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And also Aztec Network, and Tornado Cash, and Zcash, and soon Starkware, and... I'm surprised so many people on Hacker News apparently still believe that you c

And also Aztec Network, and Tornado Cash, and Zcash, and soon Starkware, and... I'm surprised so many people on Hacker News apparently still believe that you can "see all transactions" on every blockchain. It really only takes some surface level research to find working, production blockchains/cryptocurrencies that use one of several types of cryptography to hide that data, plus if you're using a pseudonymous blockchain, non-custodial ways to "break the link" between wallets.

Lordarminius 5y ago
> I'm surprised so many people on Hacker News apparently still believe that you can "see all transactions" on every blockchain. Most have no knowledge of the state of the industry. Their opposition is based on knee jerk reactions.
input_sh 5y ago
Okay but like who cares? Are any of those even in the top 30 cryptocurrencies by market cap? Is anyone speaking about them in the context of Web3 or is it all ETH, XRP and maybe two more? From my blissfully uninformed mind, the only time these cryptocurrencies pop up is precisely this: as a counterargument to the popular ones, where you can see all the transactions. They're fringes even among the fringe that is cryptocurrencies.
- everfree 5y ago
  > Is anyone speaking about them in the context of Web3 or is it all ETH, XRP and maybe two more? Aztec Network, Tornado Cash, and Starkware all run on top of Ethereum... Aztec and Starkware are currently in the community spotlight because they're rollups or so-called "Layer 2s" that push the state of the art of Ethereum's tech (and the state of the art in zero knowledge cryptography, especially Starkware's CAIRO language and their EVM to zero knowledge proof circuit transpiler). Tornado Cash has over $4B in deposits, and for many is the go-to way to anonymize transactions on Ethereum. Ernst & Young released Baseline last year, a zero-knowledge cryptography toolkit for operating private data services on the public Ethereum network. The answer to "who cares" is basically the entire nascent industry, plus a handful of mathematicians and cryptographers - if you are paying attention.
- CuriousCosmic 5y ago
  A lot of these smaller networks are on top of or connected to top 10 chains. A number of the top 10 networks will eventually (~5-10 year time frame) get privacy preserving transactions however the space is still very much in development and it's a bit easier to reason about the network and what changes to make next when you can see what the users are doing. I know at the very least, IOG (the company currently leading Cardano development) is doing privacy preserving smart contracts research with the intent that it eventually becomes part of the protocol. There's a lot for Layer 1 protocols to accomplish as it is so the space is largely delegating privacy chain research/functionality to L2s for the time being.
  - withinboredom 5y ago
    I hear the word “eventually” associated with crypto, quite a bit. I’ve yet to see an “eventually” actually pan out before they run out of money or the value tanks so low nobody will mine it anymore. As an observer following all of this fairly closely, it feels remarkably like a scam.
    - dlubarov 5y ago
      Ethereum already has options for private payments, such as Aztec (https://zk.money/ https://zk.money/).
    - everfree 5y ago
      I find it telling that several currently live privacy networks were mentioned in this comment tree that you can use today, yet you still latch on to the word "eventually" and call the space a scam.
      - withinboredom 5y ago
        Maybe that was a bit unfair. Perhaps what I should say is that there is too much competition, such that no one can get the traction they need to truly accomplish their goals, with few exceptions.
- jiggunjer 5y ago
  Doesn't the lightning network used by btc allow obfuscation constructs?
  - jslove 5y ago
    yes with taproot that just went live. there is also bitcoin liquid which is hidden as well.
lottin 5y ago
Well, you have to see all transactions, in order to know the current balances on every wallet, in order to prevent double spending. This is, in fact, the whole principle on which blockchains operate.
- CuriousCosmic 5y ago
  There is no such requirement. The only requirement is that you be able to prove consistency and correctness of the ledger. The naive blockchain implementation needs transaction visibility but there isn't a hard requirement for it beyond that. Monero uses a system that at a high level is referred to as Ring Signatures (it's not too complicated but it's more than I want to get into at the moment). Zcash and other networks use zero knowledge non-interactive proofs to prove consistency/correctness. The major drawback of privacy preserving chains is that the transactions are expensive to compute due to all the maths that goes into maintaining that consistency without publicly leaking information. This isn't prohibitive for a desktop but a mobile phone will likely take a few minutes to build and send a transaction in the current environment (can be improved by HW acceleration or general HW improvements).
  - lottin 5y ago
    I've spent the last 30 minutes researching how ring signatures can be used to prevent double spending without revealing the spender's balance, and I've found nothing. Do you know where I can find the details?
    - everfree 5y ago
      Here's a short explanation video to get you started. The general idea is that multiple signers are used, such that an outside observer doesn't know which signer is the "real" one, but only knows that "at least one of them" is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHN_B_H_fCs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHN_B_H_fCs
    - dlubarov 5y ago
      There are a lot of variations, but in Zerocash-style schemes (which can be viewed as massive ring signatures), each note has an associated 'nullifier'. Spending a note involves revealing its nullifier, and for the transaction to be valid, the nullifier must not have been used before. A nullifier is derived deterministically from private account data, and zero-knowledge proofs are used to show that a nullifier was dervied correctly without revealing the private account data. For more detail I think this is a good explanation: https://electriccoin.co/blog/zcash-private-transactions/ https://electriccoin.co/blog/zcash-private-transactions/

Lordarminius 5y ago

> I'm surprised so many people on Hacker News apparently still believe that you can "see all transactions" on every blockchain. Most have no knowledge of the state of the industry. Their opposition is based on knee jerk reactions.

input_sh 5y ago

Okay but like who cares? Are any of those even in the top 30 cryptocurrencies by market cap? Is anyone speaking about them in the context of Web3 or is it all ETH, XRP and maybe two more? From my blissfully uninformed mind, the only time these cryptocurrencies pop up is precisely this: as a counterargument to the popular ones, where you can see all the transactions. They're fringes even among the fringe that is cryptocurrencies.

everfree 5y ago
> Is anyone speaking about them in the context of Web3 or is it all ETH, XRP and maybe two more? Aztec Network, Tornado Cash, and Starkware all run on top of Ethereum... Aztec and Starkware are currently in the community spotlight because they're rollups or so-called "Layer 2s" that push the state of the art of Ethereum's tech (and the state of the art in zero knowledge cryptography, especially Starkware's CAIRO language and their EVM to zero knowledge proof circuit transpiler). Tornado Cash has over $4B in deposits, and for many is the go-to way to anonymize transactions on Ethereum. Ernst & Young released Baseline last year, a zero-knowledge cryptography toolkit for operating private data services on the public Ethereum network. The answer to "who cares" is basically the entire nascent industry, plus a handful of mathematicians and cryptographers - if you are paying attention.
CuriousCosmic 5y ago
A lot of these smaller networks are on top of or connected to top 10 chains. A number of the top 10 networks will eventually (~5-10 year time frame) get privacy preserving transactions however the space is still very much in development and it's a bit easier to reason about the network and what changes to make next when you can see what the users are doing. I know at the very least, IOG (the company currently leading Cardano development) is doing privacy preserving smart contracts research with the intent that it eventually becomes part of the protocol. There's a lot for Layer 1 protocols to accomplish as it is so the space is largely delegating privacy chain research/functionality to L2s for the time being.
- withinboredom 5y ago
  I hear the word “eventually” associated with crypto, quite a bit. I’ve yet to see an “eventually” actually pan out before they run out of money or the value tanks so low nobody will mine it anymore. As an observer following all of this fairly closely, it feels remarkably like a scam.
  - dlubarov 5y ago
    Ethereum already has options for private payments, such as Aztec (https://zk.money/ https://zk.money/).
  - everfree 5y ago
    I find it telling that several currently live privacy networks were mentioned in this comment tree that you can use today, yet you still latch on to the word "eventually" and call the space a scam.
    - withinboredom 5y ago
      Maybe that was a bit unfair. Perhaps what I should say is that there is too much competition, such that no one can get the traction they need to truly accomplish their goals, with few exceptions.
jiggunjer 5y ago
Doesn't the lightning network used by btc allow obfuscation constructs?
- jslove 5y ago
  yes with taproot that just went live. there is also bitcoin liquid which is hidden as well.

lottin 5y ago

Well, you have to see all transactions, in order to know the current balances on every wallet, in order to prevent double spending. This is, in fact, the whole principle on which blockchains operate.

CuriousCosmic 5y ago
There is no such requirement. The only requirement is that you be able to prove consistency and correctness of the ledger. The naive blockchain implementation needs transaction visibility but there isn't a hard requirement for it beyond that. Monero uses a system that at a high level is referred to as Ring Signatures (it's not too complicated but it's more than I want to get into at the moment). Zcash and other networks use zero knowledge non-interactive proofs to prove consistency/correctness. The major drawback of privacy preserving chains is that the transactions are expensive to compute due to all the maths that goes into maintaining that consistency without publicly leaking information. This isn't prohibitive for a desktop but a mobile phone will likely take a few minutes to build and send a transaction in the current environment (can be improved by HW acceleration or general HW improvements).
- lottin 5y ago
  I've spent the last 30 minutes researching how ring signatures can be used to prevent double spending without revealing the spender's balance, and I've found nothing. Do you know where I can find the details?
  - everfree 5y ago
    Here's a short explanation video to get you started. The general idea is that multiple signers are used, such that an outside observer doesn't know which signer is the "real" one, but only knows that "at least one of them" is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHN_B_H_fCs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHN_B_H_fCs
  - dlubarov 5y ago
    There are a lot of variations, but in Zerocash-style schemes (which can be viewed as massive ring signatures), each note has an associated 'nullifier'. Spending a note involves revealing its nullifier, and for the transaction to be valid, the nullifier must not have been used before. A nullifier is derived deterministically from private account data, and zero-knowledge proofs are used to show that a nullifier was dervied correctly without revealing the private account data. For more detail I think this is a good explanation: https://electriccoin.co/blog/zcash-private-transactions/ https://electriccoin.co/blog/zcash-private-transactions/