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Appreciate the help! It started syncing faster after it got down to a year, WAY faster. Turns out I did transfer it correctly. I'd be more concerned about the beta status of multibit if I was managing a business accepting BTC or used it often or used large sums. I've got 40$ so I'll risk it, I just want to get rid of 26GB+ of blockchain! Luckily I just found my 2TB drive I bought, but it's not installed yet!
Its not that Multibit is beta or in a test phase, its just that there will be a new version of Multibit (HD) soon and they are not compatible. Multibit is still a good wallet.
Quick question: I typed my balance into google (currency conversion) and it pulled up some site indexing the blockchain, does this blockchain contain the private IP address of every transaction ever made with bitcoin?
Google probably asks blockchain.info and no the blockchain (not the same as the site) does not safe IP addresses. Even the IP addresses on blockchain.info are not from the person that initialy send the Transaction (TX). Which is almost impossible to detect anyway, since you are usually connected to 8 peers and none of them knows that the TX is from you. Your bitcoin core is constantly relaying transactions for others through the network. Your TX is indistinguishable from TX by others.
The ip address listed with the quantity was not my IP address (it wasn't even a US address) so I don't think it has anything to do with me, it just got me asking questions. I know BTC is a cryptocurrency, but this is in reference to how it authenticates the transactions as legitimate, and nothing to do with securing your transactions from prying eyes correct? I'm right in assuming bitcoin is in no way private?
Its just the IP that relayed the TX to blockchain.info first, which is basically a random node. Every transaction is public, that is correct. On the other hand almost noone knows who a certain address belongs to. Thats why Bitcoin is called pseudonymus not anonymus. Similar to Mail addresses. I can send a mail to
xyz@whatever.com and I know it will
allways usually end up with the same person, but I have no idea who that person actually is unless I get these information from other sources. Mail however is usually used in a different way and people write their names at the end.
I know bitcoin has many legitimate uses but it also is notoriously connected to some less than legal transactions, are people not somehow permanently linking themselves to such transactions? I'm not using btc for this purpose so I'm not particularly concerned but I know people online who do. Is this mitigated by the constant generation of different wallet addresses? Is any personally identifiable information inextricably linking two parties generated every transaction?
To generate a new address for each time you receive bitcoins has a different reason IMHO. It makes it harder for someone else to know how much bitcoin I own. E.g. I have a bitcoin address I give to someone. That someone can check the balance on any blockchain explorer and thus known how much bitcoin I currently own and how much I owned in the past. When I just make a new one, the person knows nothing about my wealth.
Addresses can get linked. E.g. when you spend bitcoin from address A and B and C at the same time in a single transaction it is usually assumed that these addresses are controlled by the same person.
A Transaction contains very little information [1] none I would consider personal. Its basically just a list of inputs (former transactions you recieved) and outputs (spendable by someone else or yourself once confirmed).
It's hard to wrap my mind around, BTC/cryptocurrency is such a novel thing. It's hard to imagine if your dollar bill had a log file attached with the fingerprint of every person who ever held it! Maybe I'm completely misunderstanding what I was looking at
Yes. Its similar to a bill, but there are no fingerprints and the persoin receiving the bill does not see your face.
On the other hand bitcoin works completly different. In a sense each transaction takes the inputs, destroys them and makes new outputs. Like lumps of gold. You put them all in a pot (inputs) and melt them (creating the TX), from the molten gold you make new lumps (outputs) and give them to someone else or even yourself. Its just that noone can see a difference if you send a TX to me or to yourself. Unless you would use the address in my profile, but thats my fault for putting it there
Edit:
https://blockchain.info/ was the site, however if I type my public IP it doesn't list anything, nor does typing my ip address and bitcoin or any transaction amounts into google. What exactly does an IP address "relaying a transaction" mean?
See above, I answered while reading. (there is also a bit more about it below
)
Is this every transaction moving through the network or do particular nodes relay transactions?
Blockchain.info and other blockchain explorers should have all transactions known to the network. Every full node (like blockchain core) relays transactions to get them known by "everyone". If you make one with multibit you give them to a set of full nodes that do this for you.
I've read fairly thoroughly about the underlying method that btc uses and it still somewhat bewilders me. What is this relay business?
Its the way the transactions get to the miners. They spread through the network allmost instantly. You can make a test the next time you make a TX, wait before the last click to send it, open blockchain.info and see how long it takes. Usually its only a few seconds.
It's surprising to see 30,000$ transactions flying through! What are people buying cars in btc?
I think I read somewhere that people even buy houses with BTC.
lol I guess I never realized how extensively and in what large quantities btc is traded and spent. Edit2: man 100,000$ transactions! Are these single transactions? It says something like:
Inputs and Outputs
Total Input $ 48,383.90
Total Output $ 48,383.72
Fees $ 0.18
Estimated BTC Transacted $ 28.87
Why are there 5 figure outputs and inputs when 28 bucks is what is transacted?
When I click on the link (
https://blockchain.info/tx/f465928eeaeef0ac88cf35d036f46d8fe23a05f320c4290c8e4024b4ecceda15) there's a whole list of large figures broken down from that 100k figure, yet only one of them is the 28$ one.
Nice one. Very big TX. On the left side are the inputs and on the right side are the outputs. This means either that all the addresses on the left are from the same person or that its a "shared coin" transaction. Its a method that helps to further obfuscate which TX come from which person.
The way a TX works every input has to be spend entirely. I never really understood what bc.i says with "Estimated BTC Transacted". The TX transfers >135 BTC from a set of inputs to a set of newly generated outputs. If you click on "Scripts & coinbase" you can even see which outputs are allready spend.
One other thing, a quick look shows transaction fees spike when market capitalization plunges - is this people dumping btc so more transactions are carried out? Also when it lists transactions fees (.04$ by default, right? but you can make it higher for quicker transactions or something?) so the daily transaction fees/.04$ gives you the bare minimum of transactions?
Usual fees are 0.0001 per KByte. The size (in byte) of the TX depends on the amount of inputs and outputs. It makes no sense to pay an extra fee except in bordercases. If you pay the proper fee your TX will be confirmed with the next block. Just because you pay double does not make the miners mine the next block faster. They mine as fast as they can allready and mining is esentially random. You cant say in advance when you will find a block. If the price is low/falling people tend to move more coins around because they panic sell or buy for cheaps.
[1]
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transaction
