Wasabi or Samourai ?

[Bitcoiner2023]

I've spoken at length about why no one should ever use Wasabi so I won't repeat all that here. Suffice to say, they directly fund blockchain analysis, they are anti-privacy, pro-surveillance, and pro-censorship. If you want privacy, Wasabi is the last place you should look.

There are two main much better coinjoin implementations you can use, either Whirlpool or JoinMarket. Whirlpool is accessible via Samourai and Sparrow wallets, and JoinMarket from their own software here: https://github.com/JoinMarket-Org/joinmarket-clientserver

How do the big whales do it?
I don't think they mix their millions with CoinJoin.

Some do. There is currently 8,300 BTC of UTXOs on Whirlpool. Lots more use centralized mixers instead.

Do you think it would be better if I swap my ETH to btc via Cross Chain Swap?

Or switch ETH to BTC on Central Exchange and then CoinJoin/Whirlpool?

[1714308301]

1714308301

[AprilioMP]

Which one would you recommend more?

Permission to follow and listen to all the responses from great people in the forum. I have not used these two types of wallets. Later I got information that people are concerned about the privacy of wasabi.
I also found information that wasabi and samourai had clashes because of the zero transaction feature.

[FinneysTrueVision]

Although what other colleagues said is correct, I'm still using Wasabi. I would keep sending satoshis even without coinjoin, if it wasn't for the reason that, sometimes, I don't want the receiver to know my identity in the forum or the balance I hold in my wallet. So, for me, the level of privacy Wasabi provides is enough.

Of course, I'm also reticent of chain analysis companies, and I might reconsider my preference for Wasabi, but as long as data is only leaked in case of criminal offence (at least so far), I'm in no hurry to change wallet provider because, although I'm pro-privacy, I'm of course against money-laundering.

I only report my own experience, and I'm not an expert, so please take everything I said with a pinch of salt.

I'm not a fan of blockchain analysis but I've also been using Wasabi instead. I only mix UTXOs smaller than 0.01 to avoid the coordinator fee. The dealbreaker with Samourai for me is that user xpubs are sent to their servers. Even if you are using your own node you will still be coinjoining with users who aren't and whose entire transaction history is known by Samourai, thereby degrading your own privacy.

[o_e_l_e_o]

but as long as data is only leaked in case of criminal offence (at least so far)

I'm not sure where you got that information from. Wasabi feed every single UTXO which attempts to coinjoin, regardless of criminality or not, directly to a blockchain analysis company for analysis and surveillance, with that data then stored, shared, and sold to other third parties.

Or switch ETH to BTC on Central Exchange and then CoinJoin/Whirlpool?

What are you trying to achieve? Do have KYCed bitcoin which would want to unlink from your real identity? Are you trying to mix some other altcoin?

Even if you are using your own node you will still be coinjoining with users who aren't and whose entire transaction history is known by Samourai, thereby degrading your own privacy.

So just leave your coins for longer for unlimited free remixes, and you will certainly mix with other users running their own node. Or use JoinMarket instead. There is literally no reason to ever subject yourself to blockchain analysis (and pay for the privilege!) by using Wasabi.

[Bitcoiner2023]

What are you trying to achieve? Do have KYCed bitcoin which would want to unlink from your real identity? Are you trying to mix some other altcoin?

No, I don't have any KYC Bitcoins, I have accumulated Ethereum for years and now I want to keep my assets safe with Bitcoin.

The problem is, there is a lot over the last few years and Bisq / Hodl Hodl  liquidity is to low and CoinJoin / Whirlpool / just takes too long.

So what would be better?
Send everything to Binance switch it to BTC and then CoinJoin even if it takes a long time...

Or better decentralized cross chain swap / bridge

[Coyster]

No, I don't have any KYC Bitcoins, I have accumulated Ethereum for years and now I want to keep my assets safe with Bitcoin.

The problem is, there is a lot over the last few years and Bisq / Hodl Hodl  liquidity is to low and CoinJoin / Whirlpool / just takes too long.

So what would be better?
Send everything to Binance switch it to BTC and then CoinJoin even if it takes a long time...

Or better decentralized cross chain swap / bridge

If you are concerned about your privacy, you'd not send them to Binance in order to swap it to Bitcoin, because even after swapping and using CoinJoin, Binance will still have the logs pertaining to your transaction, thus i don't think you should do it that way.

There are quite a lot of centralized exchanges feigning to be decentralized, thus you have to be careful to avoid them, for privacy you may send the ETH to Binance and then sell it for fiat, and then use fiat to buy Bitcoin in Bisq, or you can set your own order in Bisq for an ETH to Bitcoin trade.

[FinneysTrueVision]

There is literally no reason to ever subject yourself to blockchain analysis (and pay for the privilege!) by using Wasabi.

Blockchain surveillance companies, including Samourai's own closed source chain analysis, don't care if you want to be subjected to it or not. They are already analyzing coinjoin participants. The coordinator fee, which is where Wasabi's funds for blockchain analysis come from, can be entirely avoided.

So just leave your coins for longer for unlimited free remixes, and you will certainly mix with other users running their own node.

Waiting for weeks to use your coins is impractical. How many of those users running their own node were using Samourai when they would still collect your xpub and the trusted node feature was only for broadcasting transactions? How many of those users will compromise other participants privacy by consolidating their toxic change due to the UTXO's being below the minimum amount accepted into whirlpool?

Or use JoinMarket instead.

I've always recommended Joinmarket over Whirlpool and Wasabi. Fewer dumb ways to leak your privacy but there are other tradeoffs and isn't the ideal service for inexperienced users.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Send everything to Binance switch it to BTC and then CoinJoin even if it takes a long time...

Or better decentralized cross chain swap / bridge

Well, it depends. Is your ETH already KYCed and linked to your identity? If it is, then sending it to a centralized exchange and swapping it for KYCed bitcoin won't make your privacy any worse (assuming you are happy with the security risk of sending your coins to a centralized exchange). From there you will need to mix your bitcoin using either coinjoin or a mixer.

If your ETH was all purchased peer to peer and not linked to your KYC, then swapping it on a centralized exchange puts you back to square one. You can still do this and then mix it as above, or you can trade it peer to peer and just be patient while you wait on enough liquidity to swap it all.

I've always recommended Joinmarket over Whirlpool and Wasabi. Fewer dumb ways to leak your privacy but there are other tradeoffs and isn't the ideal service for inexperienced users.

Yeah, this is the biggest problem with JoinMarket - it isn't just plug and play like Samourai or Sparrow.

[RickDeckard]

I've always recommended Joinmarket over Whirlpool and Wasabi. Fewer dumb ways to leak your privacy but there are other tradeoffs and isn't the ideal service for inexperienced users.

Yeah, this is the biggest problem with JoinMarket - it isn't just plug and play like Samourai or Sparrow.

@FinneysTrueVision: I also wasn't aware of this, but in a recent discussion from apogio[1] I found out about JAM[1][3] which is a web interface for JoinMarket that tries to be more user friendly for less technical advanced users. While I'm still using JoinMarket, JAM is looking rather good and I might give it a shot later when it leaves beta.
[1]https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5459335
[2]https://github.com/joinmarket-webui/jam
[3]https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5459335.msg62538568#msg62538568

[Bitcoiner2023]

If your ETH was all purchased peer to peer and not linked to your KYC, then swapping it on a centralized exchange puts you back to square one. You can still do this and then mix it as above, or you can trade it peer to peer and just be patient while you wait on enough liquidity to swap it all.

Is there anything against Decentralized Cross Chain Swap or Bridge?
Or can I use something like THORChain?

[o_e_l_e_o]

I also wasn't aware of this, but in a recent discussion from apogio[1] I found out about JAM[1][3] which is a web interface for JoinMarket that tries to be more user friendly for less technical advanced users.

I still haven't got round to trying Jam because I have no need to given I've been running JoinMarket with no issues for years, but my understanding is that it still is not average user friendly in the same way that Samourai or Sparrow is. If you aren't running Umbrel, Raspiblitz, or similar (which average users aren't), then the manual installation is still too complicated.

For example: https://jamdocs.org/software/installation/#with-docker-image

There is a big knowledge difference required between these instructions and running a simple app.

Is there anything against Decentralized Cross Chain Swap or Bridge?
Or can I use something like THORChain?

If privacy is your goal, you will achieve absolute nothing doing this. Everything done via THORChain is fully public and traceable by anyone. THORChain even admit this themselves:

THORChain is not a mixer and does not give privacy. In fact, it takes it all away. Do not conflate the two functions.

[dkbit98]

Do you think it would be better if I swap my ETH to btc via Cross Chain Swap?

Or switch ETH to BTC on Central Exchange and then CoinJoin/Whirlpool?

It would be best if you could swap etherium to monero and than monero to Bitcoin, you can even use decentralized exchange Bisq for that.
That way you won't have to use any centralized exchanges or CoinJoin/Whirlpool, but you can still do it later if you want.
In theory atomic swaps should also work fine for swapping eth-xmr-btc.

Is there anything against Decentralized Cross Chain Swap or Bridge?

Atomic Swap, AtomicDEX (now renamed to Komodo Wallet).

[BlackHatCoiner]

I've always recommended Joinmarket over Whirlpool and Wasabi. Fewer dumb ways to leak your privacy but there are other tradeoffs and isn't the ideal service for inexperienced users.

Wasabi is inferior in privacy than Joinmarket (for obvious reasons), but speaking out of experience with Joinmarket, I've got to mention these two big downsides:

• Expensive for market takers. The TL;DR of Joinmarket, is that there are always some makers online, so when a user who isn't a whale wants to mix their coins, they don't have to wait, but they have to pay the mining fee for all the makers' inputs. Makers don't pay their inputs, takers do, and when there are 9 to 12 inputs, few of which are theirs, then the cost of coinjoining can become really high.
• Not exclusive to Joinmarket, but it isn't realistic to be a market maker if you don't own lots of money. Software does include a default of 12.5% chance of ignoring fidelity bonds, but it's really improbable to be picked if you're not going to see this seriously.

I have also talked about this in here: https://github.com/JoinMarket-Org/joinmarket-clientserver/issues/1506

[YUriy1991]

What are you trying to achieve? Do have KYCed bitcoin which would want to unlink from your real identity? Are you trying to mix some other altcoin?

No, I don't have any KYC Bitcoins, I have accumulated Ethereum for years and now I want to keep my assets safe with Bitcoin.

The problem is, there is a lot over the last few years and Bisq / Hodl Hodl  liquidity is to low and CoinJoin / Whirlpool / just takes too long.

So what would be better?
Send everything to Binance switch it to BTC and then CoinJoin even if it takes a long time...

Or better decentralized cross chain swap / bridge

If the OP wants to secure your assets to Bitcoin I think Binance and CoinJoin could be better choices in my opinion. However, the Relevant Decision to choose to use Binance and CoinJoin or choose a decentralized cross-chain swap/bridge is up to the user's priorities. Btw, If security and privacy are paramount, a decentralized, cross-chain solution may be preferable. the important thing is we are familiar with it.

[Jon_Hodl]

I would recommend Samourai because it offers superior privacy by making every UTXO the same size, offers a larger anon set via endless remixes, and does not reuse addresses. Samourai is also currently in the process of decentralizing their coordinator so that users can select their own coordinator (not just Samourai) and even offer coordinator services to others which will enable anyone to generate revenue from coordinating CoinJoin txs. With enough coordinators competing, we could potentially see lower CoinJoin fees.

I would also like to point out that if you are using either method but you are not running your own node, you are trusting both your wallet as well as the CoinJoin coordinator with your xPub key which is completely antithetical to the whole idea of increased privacy via CoinJoin.

Not sure if you're interested but I actually wrote an article that is all about How To Use Bitcoin Anonymously that you might find useful if you are looking to increase the privacy of your bitcoin addresses and on-chain transactions.

[Hamza2424]

Which one would you recommend more?

Hmm, on the spot I would prefer the Samourai, Reason reported by most of the users above. Haha, also I am having a look at how my fellows are promoting their personal favorite mixers. As Op seems like to the space I would recommend you to better focus on securing the funds rather than making them more private, haha, Privacy comes later to security.

Mixers are Privacy solutions if you want to service in the crypto market avoiding any sort of law enforcement on your asset Mixers can support you in achieving a 1 step higher Privacy to avoid such situations.


Haha after reading a few more posts from Op seems like he really needs the Mixer haha because he is asking for the cross-chain swap vs Centralized exchange deposit and than mixing the coins by some service. Buddy is showing his concern for privacy and I found myself wrong on the above comment of Privacy.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Samourai is also currently in the process of decentralizing their coordinator so that users can select their own coordinator (not just Samourai) and even offer coordinator services to others which will enable anyone to generate revenue from coordinating CoinJoin txs.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to this. They already have a prototype running on testnet apparently: https://nitter.nl/SamouraiDev/status/1679092893171040256#m

Would be great to run your own coordinator over the same liquidity pool, kind of like how Joinmarket works. I wonder if their fee model will change if you are running your own coordinator?

[Bitcoiner2023]

I've spoken at length about why no one should ever use Wasabi so I won't repeat all that here. Suffice to say, they directly fund blockchain analysis, they are anti-privacy, pro-surveillance, and pro-censorship. If you want privacy, Wasabi is the last place you should look.

Would it make a difference if you connect Wasabi to your own node?
Or does the violation of privacy still exist?

[BlackHatCoiner]

Would it make a difference if you connect Wasabi to your own node?

Probably, yes. It's beyond the skill set of the average Wasabi user to disconnect from the default coordinator and connect to yours. But, maybe it isn't that much difficult, I haven't tried. I only know they aren't heading into that direction, so why using their software?

Or does the violation of privacy still exist?

They claim that blacklisting doesn't exist if you connect to your own coordinator. However, considering the numerous lies and the fact that I haven't examined the source code, I'm taking that statement with a grain of salt.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Would it make a difference if you connect Wasabi to your own node?

No difference. You can connect to your own node, but you will still be using their coordinator, which will be handing all your UTXOs and the fees you pay directly to blockchain analysis companies.

Probably, yes. It's beyond the skill set of the average Wasabi user to disconnect from the default coordinator and connect to yours.

Running your own coordinator is a different question to connecting to your own node. But given there are zero third party coordinators with any volume, and given both JoinMarket and Whirlpool both have good volume, then as you say - why would anyone bother?