What will happen with bitcoin mixers, etc. if bitcoin becomes truly anonymous?

[owm123]

I was reading this new article:
Dark markets: Seeking anonymity in Bitcoin
http://www.computerworld.co.nz/article/589727/dark-markets-seeking-anonymity-bitcoin/

Few quotes:

“True anonymity in Bitcoin is only a myth, currently,” says Vijay Michalik, Research Analyst for Digital Transformation, Frost & Sullivan.

Michalik believes that blockchain analysis, as a relatively new market sector within Bitcoin, demonstrates the weakness of pseudonymity.

For Michalik however, true financial privacy doesn't exist on the Bitcoin blockchain.

“Without a redesign, this should be a serious concern,” Michalik adds.

“In this case, Bitcoin is a worse option than traditional finance channels.”

Off course one can use mixers or jointmarket to increase ones anonymity. They all charge a "small" fee for their service. What will happen when bitcoin introduces zerocash or CT, and become truly anonymous? Will they become obsolete?

[jbreher]

What will happen when bitcoin introduces zerocash or CT, and become truly anonymous? Will they become obsolete?

If bitcoin becomes anonymous, why would anyone other than the owners of mixing services care what happens to them? I certainly wouldn't.

[owm123]

What will happen when bitcoin introduces zerocash or CT, and become truly anonymous? Will they become obsolete?

If bitcoin becomes anonymous, why would anyone other than the owners of mixing services care what happens to them? I certainly wouldn't.

They all are charging "small" fees for their services. So I'm pretty sure they wouldn't be too happy to see their income disappear out of a sudden.

[jt byte]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

[owm123]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

Why it cant be trully anonymous? There a lot of talk about confidential transactions or zero cash for bitcoin.

[jt byte]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

Why it cant be trully anonymous? There a lot of talk about confidential transactions or zero cash for bitcoin.

It is darknet/market we are talking about. Somebody will eventually create a backdoor to track every transaction. You don't think the big bosses of even the anti virus companies haven't come up with the tools to do that when they have issues. Everybody knew that Bill gates had programming code to get into his products thru this method, why not these darknet programmers doing the code for this?

[franky1]

bitcoin doesnt need to change
let the darkmarket users buy up the dark wallet crap that amir taaki created. and then the legitimate users can just use bitcoin as it is. if you want to stay pseudonymous, simple stop telling the world your bitcoin address and move funds to a new address.

[USB-S]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

Why it cant be trully anonymous? There a lot of talk about confidential transactions or zero cash for bitcoin.

It is darknet/market we are talking about. Somebody will eventually create a backdoor to track every transaction. You don't think the big bosses of even the anti virus companies haven't come up with the tools to do that when they have issues. Everybody knew that Bill gates had programming code to get into his products thru this method, why not these darknet programmers doing the code for this?

If said backdoor is created to track every transaction. I think those black markets would move over to more anonymous coins. You don't need to track legit bitcoin users, that would be just a waste of time and resource.

[jt byte]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

Why it cant be trully anonymous? There a lot of talk about confidential transactions or zero cash for bitcoin.

It is darknet/market we are talking about. Somebody will eventually create a backdoor to track every transaction. You don't think the big bosses of even the anti virus companies haven't come up with the tools to do that when they have issues. Everybody knew that Bill gates had programming code to get into his products thru this method, why not these darknet programmers doing the code for this?

If said backdoor is created to track every transaction. I think those black markets would move over to more anonymous coins. You don't need to track legit bitcoin users, that would be just a waste of time and resource.

Yes but they can pick and choose who they want to do a track down on. Don't under estimate what can be done. It can all be done. Come on! Nothing in this world, especially in the digital world (hasn't Assange taught us anything ), is totally secure from someone with an intent to find out what they want to know.

[PolarPoint]

There is no need for bitcoin to be truly and completely anonymous. Bitcoin has enough anonymity to cover most users. People who need the extra anonymity will have to pay extra for mixing services, or buy another alt. I think mixing services will become cheaper in the future because there will be competing services which offer a lower level of anonymity free, like shared wallets and off chain settlement systems.

[owm123]

It can not be truly anonymous even if dark market succeeds.
Their will always be a need for bit mixers in my opinion. They don't have nothing to fear.

Why it cant be trully anonymous? There a lot of talk about confidential transactions or zero cash for bitcoin.

It is darknet/market we are talking about. Somebody will eventually create a backdoor to track every transaction. You don't think the big bosses of even the anti virus companies haven't come up with the tools to do that when they have issues. Everybody knew that Bill gates had programming code to get into his products thru this method, why not these darknet programmers doing the code for this?

Backdoor where? In bitcoin? It would be difficult as it is open sourced. But mixing services are a different story. No ones really knows what they do with btc you sent to them. You can just "trust" that they do what they say, and dont log everything or are not working (or run by) with feds to track the coins. So if bitcoin becomes truly anonymous, then there is also no need to trust and worry about any third party service.

[jaberwock]

The miners will know the IP used to propagate the transaction.

And exchanges and other online services will associate your coins with your identity.

Bitcoin will never be anonymous, so Bitmixers always will be needed

[7788bitcoin]

Bitcoin mixers are basically money laundry, so I consider them as illegal. Not sure if they keep the record of their in/out. If they don't, you are trusting them with your bitcoin and they may not return to you after mixing...

[oldbute]

For those that think it's anonymous enough, can you explain how an employer would pay salaries or dividends etc.. in bitcoin without giving away too much information about other salaries or overall expenses.  Interested in this process.

[Small]

The miners will know the IP used to propagate the transaction.

And exchanges and other online services will associate your coins with your identity.

Bitcoin will never be anonymous, so Bitmixers always will be needed

If you perform a sybil attack and the user uses a SPV client, there's a good chance that you can determine which it originated from. It isn't fully accurate however, anyone can broadcast the transaction from anywhere. The transaction does not state which IP it proporgated from.
Mixers can also keep logs of the IP info and coin origin, you would not be anonymous in anyway.

[Kakmakr]

I think they would lower their fee's and become more competitive or add some kind of value added features that would not be included into zerocash. I doubt that Bitcoin would go that route, because they are already coming under fire for it's pseudo anonymity. 

[coinpr0n]

Confidencial Transactions might happen on sidechains, making an actual change like that to Bitcoin at this point might be hard and will probably be quite controversial as there are so many different people and businesses now involved.

[ivanst776]

I think that this will not happen, every new bitcoin startup/business  is trying to centralized the bitcoin to track their users where do they spend their money like coinbase which tracks their users, i think that these mixer will be in the market for a long time.

[Amph]

The miners will know the IP used to propagate the transaction.

And exchanges and other online services will associate your coins with your identity.

Bitcoin will never be anonymous, so Bitmixers always will be needed

well this is avoidable, i'll use a vpn or something, or i create my own vpn with a vm and vps

how they can track me then if they do not take the log from the vpn?

[owm123]

I think that this will not happen, every new bitcoin startup/business  is trying to centralized the bitcoin to track their users where do they spend their money like coinbase which tracks their users, i think that these mixer will be in the market for a long time.

And this is supposed to be good? Centralized bitcoin and tracking users. That's why ct or zerocash would be welcome addition, to stop it from happening.