15% Discount on the Trezor Model T

[Pmalek]

Seems that no one mentioned this here, so here it goes.

To mark this sad day of Trezor joining forces with Wasabi and Chainanalysis, the company has decided to offer a 15% discount on Trezor Model T purchases.
The price will be discounted from 19 - 26 April 2023. Instead of $219, the Trezor T now costs $186.

There is no need to enter any discount code. The new price automatically applies to all Trezor T orders.

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[RickDeckard]

To mark this sad day of Trezor joining forces with Wasabi and Chainanalysis, the company has decided to offer a 15% discount on Trezor Model T purchases.
The price will be discounted from 19 - 26 April 2023. Instead of $219, the Trezor T now costs $186.

Although nothing is mentioned here[1], if you scroll deep enough on the blog post detailing the process[2] we eventually find zkSNACKs:

The coinjoin process uses a coordinator, run by zkSNACKs, which is in charge of selecting which pieces of bitcoin (UTXOs) to include in a transaction and ensuring there is enough liquidity for the coinjoin to provide the required level of privacy.

I'm a bit surprised that Trezor decided to follow Wasabi rule. I wonder what's behind this decision though - I'm sure that they know that a good percentage of their clients are fully aware of their privacy and wouldn't want to use zkSNACKs as a coordinator, so I wonder the reasons that's behind this move.

One is still free to never touch the Coinjoin process within Trezor Suite, but it is still a doubtful move for sure...
[1]https://trezor.io/learn/a/coinjoin-in-trezor-suite
[2]https://blog.trezor.io/coinjoin-privacy-for-bitcoin-11aaf291f23

[o_e_l_e_o]

Trezor are now a malicious entity who fund mass surveillance and blockchain analysis and collude with the government to censor their users. I wouldn't buy one of their devices if it was 100% off.

[m2017]

Trezor are now a malicious entity who fund mass surveillance and blockchain analysis and collude with the government to censor their users. I wouldn't buy one of their devices if it was 100% off.

It seems that this is one of the stages of development of any company that produces such devices.

When a device manufacturer is just starting out, the firm is not of interest to governments. But as soon as the company grows, becomes large and gains influence in its markets, then the regulator remembers them. After all, this is a tasty morsel: by that time, the company manages to accumulate big data about users (although they claim that they don't do this). Governments will always find a way to get hardware wallet manufactures to share this information with them. It is naive to think that the regulator will miss such a good opportunity.

If privacy is needed, then it is better to use the devices of small companies until they come into the field of vision of big brother.

It's time for the crypto community to think about creating their own open source HW devices that can be assembled like a kit (hardware and software separately).

Discounts, of course, are good, but the changes pushed under this pretext don't bode well for users. Another big firm screwed up?

[hugeblack]

Is the decline in sales the motive behind such a trend, or have the legislative regulations become more stringent?

Hardware wallets are used for those who want to store several cryptocurrencies, not just bitcoins, as it is easy to manage cold storage for bitcoins, and it is difficult or almost impossible to do so for a variety of cryptocurrencies, so I do not think that any privacy-related update will not affect the sales rate.

Hopefully it's just a drop in sales and not legal issues because in the future legal issues may force them to put some back doors to recover stolen coins.

[Pmalek]

It's time for the crypto community to think about creating their own open source HW devices that can be assembled like a kit (hardware and software separately).

There are already a few hardware wallets and signing devices that you can assemble yourself. Maybe you are aware of dkbit98's thread with open-source HWs. At the bottom of the OP, you can find links to several such devices. The biggest problem is with the individual hardware components that aren't always open-source. You can also 3D-print your own cases.

DIY Open Source Hardware wallets (signing devices) (only for advanced users):

• Bowser DIY Wallet ^r
• Trezor DIY Wallet
• PiTrezor DIY Wallet ^r
• Specter DIY Wallet ^r
• SeedSigner DIY Wallet ^sd
• Krux DIY Wallet ^{sd r}

[Hispo]

Good morning to all of you.
I indeed noticed that Trezor upgraded their Software and released a discount (together with the Coinjoin for Model T). However, I am not aware of the context behind the polemic of the zkSNACKs provider.

I initially thought Satoshilabs would go with their own version of Coinjoin and do not take the lead of other wallets like Wasabi.
It would be terrible of Trezor finally got pressured enough by the men in black and threatened into accepting to infiltrate their own products with surveillance code/addons.

Would someone please give me context or sources about why this provider is malicious and why this Coinjoin is not to be trusted? Thank you. 

[o_e_l_e_o]

Would someone please give me context or sources about why this provider is malicious and why this Coinjoin is not to be trusted? Thank you.  

I've explained here about some of the inherent problems with Wasabi coinjoins: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5419000.msg61220171#msg61220171

However, even if Wasabi coinjoins did not have these problems which the devs try to sweep under the rug, every time someone tries to coinjoin some of their coins, Wasabi pay a blockchain analysis company for information about those coins, and will then censor the coins in question if they don't like what they find. We don't know which blockchain analysis companies they use because they keep it secret, and we don't know what their criteria are for censoring users. Their terms of service also make it clear that they will not tell you why you are being censored. By doing this, Wasabi are surveilling all of their users and enforcing blacklists drawn up by governments and other unknown authorities and third parties regarding who is and is not allowed to coinjoin their coins.

I certainly don't want my wallet asking blockchain analysis companies to investigate my coins, and I certainly don't then want my wallet to then refuse to let me use my coins in the way I want based on secret criteria handed down from secret third parties. Not to mention that the fee you pay by using Wasabi's coinjoin is directly funding this blockchain analysis surveillance. By implementing Wasabi's coinjoin, Trezor are directly supporting all of this. All the UTXOs in your Trezor wallet that you try to coinjoin will be investigated by blockchain analysis, you will be censored if they don't like what they see, and you are paying a fee for this privilege of being spied on and censored.

I consider directly funding mass surveillance and enforcing government blacklists to be actively malicious behavior, and antithetical to the very concept of bitcoin. I will never suggest anyone ever buys another Trezor product again.

[RickDeckard]

I consider directly funding mass surveillance and enforcing government blacklists to be actively malicious behavior, and antithetical to the very concept of bitcoin. I will never suggest anyone ever buys another Trezor product again.

If society were to apply the same concept/ideology to the fiat system, I wonder how many would see their bank accounts being blocked due to the reasons that somewhere deep in the transaction chain that money was tied to "illicit activities" or was suspected to have been associated with illicit activities. No entity should have domain/control from our own coins and any attempt to have that in effect is an attack to an individual sovereign and privacy. I will sadly also not be able to keep recommending Trezor products to my closer circle (and within bitcointalk forums) due to this greedy decision.

[o_e_l_e_o]

If society were to apply the same concept/ideology to the fiat system, I wonder how many would see their bank accounts being blocked due to the reasons that somewhere deep in the transaction chain that money was tied to "illicit activities" or was suspected to have been associated with illicit activities.

Absolutely. As I've said many times before, it's only a matter of time before every satoshi in active circulation can be linked to some malicious activity somewhere in its past. It is already a completely arbitrary decision on behalf of blockchain analysis firms as to how far back they choose to look, and therefore how likely Wasabi are to censor perfectly innocent users.

No entity should have domain/control from our own coins and any attempt to have that in effect is an attack to an individual sovereign and privacy.

QFT.

[n0nce]

Wow, this is really a sad day. I used to like recommending the 'Model One' to people with very tight budget. Even though it has no secure element, I found it good enough for most users and it fulfilled my 'open source hardware & software' requirements.

I'll stick to recommending people to save up for a Foundation Passport for now then, and potentially look more into DIY solutions as well. How about trying to build a Passport ourselves using the published OSHW files? I reckon that would be a fun project.
In my experience, building a new device from scratch (like the current DIY wallets) has a higher potential to fail / stall since without funding there eventually comes a time when nobody will continue working on the codebase and update the device to new standards and such.

[Lucius]

Absolutely. As I've said many times before, it's only a matter of time before every satoshi in active circulation can be linked to some malicious activity somewhere in its past. It is already a completely arbitrary decision on behalf of blockchain analysis firms as to how far back they choose to look, and therefore how likely Wasabi are to censor perfectly innocent users.

As absurd as this method may seem, I have no doubt that it will be used in the fight against Bitcoin when some other agendas no longer make sense. All coins will be marked as tainted at some point, and we know who will wash them and return them to the market - the same ones who do it today. Maybe they could do the same with their currency, because some say that most US dollar bills have traces of some drug on them, so why not withdraw all the dirty bills and clean them...

[o_e_l_e_o]

so why not withdraw all the dirty bills and clean them...

Even better than that, why not hand over your dirty bitcoin to the government, and the government will hand you back the same value in squeaky clean CBDC! Perhaps Wasabi could implement this feature directly for any UTXO their blockchain analysis buddies tell them is "tainted".

[Medusah]

Very sad to see them partnering with zkSNACKs.  I don't own a Trezor, but I have recommended it to friends of mine who weren't technically experienced enough to setup a wallet themselves safely.  No Trezor, no Ledger.  What easy-to-use hardware wallet is left with good reputation, source code transparent and professional maintenance?

[o_e_l_e_o]

My current suggestions would be either Passport or Coldcard.

[Pmalek]

What easy-to-use hardware wallet is left with good reputation, source code transparent and professional maintenance?

My current suggestions would be either Passport or Coldcard.

Both Passport and the ColdCard might not fit everyone's interpretation of an easy-to-use hardware device. Passport is airgapped, requiring users to work with QR codes and camera scans. It's not difficult to learn, but is different if you have gotten used to the USB-connected Ledgers and Trezors.

Additionally, ColdCard isn't open-source. They have verifiable code, but nothing is released under an open-source license. I have said before that if I am an end-user interested in checking and verifying the code myself, ColdCard allows me to do that. So, that's ok. The reasons why they aren't open-source should be of secondary importance.   

[Medusah]

For anyone interested, this is their response:  https://forum.trezor.io/t/trezor-wasabi-cooperation-with-chainalysis/12224

We understand that preventing certain UTXOs from entering a coinjoin is a sensitive issue. Our ultimate goal in supporting coinjoin is to provide individual users with an easy-to-use privacy tool.

We do not expose any new coins to a chain analysis company; the coinjoin coordinator run by a third party simply receives an existing risk score about the UTXOs entering the coinjoin. When UTXOs known to be connected to serious criminal activities attempt to enter a coinjoin, the coordinator simply refuses them. Nothing else happens.

We cannot check individual users’ activity, track it, or report on it since coinjoin is enabled via Tor, the anonymization network, and we also use block filters.

There is more information on how coinjoin work in our blog post on the topic here, including further information on how the coinjoin coordinator selects the inputs.

We practically cannot track or report users. Trezor’s coinjoin account uses block filters to mask the user’s wallet addresses and Tor to mask the user’s IP address. The process is one-way - we only receive information, that has already existed anyway, about the risk score of UTXOs entering coinjoin. This information is used for accepting/denying UTXOs to coinjoin and it is not used in the future for any purpose. This applies just for the UTXOs used for coinjoin, not for any other users’ coins.

More or less the same crap Wasabi team answers back when get asked about this.

[o_e_l_e_o]

-snip-

If their ultimate goal was actually providing privacy, then they could have partnered with a coinjoin implementation which A) actually works and B) doesn't directly fund mass surveillance. Their ultimate goal is profit, and they don't give a crap about selling out their morals and their users to get there.

And don't believe the lie about "serious criminal activities". The Wasabi Terms of Service clearly state that you can be censored for any reason whatsoever and Wasabi won't tell you why.

[Lucius]

Even better than that, why not hand over your dirty bitcoin to the government, and the government will hand you back the same value in squeaky clean CBDC! Perhaps Wasabi could implement this feature directly for any UTXO their blockchain analysis buddies tell them is "tainted".

I hope they don't read this forum (of course they do), so such an idea will not occur to them - although I am convinced that the service of "washing tainted coins by the government/central bank" would not come for free, but with at least a 10% fee. When we think about it, maybe CEX will think of something similar, so when there is already a withdrawal/service fee, maybe they will add some kind of "clean your coins fee" which would actually be some kind of centralized coin mixer

[RickDeckard]

And don't believe the lie about "serious criminal activities". The Wasabi Terms of Service clearly state that you can be censored for any reason whatsoever and Wasabi won't tell you why.

While I'm sure no one doubts o_e_l_e_o words, and to show everyone how broken those Terms of Service are, here is the relevant paragraph within Wasabi Terms of Service[1]:

COIN FILTERING

    zkSNACKs Ltd. may execute illicit activity checking and control via a contracted third party solely in its CoinJoin coordination services. zkSNACKs Ltd. may suspend your UTXOs’ access to the CoinJoin services, with immediate effect for any reason - including but not limited to illicit or prohibited activities, applicable sanctions programs, or any crime or money-laundering activity - at its sole discretion and is under no obligation to disclose the details of its decision to take such action with you. In this case you are not permitted to use the relevant/high-risk bitcoin UTXO to reach the CoinJoin services.
    You acknowledge that zkSNACKs Ltd.'s decision to take certain actions, including suspending for any reason at our sole discretion, may be based on confidential criteria that are essential to zkSNACKs Ltd.'s risk management and security protocols. You agree that zkSNACKs Ltd. is under no obligation to disclose the details of its risk management and security procedures to you.
    Your access with the relevant bitcoin UTXOs to the CoinJoin services will be permanently suspended.

The concept of "coin tainting" is already pretty abnormal but the fact that they are able to suspend any UTXO's under "sole discretion" and not provide any kind of details about it really shows how obscure and danger this way of acting is towards the whole system. I can't imagine no other good reason to build this system but only to have a free tool to censor any kind of UTXO's that an entity so desires, without the need to disclosure anything more.

I'm still baffled how Trezor managed to side with the company (and implement other privacy shady operations in the last months), but I guess the only thing that I, as an individual, is able to do is stop promoting their products and advise people that are better options out there.
[1]https://raw.githubusercontent.com/zkSNACKs/WalletWasabi/master/WalletWasabi/Legal/Assets/LegalDocumentsWw2.txt