Will Bitcoin mixers be considered illegal by worldwide governments?

[FanEagle]

I have never heard about the privacy coin you mentioned and it does not look popular to me, which I don’t see much about it on the forum except now, I know of Monero and grin, and I feel these are even more popular, but in the event that it becomes popular, government would never allow it except maybe the system is handed over to the government to control since you said that it is a centralized system and has middle man in it, which is not different from the way the traditional fiat method operates.

If it is a system that would jeopardize the operation of the government, Sure they will put an end to it, if they are still fighting the main bitcoin hard, then they would have no problem putting this one you mentioned away like it does not exist.

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[bitcoin-shark]

if a bitcoin mixer requires kyc then there would be no more anonymity and it would therefore no longer be useful, i believe that slowly all countries will outlaw mixers, but i believe there is an easy alternative like turning everything into monero then making the transaction and then re-transform everything into btc, maybe is even less expensive...

[7788bitcoin]

If governments ban mixers/tumblers, then they could easily do the same to privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies like Monero and Grin. It's all a matter of power and control over people than anything else. What do you think about this?

Government wants transparency and i am sure they will restrict and put pressure on every tumblers in the market to shut their doors or to face legal prosecution and everyone choose to move on with their life rather than fighting against the government and sadly we might see that happen in the near future, when it comes to legalization i am not sure how the government will take a stand against privacy coins, will they force the exchanges to remove the coins is to be seen, if it continue like that Privacy will be a dream for the future generation.

[mazdafunsun]

If governments ban mixers/tumblers, then they could easily do the same to privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies like Monero and Grin. It's all a matter of power and control over people than anything else. What do you think about this?

Tell me what else for mixers are used then laundering money - making their transactions untraceable?
As you wrote, mixers are centralized - so they can be brought down by legal action.
Monero and other privacy coins are not centralized so they can not be brought down.

The solution is script based mixers, the only action can be made towards site owners, but this is the future also for the decentralized exchanges.

[alexcopper]

that's a great question and very likely. I know ciphertrace's technology is good enough to trace digital assets even if they did run through a mixer so idk if governments will use that to their advantage

[maxreish]

We can't blame government for shutting down bitcoin mixers, as it was used illegally by some criminals thus the reputation of it was severely ruined. Governments has a power to do that, if they think it was better to shut it down than to become tool in a crime then we can't do anything about it.

We can't deny the fact that bitcoin mixers unconsciously peomotes the Money Laundering  act which the governments do not want that to be evaded.

[Artemis3]

if a bitcoin mixer requires kyc then there would be no more anonymity and it would therefore no longer be useful, i believe that slowly all countries will outlaw mixers, but i believe there is an easy alternative like turning everything into monero then making the transaction and then re-transform everything into btc, maybe is even less expensive...

And to do that you need a true DEX like Bisq, which is already rumored to be in use by criminals. While you are at it, you could probably run a mixer as a hidden service on tor or similar anti censorship network.

The only compromise i can imagine is some sort of community (not government) maintained list that reputable services opt in, but i see no clear solution in the horizon.

[bryant.coleman]

if a bitcoin mixer requires kyc then there would be no more anonymity and it would therefore no longer be useful, i believe that slowly all countries will outlaw mixers, but i believe there is an easy alternative like turning everything into monero then making the transaction and then re-transform everything into btc, maybe is even less expensive...

Although there are many people out there who would claim that Bitcoin is anonymous, it is not so. All the transactions are stored in the Blockchain, and if you trace the transactions, then it may be possible to find out the real identity of the user. Here the assumption is that at some point the user is converting his BTC to fiat (or vice versa).

Monero claims to be 100% anonymous and that is the reason why most of the remaining dark markets have shifted to that currency from Bitcoin. But it is not doing well in the market lately and has lost most of its market capitalization during 2018-19. The continued development has also slowed down, and it should ring some alarm bells, as there were rumors recently that the feds have found some loophole to trace the XMR transactions. That said, XMR can be converted to fiat without getting traced back to the owner.

[figmentofmyass]

The future of mixers open to all may not be a long lasting one. Even if they continue to operate with impunity it's possible third party services will reject coins that are identified as coming from them.

then it becomes like a game of cat and mouse. just as blockchain analysis companies are constantly improving their methods, so too are mixers. it's not as simple as mixers immediately becoming obsolete.

at the end of the day, all exchange customers are risking (at least under the current paradigm) is having their account closed for violating terms.

[Kakmakr]

The future of mixers open to all may not be a long lasting one. Even if they continue to operate with impunity it's possible third party services will reject coins that are identified as coming from them.

then it becomes like a game of cat and mouse. just as blockchain analysis companies are constantly improving their methods, so too are mixers. it's not as simple as mixers immediately becoming obsolete.

at the end of the day, all exchange customers are risking (at least under the current paradigm) is having their account closed for violating terms.

When you use some of these Mixers via Tor, it is virtually impossible to track these coins and these transactions and normal Blockchain analysis becomes really difficult. The problem is that the average Bitcoin user <Noob> have never used Tor and they have never used Mixer services before, so it is a steep learning curve and probably too much effort for most Newbies. 

Mixer services will not sit on their hands and wait for the analysis companies to beat their services, they will adapt to survive. <There are a lot of money to be made and these people will protect that income at all cost.> 

[Lucius]

Maybe we could ask the question in another way : Do you think any government consider mixers as legal service?

Well of course the answer is no, but most if them have no idea what this is really about, even Bitcoin is a mystery to them. The politicians we watch and listen every day are really just executors of the will of some other powerful shadow players, and in general they are very stupid people.

If one day they get instruction to start hunting coin mixers, they will do that same as the trained dog executes the command of its owner. Problem for them is how to do it effectively, and if mixers play smart they are completely safe.

If the governments could stop Bitcoin, do you think they wouldn't do it already?

[Cityhunter123]

It seems to me that it depends on the governments of specific countries. From their attitude to this.

[Abiky]

Looking at the current trends, it is difficult to believe that the US authorities are going to tolerate Bitcoin as a decentralized currency, and Bitcoin mixers are  further down the line. To put it bluntly, the government will never get comfortable to the level of anonymity provided by Bitcoin. Sooner or later, they are going to act against this. The mandatory KYC verification for exchanges is just the tip of the iceberg. In future, KYC will be mandatory everywhere, including wallets and crypto-related forums including Bitcointalk.

I don't know how many of the mixers have the required licenses and permits to operate. I doubt that the majority don't have any. Even those with the licenses may face hostile action from the government in the long term. Illegal mixers will be treated the same way as the authorities are treating the dark markets (such as Aplha Bay and Silk Road).

Exactly. That's what I've thought in the first place. As soon as governments realize that Bitcoin is unstoppable, they'll take their efforts in trying to destroy it at all costs. The situation becomes worse for mixers/tumblers, and even privacy-oriented solutions for Bitcoin (such as CoinJoin-enabled wallets like Wasabi and Samourai). Their main excuse would be that they're trying to fight money laundering and other illegal activities. But the truth is that, most criminals use Fiat for their nefarious actions instead of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum. The main reason is that cryptocurrencies are extremely volatile, whereas Fiat is not. This makes it a terrible solution for wrongdoers (not to mention that most cryptocurrencies are transparent by design too) as a means to "launder" money.

Despite these facts, we cannot deny that sooner or later, governments will take actions against centralized mixing services. They've already began taking action with centralized exchanges where KYC is a must in order to trade cryptocurrencies within the mainstream world. We've seen the case with Shapeshift where it was once an "Instant Exchange" that allowed people to exchange cryptocurrencies in an anonymous manner. On the other hand, the US' IRS agency has been against every US citizen using Coinbase.

It would be unfortunate if Bitcoin wallets end this way. If this happens, then the only means to send/receive Bitcoin would be within the "Core" Wallet which serves as a node to secure the Blockchain. Hopefully, developers would come up with a solution that would allow people to send/receive Bitcoin, and even obfuscate transactions without the intervention of governments worldwide (by making government's efforts harder to achieve over time).

Nonetheless, what we need is decentralized alternatives to current mixing services. Luckily, this is already in the works with TumbleBit, CashShuffle (Bitcoin Cash), and even the Dandelion Protocol. Which means that, privacy might be obtained with ease after all. Just my opinion

[nightxglow]

I don't know whether the government will consider bitcoin mixers illegal or something, but i can understand if that happened. Because from my perspective, i think it will be a right thing to do for the government to shut down or make mixers illegal because they are afraid it will be used for crimes like money laundering and such. Although we know it's not true, but not false too. It may be right that mixers can be used by the criminals to do the crimes, and the government may want to prevent that, although it means that the innocent one that has no bad intention in using mixers will go along as well.

[gentlemand]

When you use some of these Mixers via Tor, it is virtually impossible to track these coins and these transactions and normal Blockchain analysis becomes really difficult. The problem is that the average Bitcoin user <Noob> have never used Tor and they have never used Mixer services before, so it is a steep learning curve and probably too much effort for most Newbies. 

Mixer services will not sit on their hands and wait for the analysis companies to beat their services, they will adapt to survive. <There are a lot of money to be made and these people will protect that income at all cost.> 

We've no way of knowing how good or bad most mixing service methods are, or how good the people are who are trying to crack them. And what's a wonderful technique today may be compromised tomorrow or has been compromised for many months already.

The future of it is surely open source P2P type stuff like plenty of other areas too. Third parties are the eternal weak point of this whole scene but they were needed to get rolling.

[audaciousbeing]

Bitcoin mixers have a long history since they came into inception some time ago. They've been a viable alternative for people looking towards privacy within their Bitcoin transactions. While Bitcoin mixers are far from being perfect, they're still one of the best solutions for obfuscating transactions from third parties. The only concern would be that mixing services are centralized as they're provided by a middleman. In effect, this brings a single point of failure greatly defeating the purpose of privacy.

We've seen how Bestmixer got shut down by the authorities. They claim that Bestmixer encouraged money laundering activities which resulted in legal action. The truth is that Bitcoin mixers can be used for both good and bad things. Money laundering is mostly done with Fiat than with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin or Ethereum. Still though, the perception of worldwide governments against mixers/tumblers seems to be different nowadays. Which makes me wonder whenever Bitcoin mixers will be considered illegal by such entities within the future?

If governments ban mixers/tumblers, then they could easily do the same to privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies like Monero and Grin. It's all a matter of power and control over people than anything else. What do you think about this?

You have actually bring another angle of discussion to the mixing part of crypto hemisphere. Of course there will be series of opposition from the part of government if they realize that the services being provided is making it difficult for the tracking of people who engage in illegal activities. At the same time, it would be fool hardy to focus on the mixing services as a way of crime control rather than the exchange sites where controls should be established. When the exchange sites promoters are made to be responsible for the coins in their custody, they are expected to take it serious and ensure that maximum security is done to that effect.

[Vishnu.Reang]

Bitcoin is being demonized as a weapon of criminals and mafias by the mainstream media, despite the fact that less than 2% of the transactions are illegitimate (as per studies done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology). With Bitcoin mixers, this proportion will be much higher. So we can expect an even more hostile reaction.

[gentlemand]

Bitcoin is being demonized as a weapon of criminals and mafias by the mainstream media, despite the fact that less than 2% of the transactions are illegitimate (as per studies done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology). With Bitcoin mixers, this proportion will be much higher. So we can expect an even more hostile reaction.

That knee jerk phase is largely played out. Only complete know nothings wheel that out now.

The next phase is the sanitisation and relative integration into the existing order and that's where mixers are going to get a kicking. No regulator is going to say they're a good thing and money in general is getting ever more tightly controlled.

If someone today proposed a publicly accessible system that guaranteed the questionable dollars you put in would emerge sparkling clean no questions asked, about 1000 ICBMs would rain down on it within an hour of opening.

What was acceptable in Bitcoinland when not enough other people gave a shit suddenly hits the wall when the rest of the world looks closer.

[bitbunnny]

Bitcoin is being demonized as a weapon of criminals and mafias by the mainstream media, despite the fact that less than 2% of the transactions are illegitimate (as per studies done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology). With Bitcoin mixers, this proportion will be much higher. So we can expect an even more hostile reaction.

Not only media are hostile but I think that reason for that is ignorance, not necessary bad intention. People don't know enough about the Bitcoin and don't understand it. And people are afraid of unknown. Once you get bad reputation like Bitcoin did, that is hard to change although not impossible.
I think that will change for the better but it takes time and lot of education and positive promotion.

[RealMalatesta]

It depends on the level of scam and how rampant scam becomes through it that would make them decide if this services should be ban or not and that will only affect those that are concerned about privacy of a thing because not everyone you see in the cryptocurrency market cares about that.

I have been in the cryptocurrency industry for a while now and I have been receiving payments from my services to people in one way or another, which I have also sent out several payments and I have never bothered about inking of privacy thing and this I know that we have so many people out there that also do same.  If their services would really make the level of fraud in cryptocurrency to become rampant to the level of giving cryptocurrency too much bad name, then they might eventually ban it fully.