ㅤ

[Kryptowerk]

Yes of course, but if there are more attractive options on the market (in comparison to the current big players like trust wallet etc.), some also offering automatic and easy-to-use coinjoin and the others don't - the choices will slowly bend towards the more-privacy-providing-wallets.

Have you tried Sparrow Wallet? Much better wallet than Wasabi in every aspect, and it does have built-in access to Samourai Whirlpool.
The limitation of these mixing (CoinJoin) implementations is that they rely on a centralized server. There is JoinMarket, which instead is completely decentralized.

Really appreciate the recommendations!
Regarding JoinMarket, it's funny to read about it - isn't that exactly what Wasabi wallet could have chosen to prevent the dependency on zknacks? In their blog they explain it is not really possible to have the wallet working without it.  [BTW: I notice how out of the game I am, really confused by the name, wasn't it called zksnarks - first implemented with zcash? Or does zksnacks have nothing to do with this tech?]

Regarding Sparrow, I haven't heard about it so far. Does look awesome, indeed, great interface, coincontrol, cross-platform, it's all there!
The whirlpool mixing, is it the same/better/worse than Wasabi coinjoin?

It will become something common to use - more mainstream so-to-speak. If at some point it's just good practice to offer coinjoin, this could seriously influence the concerns Bitcoin has been facing for years now regarding its privacy. Maybe layer1 options would become obsolete.

In my opinion, CoinJoin won't evolve past the 'band-aid' stage. It was never planned or designed to become the 'ultimate' Bitcoin privacy solution; it all started here, by the way.
Personally, I'd like Bitcoin L1 Privacy to be a future main objective for Bitcoin. Similar to Monero or or Grin, where every transaction is automatically private, without relying on specific wallets, centralized servers or manual actions.

Sure, I would love layer1 privacy for Bitcoin, too. After all sound, money needs to be fungible. I didn't follow the discussion much over the last 12+ months but as far as I remember, getting a consensus to implement such a thing will probably be *quite* the challange - if it can ever happen. So that's why I am quite excited by the idea of making mixing more convenient / common.

Grin is something that sounded very promising, but even worse than Monero there is just no marketing/publicity at all for the project.

[1714156056]

1714156056

[1714156056]

1714156056

[ABCbits]

Regarding JoinMarket, it's funny to read about it - isn't that exactly what Wasabi wallet could have chosen to prevent the dependency on zknacks? In their blog they explain it is not really possible to have the wallet working without it.

IIRC many Wasabi Wallet developer work at zkSNACKs since the beginning, so kicking zkSNACKs from Wasabi wallet development seems to be impossible. Even so, they have different choice such as shut down their mixing coordinator on Bitcoin mainnet.

[BTW: I notice how out of the game I am, really confused by the name, wasn't it called zksnarks - first implemented with zcash? Or does zksnacks have nothing to do with this tech?]

zkSNACKs (company behind Wasabi Wallet) and zk-SNARKs (one of cryptography technology used by ZCash) are 2 different thing.

Regarding Sparrow, I haven't heard about it so far. Does look awesome, indeed, great interface, coincontrol, cross-platform, it's all there!
The whirlpool mixing, is it the same/better/worse than Wasabi coinjoin?

I don't know, but
1. Choosing public Electrum server or not using VPN/Tor when you use Sparrow Wallet could weaken your privacy.
2. In past, people prefer Wasabi CoinJoin (on Wasabi Wallet 1.x) over Whirpool (part of Samourai wallet).

[n0nce]

The whirlpool mixing, is it the same/better/worse than Wasabi coinjoin?

For more information about Whirlpool, check here: https://samouraiwallet.com/whirlpool
It's basically the same thing (CoinJoin), with a different (still centralized) coordinator (who didn't yet lose the trust of the community) and probably slightly different parameters and fees.

Sure, I would love layer1 privacy for Bitcoin, too. After all sound, money needs to be fungible. I didn't follow the discussion much over the last 12+ months but as far as I remember, getting a consensus to implement such a thing will probably be *quite* the challange - if it can ever happen. So that's why I am quite excited by the idea of making mixing more convenient / common.

For me, one of the biggest issues has always been scalability, because I was most familiar with Monero, where transactions just take more space. But I learned that Grin is even more efficient than Bitcoin in terms of node requirements.
I don't see why Bitcoin shouldn't adopt native privacy if we figured out how to do it with zero drawbacks.

Grin is something that sounded very promising, but even worse than Monero there is just no marketing/publicity at all for the project.

I don't think that's a problem. First of all, all those coins with lots of publicity, can only afford it through sponsors, who want some guaranteed returns. This means they get coins at a discount and other shady business, which is only bad for the project and rips off end users. I prefer honest projects that aren't completely designed around making initial investors rich.
Anyhow; when I talk about privacy altcoins, I purely look at them in terms of technology and whether their tech would be applicable to Bitcoin.

[Kryptowerk]

Sure, I would love layer1 privacy for Bitcoin, too. After all sound, money needs to be fungible. I didn't follow the discussion much over the last 12+ months but as far as I remember, getting a consensus to implement such a thing will probably be *quite* the challange - if it can ever happen. So that's why I am quite excited by the idea of making mixing more convenient / common.

For me, one of the biggest issues has always been scalability, because I was most familiar with Monero, where transactions just take more space. But I learned that Grin is even more efficient than Bitcoin in terms of node requirements.
I don't see why Bitcoin shouldn't adopt native privacy if we figured out how to do it with zero drawbacks.

Don't get me wrong, I wish that would/will happen for Bitcoin. I mean Litecoin did the MW integration and it worked perfectly. For all I know it's gonna be an uphill battle to get consensus for Bitcoin, though. There are a lot of interests that want Bitcoin to stay away from any strong opposing governmental forces - which would inevitably be summoned as soon as the wonderful transparency Bitcoin is having right now is threatened.

Edit: Wow, you put up a really nice thread there. Will do some reading to get up to date! Nice work, man.

Grin is something that sounded very promising, but even worse than Monero there is just no marketing/publicity at all for the project.

I don't think that's a problem. First of all, all those coins with lots of publicity, can only afford it through sponsors, who want some guaranteed returns. This means they get coins at a discount and other shady business, which is only bad for the project and rips off end users. I prefer honest projects that aren't completely designed around making initial investors rich.
Anyhow; when I talk about privacy altcoins, I purely look at them in terms of technology and whether their tech would be applicable to Bitcoin.

A project solely focused on its tech, without big incentives to get it promoted etc is at its core a great thing, agreed! However, and I think Monero, even though it is doing just fine, is a great example - it is still far away from mainstream usage. But "mass-adoption" or at least majority-adoption is something that is ultimately necessary. Without it, any transaction running on the "privacy-chain" will cause suspicion and possibly sanctions - as opposed to the chain which grants goverments and institutions easy access, as does Bitcoin right now.

[n0nce]

But "mass-adoption" or at least majority-adoption is something that is ultimately necessary. Without it, any transaction running on the "privacy-chain" will cause suspicion and possibly sanctions - as opposed to the chain which grants goverments and institutions easy access, as does Bitcoin right now.

That's why I'd like to see 'privacy as default'; I don't see mixing and CoinJoining becoming the default, because as soon as they get popular enough for authorities to worry, they will start cracking down on them. Look at Tornado Cash and Wasabi / zkSNACKS.
They can't 'crack down' on Bitcoin as a whole (which they had to if we got default privacy on L1).

[pooya87]

They can't 'crack down' on Bitcoin as a whole (which they had to if we got default privacy on L1).

They can't crack down on Bitcoin because it is decentralized not because it doesn't have default privacy on L1. The same reason why they can't crack down on an altcoin like Monero that has default privacy on L1. Who are they going to crack down on? The miners that are spread across the globe? Or the developers who are working on an open source project?

The reason why it works on projects like Wasabi is because they were centralized to begin with. When there is a company, it has a door and they will kick their door down sooner or later.

P.S. They kind of have to crack down on bitcoin because it has successfully challenged their money printing hegemony. That is where 90% of the FUD comes from...

[witcher_sense]

I don't see mixing and CoinJoining becoming the default, because as soon as they get popular enough for authorities to worry, they will start cracking down on them. Look at Tornado Cash and Wasabi / zkSNACKS.

Centralized mixing services are unlikely to survive in the long run because single individuals and companies are much easier to shut down than decentralized networks of people protecting their wealth from government interventions. Coinjoin and other solutions that don't require a centralized server controlled by a centralized company are another story since it is still possible to build a decentralized network of people wanting to preserve their privacy. It is not correct to compare decentralized solutions in bitcoin with pseudo-decentralized ones in Ethereum: in Ethereum, even smart contracts like Tornado Cash always depend on the whim of big corporations: after all, they are the only entities that are running full nodes and have "controlling stake."

[n0nce]

They can't 'crack down' on Bitcoin as a whole (which they had to if we got default privacy on L1).

They can't crack down on Bitcoin because it is decentralized not because it doesn't have default privacy on L1. The same reason why they can't crack down on an altcoin like Monero that has default privacy on L1. Who are they going to crack down on? The miners that are spread across the globe? Or the developers who are working on an open source project?

Exactly; that's what I'm saying! Sorry if it was unclear.
I meant: If we had default privacy on L1, to stop it happening, they'd have to go against Bitcoin as a whole, which is going to be a massive task compared to going against a single CoinJoin provider.

I don't see mixing and CoinJoining becoming the default, because as soon as they get popular enough for authorities to worry, they will start cracking down on them. Look at Tornado Cash and Wasabi / zkSNACKS.

Centralized mixing services are unlikely to survive in the long run because single individuals and companies are much easier to shut down than decentralized networks of people protecting their wealth from government interventions. Coinjoin and other solutions that don't require a centralized server controlled by a centralized company are another story since it is still possible to build a decentralized network of people wanting to preserve their privacy.

Sure, but any such 'decentralized network of people' will be smaller, much smaller, than the entirety of Bitcoin. Also think about the anonymity set. The majority of Bitcoin users doesn't CoinJoin or mix; if it was built-in to the protocol by default, the anonymity set would be orders of magnitude larger.
So, much harder to shut down and much harder to track users.

[BlackHatCoiner]

But "mass-adoption" or at least majority-adoption is something that is ultimately necessary. Without it, any transaction running on the "privacy-chain" will cause suspicion and possibly sanctions - as opposed to the chain which grants goverments and institutions easy access, as does Bitcoin right now.

That's why I'd like to see 'privacy as default'; I don't see mixing and CoinJoining becoming the default, because as soon as they get popular enough for authorities to worry, they will start cracking down on them. Look at Tornado Cash and Wasabi / zkSNACKS.

I'll have to stand against this proposal, even if I have had the same view before. First of all, let's clear out something important: there's not a lot of demand for privacy, to have it a default option. Let alone to impose it on the first layer (with MW or Ring-CT), which would require a hard fork. People don't care about their privacy, and have it forced on a base layer is a bad idea (or even have it by default). As I've already said, demand for privacy will come with education.

The second reason has to do with the tendency to have bitcoin disappeared, and become niche-like currency, such as monero. Truth be told, authorities are powerful. The more individuals tend to hide their activity, the more these authorities react. I doubt that there's going to be sufficient resistance to authorities which starve to impose laws against a black-box bitcoin with crazy demand already.

I mean, what to expect from the people of 2022? Politicians' behavior speaks for themselves. Democrats are fine with the war. Republicans are in favor of government spending. The world is becoming more totalitarian-- not less. I even have some doubts that the merchants will switch to peer-to-peer cash, privacy asides.

Also, let's see how lightning goes, because that's a privacy improvement for good.

[witcher_sense]

Sure, but any such 'decentralized network of people' will be smaller, much smaller, than the entirety of Bitcoin. Also think about the anonymity set. The majority of Bitcoin users doesn't CoinJoin or mix; if it was built-in to the protocol by default, the anonymity set would be orders of magnitude larger.
So, much harder to shut down and much harder to track users.

Even if it were possible on the bitcoin protocol level to painlessly (without a hard fork)  inject these privacy-enhancing technologies, it would go against the core principles of bitcoin, which, among other things, imply participation free of any form of coercion. With privacy-oriented Bitcoin, I am coerced into "protecting" my identity even in cases where I need my transactions to remain transparent. But actually, we don't even need to form a decentralized network of obfuscated transactions. In most cases, it is enough to avoid fiat on/off ramps and KYC exchanges and only transact with like-minded people who understand the importance of privacy in financial affairs.

[PrivacyG]

They can't crack down on Bitcoin because it is decentralized not because it doesn't have default privacy on L1.

What do you think about my theory that they are not cracking down right now on Bitcoin because it offers transparency and they are not cracking down on Monero because it is not used yet enough to matter?

They do swing back and forth all the time between accepting the existence of Privacy Coins and refusing it.  They do keep throwing dirt at Bitcoin.  But with Blockchain Analysis they have most of the information they need.  There are a few of us outside their spectrum but we are too few and too little to matter.

Cracking down on Bitcoin is very simple.  All you need to do is outlaw it due to 'extremely high levels of illicit use'.  Throw in there the worst words you possibly can next to 'illicit', such as infantile, guns, terrorism et cetera and you have a huge hoard of people who are soon to ASK the Government to do something about it.  How hard is it to do this?

My opinion is, they are not cracking down on Bitcoin because have a somewhat feeling of control.  They can monitor transactions and connect the ends.  It is even funnier to them.  A lot of people have this misconception that you can use Bitcoin completely anonymously on L1 with no Mixers, no Coin Joins, nothing.  They are however tracked down and a history is generated for all of their transactions, thanks to Blockchain Analysis.  Thoughts?

-
Regards,
PrivacyG

[Kryptowerk]

But "mass-adoption" or at least majority-adoption is something that is ultimately necessary. Without it, any transaction running on the "privacy-chain" will cause suspicion and possibly sanctions - as opposed to the chain which grants goverments and institutions easy access, as does Bitcoin right now.

That's why I'd like to see 'privacy as default'; I don't see mixing and CoinJoining becoming the default, because as soon as they get popular enough for authorities to worry, they will start cracking down on them. Look at Tornado Cash and Wasabi / zkSNACKS.
They can't 'crack down' on Bitcoin as a whole (which they had to if we got default privacy on L1).

Well, I couldn't agree more. Just reading some replies on this topic, though, clearly shows the dilemma a L1-privacy solution is facing:
- Most people don't care about privacy -> hard to convince the, that it's really necessary to update the Bitcoin protocol accordingly
- combined with the monetary incentives involved and the fear of governments starting a crackdown on Bitcoin as soon as privacy was to be an integral part of its protocol (fear is a strong force)
- miners and nodes are ultimately the ones deciding to go with such a software update or not - most of them ofc want to maximize profit; will they take that risk?

They can't crack down on Bitcoin because it is decentralized not because it doesn't have default privacy on L1.

What do you think about my theory that they are not cracking down right now on Bitcoin because it offers transparency and they are not cracking down on Monero because it is not used yet enough to matter?

Yes, I think that's definitly a big part of the equation. Monero already has a hard time when it gets to buying or trading it on mainstream exchanges. Sure, if you do some basic research it's still easy. But for the majority it's not even on their radar - so the active threat for central banks and governments is still almost neglectable. Even though, there were (and probably are) clearly efforts on the way to reduce Monero's potential power further.

Cracking down on Bitcoin is very simple.  All you need to do is outlaw it due to 'extremely high levels of illicit use'.  Throw in there the worst words you possibly can next to 'illicit', such as infantile, guns, terrorism et cetera and you have a huge hoard of people who are soon to ASK the Government to do something about it.  How hard is it to do this?

What I noticed in recent news reports over the last 2+ years or so on mainstream media, is a very critical look at Bitcoins power consumption. So my guess would be, that the "CO2-footprint" of BTC will be the ultimative killer-argument to release heavy sanctions on any bitcoin related businesses - if the real threat (immutable, decentralized, private, borderless payment method & store of value) becomes too big to handle for governments.

[n0nce]

People don't care about their privacy, and have it forced on a base layer is a bad idea (or even have it by default). As I've already said, demand for privacy will come with education.

Why is it bad to force on base layer / make it default? I don't see the reason why someone not interested in privacy would be against getting privacy 'for free' (i.e. without drawbacks like higher fees).

Sure, education is very important as well, but I don't think people will be against getting 'something extra' without drawbacks or inconveniences.

The second reason has to do with the tendency to have bitcoin disappeared, and become niche-like currency, such as monero.

You think Bitcoin would be killed by authorities if it received default privacy? And that Monero is only 'niche-like' because someone doesn't want it to become more popular?

Also, let's see how lightning goes, because that's a privacy improvement for good.

Sure; but especially with low 'Bitcoin education' (as you mentioned), people can mess up before opening and after closing their channels. On-chain privacy by default would still be great to have, in my opinion.

Even if it were possible on the bitcoin protocol level to painlessly (without a hard fork)  inject these privacy-enhancing technologies, it would go against the core principles of bitcoin, which, among other things, imply participation free of any form of coercion. With privacy-oriented Bitcoin, I am coerced into "protecting" my identity even in cases where I need my transactions to remain transparent.

I don't think that 'being coerced' to follow the consensus rules is against the core principles of Bitcoin, to be honest.
Do keep in mind that some (not all) existing privacy coin implementations allow (at least) the receiver to have insight into your transaction, if you grant it. I'm also personally not sure that there are so many use cases where you need transparent transactions (i.e. everyone can see which address sent which other address coins and how many).

But actually, we don't even need to form a decentralized network of obfuscated transactions. In most cases, it is enough to avoid fiat on/off ramps and KYC exchanges and only transact with like-minded people who understand the importance of privacy in financial affairs.

As soon as you spend those coins once, they will be tied to your PII, like Email address or even physical address (when ordering physical goods). Without second-layer mixing or CoinJoin technologies, there is no way to remove this information from your resulting change coins. It would be great not to have to do this every time.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Why is it bad to force on base layer / make it default? I don't see the reason why someone not interested in privacy would be against getting privacy 'for free' (i.e. without drawbacks like higher fees).

There you go, higher fees. Also, don't know for MW, but for ring signatures, it's also more costly scaling-wise (to have privacy, you need the entire chainstate).

You think Bitcoin would be killed by authorities if it received default privacy?

It'd attract more hostile regulation than user resistance, that's all I'm saying. Bitcoin would become a more prioritized target.

Sure; but especially with low 'Bitcoin education' (as you mentioned), people can mess up before opening and after closing their channels. On-chain privacy by default would still be great to have, in my opinion.

True, self-custody off-chain isn't as trivial as self-custody on-chain.

I don't think that 'being coerced' to follow the consensus rules is against the core principles of Bitcoin, to be honest.

It doesn't sound freedom friendly though.

[n0nce]

Why is it bad to force on base layer / make it default? I don't see the reason why someone not interested in privacy would be against getting privacy 'for free' (i.e. without drawbacks like higher fees).

There you go, higher fees. Also, don't know for MW, but for ring signatures, it's also more costly scaling-wise (to have privacy, you need the entire chainstate).

That's why I emphasize that it would need to be a 'free' upgrade, i.e. no additional fees and no higher scaling cost. If that can be fulfilled, I don't see why anyone would be against it.

You think Bitcoin would be killed by authorities if it received default privacy?

It'd attract more hostile regulation than user resistance, that's all I'm saying. Bitcoin would become a more prioritized target.

It's a hypothesis; not sure if it will hold true. I'd argue it's already being attacked, through excuses like power consumption; however I don't see 'playing by their rules to prevent regulation' as the end goal for Bitcoin. Bitcoin was created to play by different rules, to use cryptography for decoupling itself from the legacy system.
If we relinquish higher privacy goals and content ourselves with comparatively small anonymity-set, niche systems, not daring to try getting L1 privacy, we admit what they claim; that only people with something to hide want encryption and anonymity, and that mixing & tumbling was a money laundering technique.
Instead, if we can make this the new standard; like TLS in HTTP, PGP in Email (this one failed) and E2E encryption in messaging applications, nobody will question it. Nobody suspects you to be a criminal because you use encrypted communication with a server or an E2E encrypted messenger.

I don't think that 'being coerced' to follow the consensus rules is against the core principles of Bitcoin, to be honest.

It doesn't sound freedom friendly though.

With that argument, you can say that any other Bitcoin consensus rule is not freedom-friendly. Bitcoin is using hard-set rules that every node is following to remain on the chain. You can argue that there's no freedom: I can't just change my miner to generate myself 25BTC if I hit a block, or change my node to submit transactions with smaller input than output value; expecting this to be accepted by the network.

If this type of freedom was possible, Bitcoin obviously wouldn't work.

[pooya87]

Cracking down on Bitcoin is very simple.  All you need to do is outlaw it due to 'extremely high levels of illicit use'.

It is a valid theory but also I can't help but see this scenario as shutting down lots of businesses with a total worth in the billions in most countries. They won't be only cracking down on bitcoin. For example in US there is already big exchanges like Coinbase and Gemeni, different mining pools and farms like Marathon Digital, blockchain analysis companies, payment processors like BitPay, investment companies, even banks and a lot more. It is extremely difficult to suddenly decide to shut them all down.

Not to mention the US government (and possibly other govs) is using bitcoin (and Tether) for illicit activities. Cracking down on bitcoin would significantly limit their own operations specially on social media.

[Pmalek]

Not to mention the US government (and possibly other govs) is using bitcoin (and Tether) for illicit activities. Cracking down on bitcoin would significantly limit their own operations specially on social media.

The crackdown would have to happen in a way that it affects you and me (the regular taxpayers) only and makes it harder or close to impossible for us (the regular folks) to continue using bitcoin the way we want to. It's not going to affect them, and they aren't going to investigate their criminal friends and partners. They will investigate the ordinary guy and parade him in front of the cameras as a dangerous criminal. People can and are being silenced over social media. That's what fact-checking companies are for.

[BlackHatCoiner]

That's why I emphasize that it would need to be a 'free' upgrade, i.e. no additional fees and no higher scaling cost. If that can be fulfilled, I don't see why anyone would be against it.

So how can it work with no tradeoffs? As far as I know, privacy is mainly a scaling problem in privacy oriented cryptocurrencies.

It's a hypothesis; not sure if it will hold true. I'd argue it's already being attacked, through excuses like power consumption; however I don't see 'playing by their rules to prevent regulation' as the end goal for Bitcoin. Bitcoin was created to play by different rules, to use cryptography for decoupling itself from the legacy system.

Yes, but we can't go from feudalism to complete separation of money and state within just one day. There are people who disapprove free enterprise money, and these people can elect; preferably politicians who'll be in favor of them (and since politics is about taking power, I'm sure there's already enough competition for that scope).

In the USA there's already a tremendous amount of money spent from the citizens to have them surveilled. Namely, there are millions of dollars spent from government budget to chain analysis companies. I'm sure that the overwhelming majority is being spied. A minority like us can do tricks with mixing etc., but we're small damage for them over all. If we were to force the entire bitcoin space to go anonymous, I'm sure they'd approve Warren's dystopian bill by tomorrow morning.

Nobody suspects you to be a criminal because you use encrypted communication with a server or an E2E encrypted messenger.

Maybe because stuff such as https don't provide you sufficient privacy to begin with. I mean, do you feel private when connecting to facebook.com over https? Do you feel private when sending a message using WhatsApp? Or when doing a Google search? Of course not. Tor provides sufficient privacy for that stuff, and ironically they will suspect you for being a criminal if you used that so.

Can you imagine what would happen from a government perspective if Windows and every other popular OS forced the usage of Tor by the next update?

[Hispo]

That's why I emphasize that it would need to be a 'free' upgrade, i.e. no -snip-

Nobody suspects you to be a criminal because you use encrypted communication with a server or an E2E encrypted messenger.

...
Can you imagine what would happen from a government perspective if Windows and every other popular OS forced the usage of Tor by the next update?

Interestingly enough, that what you said reminds me something that I read about Bitlocker (the service of USB memory encryption developed by Windows). Even though, it is proprietary software, it seems that it lacked a backdoor and the only way to access the information without the passphrase was using a backup cypher, which the user needed to store themselves. Because of this, it seems Microsoft got some visits by the men in Black.

It is an example of how actually "privacy" works on popular, widely extended closed source software.

According to Microsoft sources,[48] BitLocker does not contain an intentionally built-in backdoor, i.e., there is no way for law enforcement to have a guaranteed passage to the data on the user's drives that is provided by Microsoft. In 2006, the UK Home Office expressed concern over the lack of a backdoor and tried entering into talks with Microsoft to get one introduced.[49] Microsoft developer and cryptographer Niels Ferguson denied the backdoor request and said, "over my dead body."[50] Microsoft engineers have said that FBI agents also put pressure on them in numerous meetings in order to add a backdoor, although no formal, written request was ever made; Microsoft engineers eventually suggested to the FBI that agents should look for the hard copy of the key that the BitLocker program suggests its users to make.[51]

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitLocker

[n0nce]

That's why I emphasize that it would need to be a 'free' upgrade, i.e. no additional fees and no higher scaling cost. If that can be fulfilled, I don't see why anyone would be against it.

So how can it work with no tradeoffs? As far as I know, privacy is mainly a scaling problem in privacy oriented cryptocurrencies.

As far as I know, Grin for instance, scales better than Bitcoin and preserves privacy on L1.

In the USA there's already a tremendous amount of money spent from the citizens to have them surveilled. Namely, there are millions of dollars spent from government budget to chain analysis companies. I'm sure that the overwhelming majority is being spied. A minority like us can do tricks with mixing etc., but we're small damage for them over all. If we were to force the entire bitcoin space to go anonymous, I'm sure they'd approve Warren's dystopian bill by tomorrow morning.

So, in the long run, privacy can only be ensured if it remains a niche subject, enjoyed by a minority, who hopes not to get 'discovered' or not to become too large?

Nobody suspects you to be a criminal because you use encrypted communication with a server or an E2E encrypted messenger.

Maybe because stuff such as https don't provide you sufficient privacy to begin with. I mean, do you feel private when connecting to facebook.com over https? Do you feel private when sending a message using WhatsApp?

I do feel private when using PGP or an E2E messenger I've compiled myself. TLS is not a privacy but a security mechanism in the first place, indeed. I'm confident though, that my information reaches the server without being intercepted.