One of bitcoin’s biggest mining farm has been working on blockchain analysis to link addresses with individuals by employing both blockchain data and other sources.
“Bitcoin address clustering is a process that exposes bitcoin users by determining which addresses belong to a single user through an analysis of Blockchain data. The act of clustering groups those addresses together, enabling investigators to link them to a single entity,” the miner says.
97 sources were used in the process, including Twitter, wallet explorers, bitcointalk, presumably Reddit, and so on, leading to identifying “slightly more than 1/6 of the whole Bitcoin blockchain,” according to the authors.
Some 95 million addresses were identified to belong to 14 million individuals or entities covering 45 million transactions out of 240 million total bitcoin transactions since the genesis block to March 2017.
“Currently, bitcoin users can have multiple addresses, making it easier to conceal identities and commit crimes on the Blockchain. The ability to link related addresses, called ‘clustering,’ is an important new tool that helps law enforcement agencies conduct criminal investigations,” said Valery Vavilov, CEO of The Bitfury Group.
http://www.trustnodes.com/2018/01/09/bitfury-de-anonymises-millions-bitcoin-transactions-addresses
