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A 27-year-old busted the myth of Bitcoin's anonymity
- nabla9 3y agoIs there short term for the following phenomenon? Articles for the general public create a false impression. This false impression becomes pervasive in public discussion. Later some events make it self-evident that it is not true. New articles come busting this myth and giving the impression that those who relied on technology believed it.
- csixty4 3y agoI think it's called Nabla9's Observation?
- gfdgdf 3y agoGood, you've leveled up. Now explain, why would someone include an adult's age in the title.
- true_religion 3y ago27 years old is the oldest you can be while still being part of Gen Z. This is an article showing that the latest generation to hit adulthood is performing social good.
- Daviey 3y agoBut that answer isn't relevant to the content of the article. If the article was providing answer to the question if the latest generation are doing these things, then it would be helpful. At the moment, it appears odd to mention an adults age in the context of the material.
- Synaesthesia 3y ago[flagged]
- danielbln 3y ago[flagged]
- toenail 3y ago> Once, drug dealers and money launderers saw cryptocurrency as perfectly untraceable. Yeah, criminals may not be the smartest bunch. Everybody who understands how the bitcoin blockchain works knows transactions can be traced.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- gear54rus 3y agoNot with Monero or mixers. There's thankfully still a few ways to avoid government overreach when dealing with money.
- toenail 3y agoOf course, on an article about bitcoin, and a comment specifically about bitcoin, somebody has to spam monero.
- gear54rus 3y agoThere are mixers for most anything tho. Including bitcoin.
- benterix 3y agoCan you guarantee bitcoin mixers are safe?
- Synaesthesia 3y agoOut of curiosity, do you think it's more untraceable than BTC? And is it not at the entry and exit points that these things are traceable?
- faeriechangling 3y agoA article about the traceability of anonymity of bitcoin absolutely invites discussions of privacy coins which nominally make crypto untraceable and anonymous. Why is that unusual? Why is it so ridiculous for the highly relevant topic of Monero to be brought up?
- MattPalmer1086 3y agoI don't get it, who thought it was ever anonymous? Bitcoin has a public ledger by design. It has never been anonymous, it is only pseudonymous.
- unsupp0rted 3y ago"Crypto" sounds "cryptic", so lots of people think it's anonymous by virtue of accidental branding. Most people don't realize bitcoin has any ledger, public or otherwise. They think of it like cash transactions, but with virtual money. Basically people think Bitcoin is that which Monero actually is.
- geerlingguy 3y agoI've seen many instances of Bitcoin called "anonymous digital currency." I'm pretty sure outside the HN bubble, a lot of people thought one of the aspects that drew people into BTC was the fact it was 'untraceable' and 'just a bunch of random addresses', not requiring you to have a bank account, postal address, etc...
- Ar-Curunir 3y agoPlenty of folks who used it and didn’t grow the difference between anonymity and pseudonymity. Also note that the work mentioned in this article happened 10 years ago, when public knowledge and understanding of Bitcoin was very low.
- jacknews 3y agoI don't get why it's "A 27 year-old". How is that relevant? 27-year-olds should be at peak capability, if not productivity, especially in maths. If it said "A 9-year-old" that would be news-worthy, suggesting bitcoin anonymity was always a case of the emperors new clothes.
- pixxel 3y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39042564 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39042564
- hashim 3y agoBecause it's exceptional - most 27 year olds are not doing anything as impactful, if they've even figured out what to do at all.
- andirk 3y ago27 is basically the youngest age a person can be a medical doctor, and a couple years out of finishing a Ph.D. It's no prodigy at all.
- johngossman 3y agoThis reminds me very much of an excerpt from a Michael Lewis book. A complex topic boiled down into simple analogies accessible for laypersons and personalized with character details: a childhood of odd obsessions, hints of precociousness, a good but not superstar academic career, brushing up against the more famous. And like Lewis (I enjoy his writing), breathless, and, if you actually know the subject, so simplified and over dramatic to be misleading. Not even wrong. I’m sure the book from which this is excerpted is full of fun stories and quirky characters. In the case of the “27-year old”, she’s interested in puzzles and language at a young age, which turns into studying cryptography. To the muggles, this all probably seems eccentric and obsessive, but to the average HN reader, not particularly strange. Similarly, describing her activities as “one of the strangest, most hyperactive Bitcoin users in the world” is dramatic, but undercut by “In all, Meiklejohn carried out 344 cryptocurrency transactions over the course of a few weeks.” Not criticizing Meiklejohn, whose work is clever and interesting, or the author, who is writing to his audience, but I think I will pass on the book.
- johngossman 3y agoHa! Went to the Amazon page for the book and the blurb starts with an endorsement by Michael Lewis.
- faeriechangling 3y agoWhat a preposterously stupid title and premise for an article. Nobody with a clue thought crypto was anonymous to begin with. It's a public ledger, it's a hyper transparent technology, it's almost the polar opposite of anonymous and untraceable. If this article, more honestly said "a 27 year old developed a technique for tracing and de-anonymizing crypto" the article would make more sense.
- m3kw9 3y agoIt could be anonymous till you cash out
- ramraj07 3y agoYour definition of cash out needs to include not ever paying for anything else even in btc.
- hashim 3y agoWhether you consider them to have a clue or not, many (if not most) people believe crypto to be anonymous, likely due to its disproportionate popularity with criminals and cybercriminals. Ransomware always points to a Bitcoin wallet, not bank details.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]