With no mixer we are all known now?

[chinapeople]

If it was wanted they could make a list, no? We have our real life labeled on exchanges. All the time we withdraw or deposit it gets on the list. Soon they could know most of the wallets connected by us and follow every bit we send?

[GTO911]

You are at the wrong place, privacy isnt much talked about here, because Bitcoin has privacy as worse as it could get. Bitcoin is the wet dream of governments, where every transaction or everyone can be tracked.

The reply you might get mostly is - privacy is for criminals, ignore those dumb people, because




The above image has been taken from The Monero Bitcoinference youtube video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEVm1dMn5Ks

[BitcoiNaked]

^ monero is a no because there is no financial transparency. A big problem with many powerful institutions is the transparency about how their funds are being utilized. Whether it’s fractional lending by banks, national taxation by the IRS, or even donations collected for a good cause, the truth is that we have zero transparency. The funds collected by these institutions are often allocated at their discretion and with zero public insight or scrutiny. This type of monetary system is destined from the start to be rifled with blatant corruption or mismanagement of funds. We currently have a system where the people’s financial accounts have to be fully disclosed for tax purposes, yet their representative institutions have zero disclosure and in some cases such as the Pentagon, they mysteriously lose 8.5 trillion dollars (yes, I said trillion) of the tax payer’s money.

Thanks to the Bitcoin blockchain, all transactions that take place on the network can now be tracked from start to finish. This is an amazing new ability that the public has never had before and will help keep these intuitions honest about how the people’s funds are being spent. While you can only currently see address X sending to address Y, as we move forward in developing the Bitcoin ecosystem, many of these addresses will eventually have an identity associated with them. So if you were to donate funds to a charity you’d be able to track the allocation towards paying salaries, services, materials, etc etc.

[spazzdla]

bitmixer.io   ...?

[Biitcoin]

It's probably no body's fault and it's your own fault , it's your fault thatyou have your life in exchange and you provide them with your real informations .
You could use a new bitcoin adress for each transaction like Satoshi said and you should be just fine .

[chinapeople]

It's probably no body's fault and it's your own fault , it's your fault thatyou have your life in exchange and you provide them with your real informations .
You could use a new bitcoin adress for each transaction like Satoshi said and you should be just fine .

Starting with Bitcoin it is what called out to me. I am told is all anonymous and I can send where I want. People go to jail if their finance exit the country. It should not be this way. Bitcoin makes this different, but you have to hike a mile just to hide your face when wanted.   

[Slark]

I found interesting article about state of the Mixing Services in cryptocurrency world. If you want to know in details how these services works (there are some crucial differences between them).
You can read this article: https://www.deepdotweb.com/2014/05/25/current-state-coin-mixing-services/ Article is little dated (May 2014) but basic principles are the same.

[jdbtracker]

Well... as far as I understand it: All transactions are known within the network, but the identities of everyone involved is not... if proper precautions are taken, they may know the price of what you are purchasing... but they won't know who you are.

 It's an interesting take on privacy, to truly be able to understand the economic fluctuations of nations, of the world without bias and available at your fingertips; This is important... more than 90% of the data collected by governments is not available to us; we have to trust them... and I don't think trust should be required, we should know for sure.

If you are worried about being known keep your physical Personae separate and create a anonymous Personae, deal only with decentralized exchanges. Trust me, they don't need to know who you are to keep work properly, just the knowledge that money A is being transfered to Money B... Cash is anonymous.

It irks me to think that all these regulators require name address, etc so they know where to come get you, but it's not needed; They just need to, truthfully, see how their policies are working by seeing the flow of economic data and change rules accordingly... but you know, they want their cake and have it too.

They're gluttons for punishment, anything to do as they say, not as they do. It's quite funny when you think about it, the Elites and all that.

[RodeoX]

Nope. If we can all be listed then start with me. How many coins do I have?

[chinapeople]

Nope. If we can all be listed then start with me. How many coins do I have?

There are ways it can be avoided, I said this before. It is not an easy thing to do. If I want to sell or if I do want to buy easy I have to connect to my bank. When I connect to my bank I make a foundation of my name on the exchange. After this all, any wallet I have that I sent to my exchange can be added to my list. With little work each of the wallets in my wallet can be tracked back to me also any transactions I make to fill my wallets can be tracked back also.

There are routes I can take to avoid all of this. But it is not as easy as you make me think.

[Kazimir]

If it was wanted they could make a list, no? We have our real life labeled on exchanges. All the time we withdraw or deposit it gets on the list. Soon they could know most of the wallets connected by us and follow every bit we send?

Suppose you withdraw 2 BTC from an exchange, and you do a couple of payments:



Now which of the wallets on the right are yours?

Nobody can tell.

[chinapeople]

If it was wanted they could make a list, no? We have our real life labeled on exchanges. All the time we withdraw or deposit it gets on the list. Soon they could know most of the wallets connected by us and follow every bit we send?

Suppose you withdraw 2 BTC from an exchange, and you do a couple of payments:



Now which of the wallets on the right are yours?

Nobody can tell.

Ok then, I see what you mean by that. I may just worry too much.

[achow101]

Also, if you don't get your Bitcoin from exchanges, then you won't have an identity associated with your coins. If you do work for Bitcoins or mine them, and at no point involve an exchange, you still get Bitcoin and there won't be an identity associated with your coins. Furthermore, with Bitcoin addresses, even if you can trace Bitcoin transactions, you can't know for sure whether the next address is the same person or a different one.

[dodgecharger]

It's probably no body's fault and it's your own fault , it's your fault thatyou have your life in exchange and you provide them with your real informations .
You could use a new bitcoin adress for each transaction like Satoshi said and you should be just fine .

Starting with Bitcoin it is what called out to me. I am told is all anonymous and I can send where I want. People go to jail if their finance exit the country. It should not be this way. Bitcoin makes this different, but you have to hike a mile just to hide your face when wanted.   

Can a mixer help? Perhaps. Can it make you completely anonymous? Probably not. The problem is that so many people think something like a mixer will protect them completely, and then they do things they shouldn't be doing and end up in a lot of trouble

[LiteCoinGuy]

You are at the wrong place, privacy isnt much talked about here, because Bitcoin has privacy as worse as it could get. Bitcoin is the wet dream of governments, where every transaction or everyone can be tracked.

The reply you might get mostly is - privacy is for criminals, ignore those dumb people, because

well no, Paypal and Credit Cards are that dude.

[RodeoX]

Nope. If we can all be listed then start with me. How many coins do I have?

18.653, now you must send me one! Honestly it would all be guess or speculation without the cooperation of merchants and users you have made trades with and following the coins.

On the nose!!!

lol, no.  

The point, I suppose, is that if you want additional privacy then you must do additional work. Seems fair.

[jonald_fyookball]

If it was wanted they could make a list, no? We have our real life labeled on exchanges. All the time we withdraw or deposit it gets on the list. Soon they could know most of the wallets connected by us and follow every bit we send?

Suppose you withdraw 2 BTC from an exchange, and you do a couple of payments:



Now which of the wallets on the right are yours?

Nobody can tell.

Pretty much this.

Taint analysis gives too many false positives to prove that someone controls/owns an address.

[unamis76]

Use a different address each time and use change addresses. Don't connect your identity to any addresses and there you have pretty much enough privacy. It's like people said above, if they can track us, how many coins does each one of us has?

[oblivi]

Use a different address each time and use change addresses. Don't connect your identity to any addresses and there you have pretty much enough privacy. It's like people said above, if they can track us, how many coins does each one of us has?

If you have a business or even as a freelance that requires credentials to get paid, how are you going to not have your address linked to you?
And if you buy in a BTC-accepting business, how isn't the address you give them not going to be linked to your real name and data?

[achow101]

Use a different address each time and use change addresses. Don't connect your identity to any addresses and there you have pretty much enough privacy. It's like people said above, if they can track us, how many coins does each one of us has?

If you have a business or even as a freelance that requires credentials to get paid, how are you going to not have your address linked to you?

Once the coins start moving, they can't reliably know which addresses you send to are actually yours.

And if you buy in a BTC-accepting business, how isn't the address you give them not going to be linked to your real name and data?

Even if it is, if you load that address with just the required amount, they won't know about the rest of your Bitcoin. The change will be hard to trace after a few transactions anyways.

[sillycerebellum]

Well, maybe someone 'external' can't link your identity to your exchange withdrawal address, but the exchanges themselves no doubt possess all the relevant information. The same goes for any mixers you might use. All depends on the amount of logs they keep, and with whom they share the info, whether it be knowingly or otherwise.

A solutions is to keep the coins moving, preferably into separate wallets. Basically this:

Once the coins start moving, they can't reliably know which addresses you send to are actually yours.

[NorrisK]

Use a different address each time and use change addresses. Don't connect your identity to any addresses and there you have pretty much enough privacy. It's like people said above, if they can track us, how many coins does each one of us has?

If you have a business or even as a freelance that requires credentials to get paid, how are you going to not have your address linked to you?

Once the coins start moving, they can't reliably know which addresses you send to are actually yours.

And if you buy in a BTC-accepting business, how isn't the address you give them not going to be linked to your real name and data?

Even if it is, if you load that address with just the required amount, they won't know about the rest of your Bitcoin. The change will be hard to trace after a few transactions anyways.

it would be very easy to track any transactions back to the originating wallet. therefore, your company balance would be public. (although,most businesses needto share books in their yearly report anyway right?)

[GingerAle]

http://coinalytics.co/tools/tracker.html

enjoy!

RodeoX, at some point ( 2015-1-04) you maybe had ~25 btc, at which point I think you sent it to an exchange.

have you reported the income you made with bitcoin from here?

https://blockchain.info/address/13dh6dNZ3FcXSnJRG8tBCUTvaaRaxgx7rn

[achow101]

it would be very easy to track any transactions back to the originating wallet. therefore, your company balance would be public. (although,most businesses needto share books in their yearly report anyway right?)

But if the coins are moving, then they can't reliably know how much is held at present time. Sure they can all be traced, but that only tells you that at one point in time, the company had X amount.

[grendel25]

This is why alt coins like Monero and dark coin are doing well.  But it depends on the consumer and what features people are after.  Not everyone is after being anonymous.  Some people just want a good deal and for some bitcoin is sort of like couponing to get a better deal.

[RodeoX]

http://coinalytics.co/tools/tracker.html

enjoy!

RodeoX, at some point ( 2015-1-04) you maybe had ~25 btc, at which point I think you sent it to an exchange.

have you reported the income you made with bitcoin from here?

https://blockchain.info/address/13dh6dNZ3FcXSnJRG8tBCUTvaaRaxgx7rn

Closer! That is one of my wallets. (I don't hide). But the total is off I think? And I'm not using exchanges much anymore. I don't think I used one this year. But yeah, that is some of my BTC. The best way to find out may be to get my tax return. I submit for purchases over $10K. So yes, I report my capitol gains, even though I never sell bitcoins.

[OROBTC]

...

I invite people to examine my BTC transactions as GingerAle did with the coinalytics tool (or other similar tools).

Because I am no expert, I am quite interested in having my BTC operations examined by skilled people here at bitcointalk.

I would also be interested in any suggestions as to improving my BTC security.

Thanks!


EDIT: Great thread, a much-needed discussion

[GingerAle]

Here's another tool

https://www.blockseer.com/

[pooya87]

If it was wanted they could make a list, no? We have our real life labeled on exchanges. All the time we withdraw or deposit it gets on the list. Soon they could know most of the wallets connected by us and follow every bit we send?

if you don't want your identity be revealed and associated with your bitcoins using Mixers is one of the options, that is proven to work.
if you don't want that, you can buy bitcoin from someone close to you with cash so that there would not exist any record of you buying those coins and send them to a fresh bitcoin address that you have just created with no connection to other addresses.