Should I use mixers?

[Stedsm]

I hope everyone here knows what mixing services are, and for those who don't:

BTC mixers work as a medium, a medium that works like an escrow, gives you back your own coins but on your desired addresses and that too, from different places so for you to become non-traceable at your end. Now, these mixers don't know where these coins will be going to, so it's only you who knows about your coins, your addresses and your transactions.

So, what's the reason behind this thread?

Actually, most exchanges are reluctant to providing their users the authority of using mixers while depositing on their platform and I have heard so many news about exchanges stopping and freezing the account and some didn't even release the account as of today. I'm a privacy conscious person and would like to ask you whether I should still use mixers when depositing on an exchange or not.

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[figmentofmyass]

Actually, most exchanges are reluctant to providing their users the authority of using mixers while depositing on their platform and I have heard so many news about exchanges stopping and freezing the account and some didn't even release the account as of today.

that has happened several times publicly with coinjoins......any examples of it happening with centralized mixers?

I'm a privacy conscious person and would like to ask you whether I should still use mixers when depositing on an exchange or not.

exchanges routinely track your blockchain activity several hops out, for both deposits and withdrawals. with that in mind, should you use mixers? you tell me.

if you're holding coins withdrawn from a DNM or gambling site and need to cash out through an exchange, mixing them first is a no brainer. if your coins are clean, it's a question of privacy.

[anonymixer]

At ]Anonymixer, we provide the service of Mixing coins where no-one knows that you used a Mixer in the first place.

It is most important to us that no-one is able to identify any of our wallets, or our transactions through common input ownership heuristics and/or peel chains, our Wallet implementation has been written from scratch, for this very purpose.

[Bitcoin_Arena]

I don't use mixers if I am sending coins to a centralized exchange. One of the reasons is bitcoins from a suspicious source like stolen funds could be included as an input in our receiving transaction and this could cause an exchange to block your bitcoins if they have been analyzing and following the money trail.

Maybe the best way right now is either us Monero or send mixed coins strictly to decentralized exchanges like bisq or localcryptos. There you won't have any much worry of having your funds blocked due to suspicious transactions.

[anonymixer]

I don't use mixers if I am sending coins to a centralized exchange. One of the reasons is bitcoins from a suspicious source like stolen funds could be included as an input in our receiving transaction and this could cause an exchange to block your bitcoins if they have been analyzing and following the money trail.

Maybe the best way right now is either us Monero or send mixed coins strictly to decentralized exchanges like bisq or localcryptos. There you won't have any much worry of having your funds blocked due to suspicious transactions.

Monero is fantastic, it really is, but just one thing to note from a "Flagging" perspective. When you receive or send Bitcoin coins from a service such as xmr.to or MorphToken, this is known. It is most definitely known which coins are emitted from these services.

It is so known about coins emitted from these services, that you frequently subsequently receive Transactions to outgoing addresses advertising stuff from other services, with the advertised services themselves being encoded in Bitcoin Eater Addresses at the very top of the Outgoing UTXO list. The rest of the Outputs include loads of other users of the mixing service - and you're all grouped together.

I guess as all the service users get a few satoshis each, every cloud has a silver lining.

[mk4]

Personally, while I do mix/coinjoin some of my coins, I don't send the mixed/coinjoined coins to exchanges due to the slight risks of account locks(though I almost barely used custodial exchanges anyway).

Regardless though, don't just solely rely on mixing and coinjoins. Practice things like coin control[1] as well.

[1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=144331

[cryptoaddictchie]

I'm a privacy conscious person and would like to ask you whether I should still use mixers when depositing on an exchange or not.

Never tried yet mixer, so I am indeed interested with this. Is it gonna work on centralized exchanges too? I mean the deposited address on an exchange will be used but you are sending from your non custodial wallet. Ive heard that mixers usually do a none to none custodial wallets only or it depends on the services?

Aside from the benefit of securing your privacy, these service might be turn down in the future due to scammers using it to hide their traces.

[anonymixer]

Not deposit, but here's an example: https://twitter.com/PaxosGlobal/status/1222237095009320960

Yes. In this case, Ronald McHodled stated that he sent coins from an Exchange to a Wallet that had an older address format (e.g. P2PKH), from there he sent the coins to a separate Wasabi Wallet [1], presumably when he sent those coins, he would've sent them entirely (without change) which for all intents and purposes is considered to be an "internal transfer" of funds (from Wallet to Wallet).

From the Wasabi Wallet, he then performed and participated in a CoinJoin [2] which is very easy to flag - so it is known, with very basic chain-analysis that it's likely he is participating in CoinJoins with coins sent from the Exchange.

[1] https://twitter.com/RonaldMcHodled/status/1222207563854274561
[2] https://twitter.com/RonaldMcHodled/status/1222195787112673281

[shield132]

You know, blockchain is an open book of transactions. Do you have something to hide from anyone? If no, then there is no reason to use mixers. If there are certain things where others know your address but you don't want to know them where did you send your money or you don't want to anyone know it in overall, then you should use mixers. It will work unless someone preys on you. Even if someone preys, then do it smartly and mustn't depend only on mixers, there are also better altcoins for this. That's my answer

[AB de Royse777]

I am sharing my personal experience of handing my coins. Till now, I never had any bad experience with any exchange or gambling site, so I do not know how it tastes. In my case if I need to sell any coin then I do p2p, I am not a trading guy by the way.

However, having that complication in mind - after mixing my coins I take them in my wallet and do whatever I want to do. I am still not sure if this is an issue with them (exchanges). Do they create issue when you directly deposit something from the mixer or take them to a mixing address? Even if they do then how do they confirm that the fund is connected to mixer?

If no, then there is no reason to use mixers.

The reason for mixing is not hiding but to protect your privacy. There is a difference.

[anonymixer]

Even if they do then how do they confirm that the fund is connected to mixer?

By looking at coin history/lineage for deposits, as well as tracking where coins go once they've been sent from the exchanges to users, i.e. do the coins ultimately go through a CoinJoin mechanism further down the line?

Binance in Singapore, for instance froze a user's funds after they were connected with a Wasabi CoinJoin.

Companies like Chainalysis have perfected the art of tracking Bitcoin and Bitcoin users and employ a host of techniques of identifying (Wallets / Entities / Clusters) through all sorts of analysis, which includes co-spending of inputs, change address analysis, amount analysis and unique finger-print style analysis of wallets. This means they are able to identify Gambling website entities and who is who.

CoinJoin transactions, by their very nature, are very easy to identify, even including which type of CoinJoin service you even used.

When exchanges use and integrate these Chain Analysis services into their systems, user's simply get flagged and the exchange is then capable of becoming a bully asking for further KYC checks.

So far, this flagging and policing hasn't been massively prevalent on a wide-scale. But it's possible that it may increase in the future.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I'm a privacy conscious person and would like to ask you whether I should still use mixers

The real question here is whether you should still use centralized exchanges. Being interested in maintaining your privacy and using centralized exchanges are pretty much mutually exclusive these days. Centralized exchanges, particularly the most popular ones, work tirelessly to track their customers' deposits and withdrawals and de-anonymize everything that they can.

Do you have something to hide from anyone? If no, then there is no reason to use mixers.

Disagree. If you have nothing to hide from anyone, then I'm sure you'll have no problem sharing PDFs of your bank statements in this thread? Or perhaps you could share your internet browsing history? Or maybe the contents of your email accounts? You don't need to have something specific that you "want to hide" to be interested in maintaining a basic standard of privacy.

[Stedsm]

Do you have something to hide from anyone? If no, then there is no reason to use mixers.
--snip--

That's not true, those who are concerned about their privacy or get concerned at some point of time, would definitely go for mixers.

--snip--   
Do they create issue when you directly deposit something from the mixer or take them to a mixing address? Even if they do then how do they confirm that the fund is connected to mixer?

If they manage to know about our transaction coming from a mixing service, they'll definitely do something to stop us withdrawing it or just block our account right away. I'm scared of this.

Companies like Chainalysis have perfected the art of tracking Bitcoin and Bitcoin users and employ a host of techniques of identifying (Wallets / Entities / Clusters) through all sorts of analysis, which includes co-spending of inputs, change address analysis, amount analysis and unique finger-print style analysis of wallets. This means they are able to identify Gambling website entities and who is who.

--snip--

They're doing good, but only for these exchanges and it's totally against the protocol IMHO. I mean, what's the meaning of dealing in crypto when your transactions will be traced by these companies? It can be useful in hack cases but this is literally centralization when they are able to be the place where every single address can be traced and categorized. I mean, I see it as something negative but your views may be different on this.

[coupable]

CoinJoin transactions, by their very nature, are very easy to identify, even including which type of CoinJoin service you even used.

This brings to mind the question about using Chipmixer. We all know that most chain analysis failed to identify transactions from/to Chipmixer wallets. And with the system of Chipmixer where the user receive chips of private keys/addresses containing the desired amount which has been previously sent to that keys. In this case, isn't evident to send those funds to a personal address then to any centralised exchange ?

[Husires]

these mixers don't know where these coins will be going to, so it's only you who knows about your coins, your addresses and your transactions.

It is inaccurate, but the source who carried out the mixing process may know the potential of these currencies and may store and sell them to analytics companies, which will find your personal data if you use any central platform.

Do not trust mixers, nor the way they claim to scramble coins perfectly. Most of these mixers can be tracked and many of them sell personal data.

After mixing currencies, your coins may be tracked if you use explorers or if the network and devices you work with are unprotected.

[Stedsm]

Most of these mixers can be tracked and many of them sell personal data.

You may be correct but there was a thread "Breaking Mixing Services" where a user named Felix Maduakor stated that he was able to crack the details of transactions taking place in most of the mixers except Chipmixer. He claimed that he was unable to find the sources and said that he tried his best but couldn't crack any of the Chipmixer transactions till the date he was active here.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I mean, I see it as something negative but your views may be different on this.

It is categorically negative, and is against the very idea of bitcoin. Even if you ignore the massive privacy invasion and the attempt to de-anonymize every user of bitcoin, they track addresses and transactions so that the third parties they work for, mainly governments and centralized exchanges, can attempt to blacklist addresses or censor transactions. One of the main tenants of bitcoin is to be censorship resistant. This is what happens when you use and trust third parties such as centralized exchanges though. You no longer play by the network rules or consensus rules - you play by their rules. Your coins are theirs, and they can do anything they like with them.

We all know that most chain analysis failed to identify transactions from/to Chipmixer wallets.

I don't think it was that they failed to identify transactions coming from or to ChipMixer, but rather, when a transaction was identified as coming from ChipMixer they were unable to link it to any specific transaction being deposited to ChipMixer. This is contrast to most other mixers, which as Stedsm points out above, can have their deposit and withdrawal transactions linked fairly robustly.

[AB de Royse777]

If they manage to know about our transaction coming from a mixing service, they'll definitely do something to stop us withdrawing it or just block our account right away. I'm scared of this.

And just like that they will keep the coins? This is stealing imo.

The real question here is whether you should still use centralized exchanges. Being interested in maintaining your privacy and using centralized exchanges are pretty much mutually exclusive these days. Centralized exchanges, particularly the most popular ones, work tirelessly to track their customers' deposits and withdrawals and de-anonymize everything that they can.

I am not into trading but the people who are into trading they do not have many options but to use all those centralized exchanges. This seems a big problem for cryptocurrency users.

[shield132]

The reason for mixing is not hiding but to protect your privacy. There is a difference.

When you hide your transactions, it means you are protecting your privacy, i.e. hide traces = protecting privacy. What's the difference between them?

Do you have something to hide from anyone? If no, then there is no reason to use mixers.

Disagree. If you have nothing to hide from anyone, then I'm sure you'll have no problem sharing PDFs of your bank statements in this thread? Or perhaps you could share your internet browsing history? Or maybe the contents of your email accounts? You don't need to have something specific that you "want to hide" to be interested in maintaining a basic standard of privacy.

From your statement, it looks like on bitcoin transactions there is my full name written across it and there is a full and detailed explanation about my transactions. I'll give you my wallet and tell me when and what I bought via it.  I understand what you want to say but it's not really how you describe it. I have made a lot of bitcoin transactions via different wallets, everything is okay, have never had privacy problems, bitcoin alone seems enough for basic covers. That's why I think using of mixers is a waste of time and money if you don't really need an extra layer of protection.

[AB de Royse777]

When you hide your transactions, it means you are protecting your privacy, i.e. hide traces = protecting privacy. What's the difference between them?

I have not stolen anything or have not done anything illegal however I do not want to let others know that this is my coin, I want to keep everything unknown from others.

Are you saying this is wrong? Protecting my privacy is my basic right.

In your context you sound like something is wrong this is why nothing to hide.

You know, blockchain is an open book of transactions. Do you have something to hide from anyone? If no, then there is no reason to use mixers.

And clearly this is not the case.