Governments against privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies

[Drai]

One thing Governments around the world all have in common is the desire to monitor the funds of it's citizens so that they would be able to tax it accordingly, Privacy coins threaten this control and would leave them in the dark.

[Febo]

One thing Governments around the world all have in common is the desire to monitor the funds of it's citizens so that they would be able to tax it accordingly, Privacy coins threaten this control and would leave them in the dark.

Not only Governments. Everyone. Also robbers. Robbers need to know who have wealth to steal it. If they dont know they are totally in a dark and cant steal it.  Transparent ledger cryptocurrencies have some advantages over opaque ledger cryptocurrenies, but also some disadvantages. I believe security and safety will overrule all the rest.

[cryptonewbie]

Imagine if you were a Landlord and the agreement with your tenants is that they will pay you 10% of their earnings, and then suddenly a new method is introduced that would enable them hide their earnings from you, would you like that new system or would you kick against it? That is the exact same thing happening between Governments and Privacy Coins.

[Abiky]

Governments are against everything that do not provide them taxes and revenue, privacy coins being anonymous and un trackable are the most troublesome for govts that want to track transactions, generally govts are against all coins but they cannot do much about them, even the fiat backed stablecoins like libra is not being supported or encouraged by govts rather they want regulations and taxes and control over them.

That's certainly true, mate. All governments want is supremacy and control over their citizens. They achieve this by making people use their national currency over any other alternative they can't control. Their main excuse is money laundering, but the truth is that illegal activities also happen within Fiat. Money is a double-edged sword as we know it. It can either be used for good things or bad things. Knowing that governments have paid attention towards crypto and Blockchain technology, shows us how worried or concerned they are.

Governments believe that alternative currencies like Bitcoin, and Ethereum will become a threat to their current monetary system. That's why they've been implementing fierce regulations in order to avoid crypto from overcoming Fiat anytime soon. But it's very unlikely they'll succeed as the revolution has just begun. Blockchain technology is too big to fail nowadays, which leaves governments no choice but to join it or be left behind.

As for privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies like Monero and Grin, they'll always be the number one target from central banks and governments worldwide. This is largely because, all transactions are obfuscated which prevents governments from taxing these cryptocurrencies. On the hand, transparent cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum have a greater chance of becoming accepted by worldwide governments because it's easier to track & trace transactions for taxation.

Nonetheless, the future of privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies largely depends on how many people support them. Despite the ever-growing restrictions from governments worldwide, people need to find alternative ways to continue using these cryptocurrencies in order to keep the ecosystem alive. Considering how big Blockchain technology has become, it's becoming more difficult for governments to be able to shut it down in every way. Which is why, I believe that privacy coins and ordinary cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum will be here to stay for many generations. Just my opinion

[Febo]

Imagine if you were a Landlord and the agreement with your tenants is that they will pay you 10% of their earnings, and then suddenly a new method is introduced that would enable them hide their earnings from you, would you like that new system or would you kick against it? That is the exact same thing happening between Governments and Privacy Coins.

Landlord and you can simply change the way how you determinate your rent.  It is simple. If cryptocurrency is useful for landlord to use and for you to use you will not decide to not use it simply because you had set rent that way.

[coaprotet]

If crypto would get mass adopted there would be place for privacy coins alike Monero, because governments are fighting against any privacy sources. They are not able to keep things under control when somebody runs anonymous.

[Vektrum]

Confidential coins cannot be controlled, therefore it is not surprising that governments do not like them and they intend to fight them. But for example, European politicians proposed deanimizing Zcash wallets so that the owners of this coin could further trade it on exchanges and use it for their own purposes. Apparently because of this, the price of Zcash, Dash and Monero fell so much.

[Herry Toms]

I think governments can do nothing against privacy coins. They can't ban or regulate, mean to say governments have no control over crypto or more specifically over privacy coins.

[Hueristic]

I think governments can do nothing against privacy coins. They can't ban or regulate, mean to say governments have no control over crypto or more specifically over privacy coins.

Normally a privacy centric project is in the ballpark of an aggressive governments reach if they wish to attack. And there are a myriad of vectors for said action so we have a saying, Complacency kills, and i think it is appropriate for this discussion.

[senin]

How can they prohibit anonymous cryptocurrencies? It will not be possible to track them, the only option is to remove them from the exchange, but not all exchanges will want to do it. People will be able to make exchanges and exchange coins among themselves. Of course they will affect the course of the coin, but it will give new ideas for solving this problem.

The Japanese government has already banned the use of cryptocurrencies with a high degree of confidentiality, such as Monero, Zcash, Dash. Therefore, such a ban is also possible on the part of other states. States will inevitably over time tighten the regulation of all cryptocurrencies, and this will especially apply to those that have a high degree of anonymity. It is hard to say where this will lead.

[pishite]

How can they prohibit anonymous cryptocurrencies? It will not be possible to track them, the only option is to remove them from the exchange, but not all exchanges will want to do it. People will be able to make exchanges and exchange coins among themselves. Of course they will affect the course of the coin, but it will give new ideas for solving this problem.

The Japanese government has already banned the use of cryptocurrencies with a high degree of confidentiality, such as Monero, Zcash, Dash. Therefore, such a ban is also possible on the part of other states. States will inevitably over time tighten the regulation of all cryptocurrencies, and this will especially apply to those that have a high degree of anonymity. It is hard to say where this will lead.

Many cryptocurrencies support anomizers, how can this be prohibited?
Even if they close the range of addresses, they will not be able to do anything, since the coins will work on another.
You can consider an example of a telegram messenger that was banned and invested quite a lot in blocking it, but it works.
And cryptocurrencies are still mainly used by advanced users, so there will be workarounds anyway.

[dearbesz1219]

With freedom, privacy come many problems
Look for example on ICOs - they are completely free what they can do with the raised funds, even they can scam you because they do not guarantee you anything! Also you are completely free to avoid investing into ICOs. 

[Febo]

How can they prohibit anonymous cryptocurrencies? It will not be possible to track them, the only option is to remove them from the exchange, but not all exchanges will want to do it. People will be able to make exchanges and exchange coins among themselves. Of course they will affect the course of the coin, but it will give new ideas for solving this problem.

The Japanese government has already banned the use of cryptocurrencies with a high degree of confidentiality, such as Monero, Zcash, Dash. Therefore, such a ban is also possible on the part of other states. States will inevitably over time tighten the regulation of all cryptocurrencies, and this will especially apply to those that have a high degree of anonymity. It is hard to say where this will lead.

Japanese government did not ban anything. That is FUD that come out in media. Show me the law where code was prohibited please.

[Abiky]

Confidential coins cannot be controlled, therefore it is not surprising that governments do not like them and they intend to fight them. But for example, European politicians proposed deanimizing Zcash wallets so that the owners of this coin could further trade it on exchanges and use it for their own purposes. Apparently because of this, the price of Zcash, Dash and Monero fell so much.

Exactly. But still, privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies can be "rigged" by the developers themselves (like for example, placing a backdoor on the cryptocurrency for the government's intervention). As far as I know, Zcash is a privacy-oriented cryptocurrency which has plans of implementing a backdoor (if they didn't implemented it already) in order to allow governments to take action against any suspicious activity on the Blockchain. This would prove to be bad against the censorship resistance cryptocurrencies have been known for a long time. A link of the article explaining the backdoor can be seen here: https://blockonomi.com/zcash-backdoor/

Despite the efforts done by many governments worldwide, they'll never succeed because of the open-source and decentralized nature of crypto. If a specific privacy coin gets compromised, the community can easily create a new fork of the same with stricter anonymity features. The ecosystem will continue to adapt until it's resilient enough to withstand anything along the way. The strongest privacy-oriented cryptocurrency yet is Monero with a battle-tested technology that's proven to effectively anonymize every single transaction made on the Blockchain without intervention from third parties. Whereas other privacy coins like Zcash and Dash provide optional anonymity, Monero enforces it at the protocol level.

Nonetheless, it's no secret that governments want to gain control over the world's monetary system. The moment they see privacy coins rising in popularity, is such where they'll do anything at their disposal to stop them. After all, it's nearly impossible to track every single transaction made on privacy-oriented blockchain ledgers, which prevents the government from taxing them, as well as, tracking criminal activity. Which is why, the battle against privacy coins will be a never-ending one. Hopefully, privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies would survive for a long time as people give their full support. Just my thoughts

[Hueristic]

How can they prohibit anonymous cryptocurrencies? It will not be possible to track them, the only option is to remove them from the exchange, but not all exchanges will want to do it. People will be able to make exchanges and exchange coins among themselves. Of course they will affect the course of the coin, but it will give new ideas for solving this problem.

The Japanese government has already banned the use of cryptocurrencies with a high degree of confidentiality, such as Monero, Zcash, Dash. Therefore, such a ban is also possible on the part of other states. States will inevitably over time tighten the regulation of all cryptocurrencies, and this will especially apply to those that have a high degree of anonymity. It is hard to say where this will lead.

Japanese government did not ban anything. That is FUD that come out in media. Show me the law where code was prohibited please.

I believe they made it against regulations for their exchanges to list them or some such thing but I am not sure.

[bodler88]

No government will ever recognize cryptocurrency as a legitimate means of mutual settlements between people, because this will lead to the loss of one of the main control levers that government has. Of course, they cannot turn off the Internet to make the entire infrastructure disappear, but what they can do is to prohibit the exchange of cryptocurrency money for fiat, which is now being done in some countries. Tell me, who will be interested in cryptocurrency, if you cannot use it to buy a food to feed your children, and at the same time not able to exchange it for fiat money?

[gensol]

Government will never like what they have no control of. About privacy coins, it will al ays be difficult for the government to trace any individual transactions or place a charge against anyone for amounts of transactions made.

[atjiat]

Guys, one way or another, we will have to come to terms with the fact that the cryptocurrency will be under control.  Cryptocurrency users can exchange funds with each other, but buying goods using cryptocurrency will not be possible anyway, because any business is under state control and there are certain rules for entrepreneurial activity.  If there is an acute question regarding KYC and tax returns in relation to cryptocurrency, then we can not change anything.

[crenfrosck]

I have to tell that I fully understand your position in this particular discussion, however, I do not share the belief of the goverment turning down XMR/GRIN. Sure, they might be capable of pushing them outside the world of "common transactions," but they exist and the black market is unstoppable just like human desires. They would participate in a war they have no chance winning of (and even funded by taxpayers money... tragic in its own way). I really hope they will realize that technology has finally reached a point when no authority is big enough to stop decentralized systems of p2p transactions. Oh Lord, I know this will be bloody... Nonethless, as long as there are people looking for freedom as their primary desire, privacy will be seeked at all fronts (including transactions).

[irukandji]

What are your thoughts about this?

All will be banned. One government will set up a "patsy" and jail them for 20 years are scare everyone.