How to accept payments without having the address attached to you forever?

[cellard]

So let's say I want to accept payments or donations in a webpage so I put a QR code there. The problem is I dont want the address to be attached to my real name forever because this is dumb from a privacy perspective (it would be like having your bank account transparent in a webpage). Everyone could see how much money I got paid/donated and everyone could see where that money goes as soon as I move it. You could say "duuh move it a to mixer". Well we shouldn't depend on mixers, its a very primitive form of privacy and a centralized one to boot, and its just annoying that you can't directly buy or whatever, you always would need to lose time with the damn mixers first.

So how to solve this?

[RustyNomad]

There are scripts that can link a wallet, for example Electrum, to your site.

It will then provide each client with a new address when they click on the donate button. In that way the address keep on changing.

EDIT: Been thinking about this a bit more. I'll still be able to find out how much you received even if you rotate the addresses on the site. At one stage or another you are going to move most of the funds in that wallet to another and if you do I will be able to see that when looking at the blockchain even if I only have one of your addresses. Might take some work but in the end I'll be able to link most of your addresses.

This would be the ideal place where a stealth address could be used. I know there was a BIP about it but have not seen anything about it recently so not to sure whether this is still in development and or whether it will actually see the light of day.

[aso118]

There are scripts that can link a wallet, for example Electrum, to your site.

It will then provide each client with a new address when they click on the donate button. In that way the address keep on changing.

EDIT: Been thinking about this a bit more. I'll still be able to find out how much you received even if you rotate the addresses on the site. At one stage or another you are going to move most of the funds in that wallet to another and if you do I will be able to see that when looking at the blockchain even if I only have one of your addresses. Might take some work but in the end I'll be able to link most of your addresses.

This would be the ideal place where a stealth address could be used. I know there was a BIP about it but have not seen anything about it recently so not to sure whether this is still in development and or whether it will actually see the light of day.

1) You don't really have to move the coins to another wallet.
2) If you are really careful, you can use coin control to obfuscate any inferences a person can draw by having only one/few of the addresses.

[RustyNomad]

There are scripts that can link a wallet, for example Electrum, to your site.

It will then provide each client with a new address when they click on the donate button. In that way the address keep on changing.

EDIT: Been thinking about this a bit more. I'll still be able to find out how much you received even if you rotate the addresses on the site. At one stage or another you are going to move most of the funds in that wallet to another and if you do I will be able to see that when looking at the blockchain even if I only have one of your addresses. Might take some work but in the end I'll be able to link most of your addresses.

This would be the ideal place where a stealth address could be used. I know there was a BIP about it but have not seen anything about it recently so not to sure whether this is still in development and or whether it will actually see the light of day.

1) You don't really have to move the coins to another wallet.
2) If you are really careful, you can use coin control to obfuscate any inferences a person can draw by having only one/few of the addresses.

Agree but you will have a problem if you want to 'empty' the wallet and or withdraw the bulk from time to time. If you use the wallet on a daily basis then it will be easier to hide the actual total received through coin control as you mention.

[johnyj]

You can always use a web wallet address directly, where all the receiving funds are mixed in their hot/cold wallet

Strictly speak, this feature is what all the money launderers most desired, and not a good future for bitcoin since that will result in much harsh regulation from governments

[BillyBobZorton]

You can always use a web wallet address directly, where all the receiving funds are mixed in their hot/cold wallet

Strictly speak, this feature is what all the money launderers most desired, and not a good future for bitcoin since that will result in much harsh regulation from governments

It's obvious that what OP says is a real problem for anyone, law abiding citizen or not.
If you are taking payments (or donations) on a public website which is linked to your real credentials (for example, you are a filmmaker taking donations or something) people will be able to see how much money you've gotten from your fans. So let's say your landlord sees you've gotten a ton of money because your latest film was a success and it sold great and on top of that your fans were nice enough to give you a lot of donations. Your landlord now knows you are pretty well off and he feels like raising the rental rate. This is an example.

No one should be able to know how much money you are getting, and no one should be able to learn about the behavior of inputs and outputs, trust mixers, keep your stuff on webwallets and whatever bizarre workaround we have now, because we need it to be as easy and accessible to everyone as possible.
We need better privacy on Bitcoin, a lot of people has called this out already, it's a fact.

[RustyNomad]

The solution is a 'Stealth Address' as I mentioned earlier.

I know DarkWallet was to have this and there was something in development for bitcoin. Let me see if I can find the link quickly.

EDIT: Below are some links where stealth addresses are discussed. Might all be relevant but will give more information on how it works and why it will be a solution for the OP's scenario.

https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/20701/what-is-a-stealth-address
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1086498.0

[odolvlobo]

So let's say I want to accept payments or donations in a webpage so I put a QR code there. The problem is I dont want the address to be attached to my real name forever because this is dumb from a privacy perspective (it would be like having your bank account transparent in a webpage). Everyone could see how much money I got paid/donated and everyone could see where that money goes as soon as I move it. You could say "duuh move it a to mixer". Well we shouldn't depend on mixers, its a very primitive form of privacy and a centralized one to boot, and its just annoying that you can't directly buy or whatever, you always would need to lose time with the damn mixers first.

So how to solve this?

You can generate a new address for every payment or donation using an HD wallet. Every time the page is displayed, show a new bitcoin address.

[PolarPoint]

You don't have to change the donation address at all. Send the donations to a web wallet like Xapo. They give you a new deposit address for each new transaction. Then send the coins to your own address.

[Meuh6879]

send to kraken, wait 24h, retrieve BTC after = cleaned fund, no track.

be smart.

[johnyj]

send to kraken, wait 24h, retrieve BTC after = cleaned fund, no track.

be smart.

Kraken keeps every of your wallet address

I remember that a Swedish exchange was forced to hand out user's transaction history, they even fight to the court to protect user privacy but the court ruling is that they must cooperate with police and tax authority

[johnyj]

You can always use a web wallet address directly, where all the receiving funds are mixed in their hot/cold wallet

Strictly speak, this feature is what all the money launderers most desired, and not a good future for bitcoin since that will result in much harsh regulation from governments

It's obvious that what OP says is a real problem for anyone, law abiding citizen or not.
If you are taking payments (or donations) on a public website which is linked to your real credentials (for example, you are a filmmaker taking donations or something) people will be able to see how much money you've gotten from your fans. So let's say your landlord sees you've gotten a ton of money because your latest film was a success and it sold great and on top of that your fans were nice enough to give you a lot of donations. Your landlord now knows you are pretty well off and he feels like raising the rental rate. This is an example.

No one should be able to know how much money you are getting, and no one should be able to learn about the behavior of inputs and outputs, trust mixers, keep your stuff on webwallets and whatever bizarre workaround we have now, because we need it to be as easy and accessible to everyone as possible.
We need better privacy on Bitcoin, a lot of people has called this out already, it's a fact.

In current system, banks know all of your transactions, and I don't think majority of people have any problem with that. If you use a web wallet, the wallet operator knows your transactions, similar to a bank

There is a reason regulators want trace-ability of digital money, mostly because of lots of scams and thefts online. A digital money that can be traced will greatly improve consumer protection. Otherwise it will be very popular among criminals, thus resulting in stronger resistance from governments, and will hurt bitcoins mainstream adoption, eventually drive it underground

[ranochigo]

So let's say I want to accept payments or donations in a webpage so I put a QR code there. The problem is I dont want the address to be attached to my real name forever because this is dumb from a privacy perspective (it would be like having your bank account transparent in a webpage). Everyone could see how much money I got paid/donated and everyone could see where that money goes as soon as I move it. You could say "duuh move it a to mixer". Well we shouldn't depend on mixers, its a very primitive form of privacy and a centralized one to boot, and its just annoying that you can't directly buy or whatever, you always would need to lose time with the damn mixers first.

So how to solve this?

You could use a POS service such as bitpay and they generate a unique address per person and the publicwouldn't know your address except Bitpay. Other wise, you can create a script to generate an unique address per person and create a lot hot wallet and forward the funds there. It would be quite hard to determine if they belong to you. Sending it to an exchange or online wallet wouldn't help as the Waller operator can still know who you are and increase the risk of losing your BTC due to hacking.