I found this research paper by some people at UCSD:
A Fistful of Bitcoins: Characterizing Payments Among Men with No NamesAlthough most of the info is common knowledge on the forums, I wanted to share for those who may find it useful/interesting. The headline reads like a TechCrunch article, but the main purpose of the study was to determine Bitcoin's level of anonymity and to determine if transactions could be traced. The conclusions are pretty much what we already know on the forums.
- Most transactions that go through an exchange like Gox or Bitinstant usually have some personal identifiers associated with them (whether real or not). These transactions have a higher likelihood of being traced.
- If some authority issued a subpeona on Gox (or any other exchange), they could potentially give out details on many silk road transactions.
I came across the article reading the MIT Technology Review:
Mapping the Bitcoin Economy Could Reveal Users IdentitiesAK Coins