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I really don't understand the persistence of the myth that Bitcoin, which is a public ledger, is not traceable.
by yosito 5y ago
I really don't understand the persistence of the myth that Bitcoin, which is a public ledger, is not traceable.
- toyg 5y agoProbably it's the mainstream confusion between anonymity and traceability, as well as between anonymity and pseudonymity. As soon as Joe Sixpack can't see something that resembles a name, they go "ah-ha, I'm anonymous! so nobody can see what I do!"... despite being wrong on both counts (wallets are pseudonyms, and as you say the ledger is public).
- acdha 5y agoIt’s a common talking point for Bitcoin salespeople. If you search the archives here you can see a decade of random people making that claim and either going silent or confabulating wildly when asked to support it — and HN has a relatively high average technical skill level. It took years for reporters to start questioning it, and that means there are a LOT of people whose understanding is shaped by what they heard in 2015.