As you may have heard, recently there is even some initiative to collect non-custodial wallets user identities using AOPP, fortunately, some wallets already decided to remove it. Nevertheless, it doesn't mean that governments will stop at that point. Expect that the government will figure out how to enter a few applications/entities/platforms that have centralized points.

You can, but I would consider that an unsafe way to secure your funds as you cannot verify how your keys and seed phrases were stored on their platform. It is much better to sweep the funds to a new wallet you've created on a non custodian, open source wallet software, like electrum.

And of course, you verify the signature.

Based on what OP said, it looks like he was referring to the old era Blockchain.info wallet, which never gave one any back up phrase or seed phrase  that they could use to restore an account... Correct me if am wrong.

oh people.. your missing the point

blockchain.info wallet(separate department from the exchange) is the wallet service where you can export your private keys..

but thats not the point. its not about the symantics of "custodial"

it's about that blockchain.com exchange (different department) is a service that is an exchange
its the fiat exchange element that creates the need for KYC

the KYC element is not about the wallet service. but the fiat exchange service
something that has been integrated straight into the site when you log in.. there is no way to separate your login from having access to their exchange part.

(sidenote. if you want to get into symantics. go to blockchain.info/.com find the login page.. and then put your browser into 'offline mode' and see how far you can get at just client side.. it will surprise you)

It's a natural trend. Crypto market need more regulations in order to expand its adoption. Regulation and adoption will move together. I believe that we won't see massive adoption if there will be no more and stricter regulations on the crypto market.

I share two topics on KYC and wallet recover with seeds from Blockchain.com

• Why KYC is extremely dangerous – and useless (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5221497.0)
• [Guide] Use CPFP if your stucked transactions from blockchain.com wallet (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5324302.0)

Yes, OP mentioned blockchain.info before, but now it has changed its name to blockchain.com. They are not like coinbase, they provide seed cluster for us and we have full control over our assets. But as OP said they started offering KYC, I think it's not secure anymore.

Indeed. Even those who are decentralized were started to require some KYC now thus being strict and following AMLAs regulations. I have experienced one particular wallet which has level options of KYC and with withdrawals and depo limits.


Well, thanks for clarifying the point. Since it is one of the well known crypto exchange, the need to know your customer service is a must, considering to know all the details for them to provide better service , to prevent fraud and to know how those customers are using their platforms.

If they give you (customers) mnemonic seeds, you still have control on your coins. At least until they do some crazy changes. Meanwhile, to protect yourself, you can import wallets by given seeds to Electrum wallet ie. and move your Bitcoin to another wallet (not another address in the same wallet).

Read my topic, link above (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5392859.msg59747517#msg59747517) for a simple guide.

what you also need to know.
is even if you are not at the $value level to need to hand over birth-certified ID. exchanges are already getting data about their customers.
they are already chain-analysing and IP logging... even fresh accounts with $0 value

if you use random IP's or known vpns/proxies or mixing your coins using known mixer addresses. you will be red-flagged as suspicious. right from the start

this basic analysis is done to check for duplicate accounts trying to circumvent the $value min limit before KYC is required. and yes if you are red flagged. the service can (just within the service terms and conditions, NOT regulation.. ask you to provide KYC and an explanation as to your activity)

A lot of things have changed in the cryptocurrency industry since 2012-2013.
Were you sleeping under a rock in the last 10 years. ;D
Yes,more and more services will "adopt similar techniques",because they are required by the laws and regulations.
It's weird that Blockchain.com is offering a financial incentive,in order to force it's users to ID verify themselves.
Most crypto exchanges would just say that ID verification is mandatory and won't offer 5 dollars.
Perhaps Blockchain.com wants to treat it's customers in a better way,despite the fact that I've heard many horror stories about people being scammed by this company.

You don't. You have some control over your assets, but full control implies that you and you alone have control over them. If you store coins on a blockchain.com wallet or under a blockchain.com generated seed phrase, then you have absolutely no idea who else has access to your coins.

If a service is demanding KYC then it isn't decentralized, despite what it may claim.

As I said on another thread about this (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5391083.msg59626965#msg59626965), it is because your data is far more valuable to them than $5. Your data can be endlessly monetized, sold, shared, etc.

Blockchain.com can claim to be a decentralized wallet, but getting more not to be a decentralized platform, it is not even decentralized unlike because this is what centralized services are doing. It is just a means to link a person's address to the exact person. Blockchain.com is getting centralized.

You can still use a reputed wallet like Electrum that is decentralized.

Very possible. Just because most people are even foolish about privacy, they are willingly given out their personal data out. But reputed decentralized wallet like Electrum should still be existing.

Yes, they promised a certain amount of BTC if you verify with them. Moreover, there used to be several levels of verification, the highest I think was gold, for which you had to get some stellar coins or something like that. And it's one of the oldest and most famous wallets. Even I had my first exposure to bitcoin through blockchain.com. Soon the privacy of cryptocurrency will be completely forgotten! I wouldn't trust anyone with my ID!

There was no BIP39 seed phrase in the wallets created before the upgrade they did in 2016. But users had full control over their fund.
As far as I know, in the old wallets, users had a json file which could be used for recovering all private keys if they knew the encryption password.

Again, I am not saying blockchcain.com wallet is secure. It's possible that they have access to the keys. It's also a buggy wallet with an unresponsive support.

It might have been KYC free for many years.. but the large investors from Wall Street has changed it's original goals to be pseudo anonymous. Blockchain.com are now backed by renowned investors from Silicon Valley, Wall Street, and London.  ::) See : https://www.blockchain.com/about  (Venture capitalist has funded $537M of equity, valued at $5.2B)

They also added the "Exchange" part now... and NO exchange can operate without the KYC requirements. They pulled the same shit as what "Circle" did.. back in the day. They pull you in with promises of pseudo anonymity to build a huge user base and then once they get that huge user base, they change the business model to a "Bank"  ::)

Blockchain.com, Inc. are registered Money Services Businesses in the United States. https://www.blockchain.com/legal/law

It might have been KYC free, but it was never private or anonymous. They quite clearly have access to all your addresses and transactions, and link all that in to your email address, IP addresses, device identifiers, browser fingerprint, geolocation, and so on. You have absolutely zero privacy if you use blockchain.com.

Also, imagine having a few hundred million dollars to invest and choosing to invest in literally the worse service in the whole of bitcoin. How embarrassing.

Bank and data broker. Their Privacy Policy gives them scope to not only share your data with third parties, but also to allow third parties to use their website to collect your data directly.

Excuse me for not responding the past two days, my schedule was a mess and wasn't available.

Okay, back to the subject now, Blockchain.info was the first wallet I ever created, back then, you could only access your wallet via its unique ID, and if I'm not mistaken, if it was lost it couldn't be recovered. This has changed now, you can now access your wallet using your email address, while it records way more data than it used to.

On top of that, it also functions like an exchange, things have severely changed, and I'm curious if we're about to see some further centralization and an effort to contain cryptocurrencies.

P.S It also sends me a newsletter to my email on a daily basis. :o

As far as I know, old users had a "wallet.aes.json" file which could be used for recovering all the private keys.


The other important change is that, they give users a BIP39 seed phrase which can be used for recovering the wallet without any need to their service.


Are you sure that you receive the emails from blockchain.com and they are not phishing emails?
I also have a wallet on blockchain.com. But I never receive email from them.

I think you're just aware of this Blockchain.com wallet improvement because you didn't check the email account you used to register your account or login into your account because this movement started some years ago and if i could remember, it started when they did their first airdrop but the crypto tax calculation will be added last year.
 
I believe this is the price we have to pay for cryptocurrency to be mainstream and in the future, more DEX will adopt the same techniques especially not that the Russian government is planning the escape the US, EU, etc sanctions.

It's possible that some wallets in the future will require a KYC process. Anyway talking about Blockchain.com, just stay away from that exchange/wallet, I've read so many stories of people who found their wallet locked for "security reasons" and despite all the documentation they sent, they wouldn't unlock the wallet. I wouldn't put any satoshi there, and for sure I wouldn't give them my personal details.

Okay, for anyone who might be interested, I did actually fill up my details, in an attempt to receive the bonus they were offering. After approximately 2 weeks, the $5 bonus was credited into my account. Was it worth it? Meh, if you're planning to use the service, I don't see why not. They didn't ask for too many details, all the exchanges I'm using already have them, so it's not that big of a deal.
https://i.ibb.co/TrT9nLL/Screenshot-20220417-015938-2.png

Aside this, blockchain.com wallet is not recommendable at all, there are many complaints of people that will have funds but the wallet will indicate they have no fund. If the seed phrase is imported on a reputed wallet like Electrum, the coins would be recovered. One of the reasons not to use the wallet even at all.

They did not ask for to much details? I do not think you are right. Was identity not asked for? What could be more detailed than that. You gave out your identity just for $5, that is surprising though when your data is worth more than that but most people do not know that. Although, you have indicated already that you have the data on exchanges before. But there is nothing bad to let people that are novice about how KYC is extremely dangerous to let them know the negative aspect of giving centralized service providers KYC.

Aren't you using exchanges, such as Binance or Bitstamp? All exchanges now ask for identity verification, whether we like it or not, we'll have to face it. I highly doubt that it's feasible to avoid such identification for long. All major exchanges ask for it, unless you're up to decentralised finance and use exchanges such as Pancakeswap.

I don't have much to hide, nor am I hiding huge amounts of Bitcoin that I'd rather not declare, it's an inevitable process.

Nope. Bisq and LocalCryptos instead. ;)

All centralized exchanges.

I've been avoiding it for years, and I plan to continue doing so.

I also have nothing to hide - doesn't mean I want centralized exchanges and the huge number of third parties and governments they share data with spying on every satoshi I spend.

I remember LocalBitcoins, a site I had accessed a few years ago, but asked for identification in order to trade. The services you've mentioned are not that well-known here, and not as direct as exchanges. Bisq on the other hand, is similar to DeFi exchanges, which certainly come in handy and could be used as an alternative indeed.

Most of my funds are in BSC, via the metamask wallet, thus, I certainly get your point, nor am I planning to move them anytime soon. However, when withdrawing to fiat, the most convenient is exchanges, and probably the most direct.

I also receive such emails on a daily basis, and I am pretty sure they come from a legitimate domain given their content. The reason why you do not receive them may be because you did not check this option in the blockchain account settings, or at some point, you unsubscribe from such e-mails.

https://i.imgur.com/IEo7PMf.png

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I was never in the belief that cryptocurrencies were anonymous, and I’m surprised people are still thinking in that direction. Anonymity and privacy are not something that can be achieved nowadays without much effort and hassle, and if you want to hide from some powerful people because you did something bad, then the only way is to completely disappear from the grid.

Big Brother has bigger eyes than he had before, computers, smartphones, and TVs are constantly spying on us, and surveillance cameras and hundreds of satellites and drones overhead record our every move. It may just seem that way to me, but KYC on some crypto exchanges could be our least concern in the time to come.

Now that you've said that, I receive newsletter emails from them on a daily basis, they've certainly changed how they used to function, a few years ago, they were nothing but a simple online wallet, you couldn't even recover your account if you lost the walletID.

Our data is being monitored on a daily basis, in a variety of ways, one of the most major ones, our mobile phones. Providing identification on an online exchange is only the tip of the iceberg, it's not like they're using them for marketing purposes. If I'm not mistaken (correct me if I'm wrong), exchanges only have to provide such information if requested by law enforcement, such as tax services, I might be wrong though.

Bisq (https://bisq.network/) just still remains the most decentralized exchange, just that alerts can be managed on mobile app but the trades is through using personal computer using open-source software. This may not be convenient and the trading volume may not be as high as on centralized exchanges, but people that wants privacy still prefer it to centralized exchanges that demand for KYC.

Alternatively, you can still try Hodlhodl (https://hodlhodl.com/) or Localcryptos (https://localcryptos.com/). Localcryptos still have considerable high liquidity, try it before complaining that using centralized exchanges are more direct. There is nothing more direct than to send or receive bitcoin directly on an address generated by your noncustododial wallet rather than using centralized exchanges which you do not have the keys, you will still need to transfer the coins to noncustodial wallet to have full control over the coins.

Decentralized exchanges like Bisq is not the same as those altcoin exchanges that are altcoin based because you can not exchange to fiat on the altcoin based exchanges.

But you still meant that privacy and anonymity are still both possible, but just that it is not easy to maintain but some people are still having privacy while using bitcoin with the use of full client wallet like Bitcoin Core using Tor connection, some people have some transactions that are also anonymous as they use Tor on SPV noncustododial wallet for making transactions while not connecting with their IP address at all but only using Tor.

You are not wrong because many people have lost their privacy before they even know what privacy his while making use of bitcoin. But still if they know already, they can start being private and/or anonymize some transactions of their choice.

Ofcourse they are, why do you think most exchanges are asking for KYC details these days.
Exchanges are holding their user's personal details linking to their crypto portfolio.
As cryptocurrencies get more adopted the governments will probably use the KYC details for regulation.
This will increase the centralization but will also bring in mass adoption of cryptocurrencies.
Privacy coins will still exist but only those who care more about privacy will stick to those cryptocurrencies.

I'm not implying that there aren't any decentralised services that could potentially substitute for exchange usage, but it's all I've used for the past years. I'm not underestimating the platforms you're mentioning, nor the need for decentralisation, personally, I'm storing my funds on Metamask, instead of an exchange or a custodial wallet.

My opinion is simply stands that our actions are easily monitored, unless you're avoiding Google, Facebook and banking services, your data is out there, providing your details on an exchange isn't something new, nor unusual.

I used to keep my money in the Blockchain wallet, and I was okay with it. I had my pass phrase, password, 2FA. Then there was a time when I wanted to access my wallet, but the code from Blockchain just didn't arrive to my phone, and the email confirmation didn't arrive either. It was a technical issue, of course, and everything arrived the next day, but that's when I decided to move to Electrum, at least. I'm glad I did that, given how Blockchain is starting to involve KYC, reporting taxes and stuff. But as for the safety of storing money on Blockchain, I do believe they don't have access to passphrases and that technically the coins do belong to customers. Still, though, why risk it if there are good alternatives.

If I'm not mistaken, as you've also mentioned, Blockchain.com does provide you with your seed phrase and private key. Although, I've also faced similar issues with what you've claimed. Not on the same platform, it was BitGo, was my fault though and not the service's.

I had lost access to my 2FA device, resetting it requires 48 hours, for security purposes of course. As a result, I lost a great trading opportunity, and that's one of the reasons I turned to Electrum, even though it was purely my fault.

I never used this service and I have o plans to do so but kindly answer these questions. Can you use your blockchain.com seed phrase in another wallet provider and access your funds? I'm also curious if blockchain.com restrict your money for suspicious activity since they require information that centralized exchanges and custodial wallets usually do.

As the source code isn't available to the public, there is no way to know that. It's possible that they have access to users seed phrase
(The 12 words you use for recovering your wallet is called seed phrase, not passphrase.)

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Yes. The seed phrase they give you is BIP39 and is compatible with many other wallets.


blockchain.com is both a wallet and an exchange.
If your fund is on their wallet, it can be recovered using your seed phrase.
If your fund in on their exchange, they can do everything they want.

I suggest you read the reviews on this page (https://cryptogeek.info/en/wallets/blockchain-com). People there are discussing the topic of verification on the blockchain.com site.

if not for the sake of centralization, then whats the need for asking people to do kyc. its a pity we are speaking and talking daily about freedom but yet we are at the mercies of centralized exchanges and custodian wallets. its good there are always alternatives so you can make many choices.

I also received the same email from Blockchain wallet.But I have not verified and they offered another 20$ bonus
 for holding 100$ Bitcoin. I just ignored this offer as I am not interested to do kyc verification.

Every company wants to collect data because they know how much precious it can be for themselves even like future promotions,etc. I don't really use blockchain.com anymore because its one of the wallet filled with bugs even after this much experience they can't be able to provide experience like coinbase atleast.

Fortunately, you are free too choose what exchanges or wallets to use and decide to submit your identity documents for KYC or reject to do so.

There are non KYC exchanges and platforms for you to use: https://kycnot.me/
Not your keys, not your coins: https://notyourkeys.org/
KYC is dangerous and when you lose your identity documents on the Internet, you lose it forever. Why KYC is extremely dangerous and useless (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5221497.msg53726647#msg53726647)

I think KYC is a bad strategy from wallet owners or exchanges who want to steal our money, I still have assets in several exchanges and unfortunately when it's been inactive for almost 3 years and seeing the current market prices are fantastic it seems they blocked my account and asked for KYC, when I was able to enter with KYC but all deposit addresses changed and the balance was lost without being able to do anything.

Cryptocurrency Wallet Development Services
 (http://Cryptocurrency Wallet Development Services)

We are an end-to-end cryptocurrency wallet development company that provides excellent and secure multi-cryptocurrency wallet development services.Avail crypto wallet development solutions to eliminate identity theft, stop digital fraud and any malicious behavior in trading and money. transactions

If any wallet offers you KYC, you should forget about that wallet and use another one. Blockchain.com has been popular for a long time, but now there are many other good services that have much more functionality than this wallet. Generally, confirming your identity and showing your documents to unknown people on the Internet is not the best idea. It's even better to choose exchanges where you can buy and sell crypto without KYC.

That's interesting, I never faced any issues with Blockchain.com, but that belongs to the past, since a lot of things have changed since then. Although, we can't be 100% sure about the legitimacy of these reviews, let me elaborate. Blockchain.com does provide you with your private keys and the seed phrase, at least they used in the past, how can someone block your wallet if you actually have your keys, can't you import them into Electrum for instance?

Yes, You can import your seed phrase into any other wallet supporting BIP39 seed phrase and access your fund.
I have read many reports regarding blocking accounts on blockchain.com. But they all are related to their trading account and they have nothing to do with blockchain.com wallet.

Bitcoin should not be stored on a wallet that requires KYC, you should move all your assets to a wallet that does not require KYC. I can't understand, what is the bitcoin storage wallet that requires KYC for. If it's an exchange that requires KYC to combat money laundering and transaction fraud, that's acceptable.

I see, I wouldn't use their trading platform either, there are much better options, safer, more established and trusted ones. There are so many exchanges nowadays, that I can't find a single reason to use their service, to be honest, I didn't even know that they operated as an exchange. I'd appreciate if someone could answer if they also offered it in the past, since I've only used their wallet.

Click here (https://web.archive.org/web/20191221004340/https://exchange.blockchain.com/) to see the oldest version of their exchange page I could find. It has been taken on December 21, 2019.

Edit:
They launched their exchange in July 2019. Click here (https://techcrunch.com/2019/07/30/blockchain-the-company-launches-an-exchange-the-pit/) to see the reference.

Great job, I never remembered providing such a service, the past few months I've been bombarded by emails. I don't see any reason to use their services anymore, they've completely changed their business plan. On top of that, I don't like their trading fee policy, the maker (the person who places the order) is charged 0.20% and the taker (the one who accepts your order), is charged 0.40%. Most exchanges, such as Binance don't charge that much, while their interface isn't the best I've seen (compared to those I've used, Binanxey, Bitstamp and Kraken).