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The anonymity aspect of bitcoin has always been overplayed. It's possible to be anonymous, but you'd have to work at it. And the transactions themselves are in
by waterlesscloud 13y ago
The anonymity aspect of bitcoin has always been overplayed. It's possible to be anonymous, but you'd have to work at it. And the transactions themselves are in the public record forever, so you've got to never slip up, even years later. Good luck.
The most interesting news today was the interview by American Banker with the head of FinCen. The questions are pretty probing, and they get some interesting answers.
http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/178_104/fincen-chief-q-and-a-what-we-expect-from-digital-currency-firms-1059485-1.html?zkPrintable=1&nopagination=1 http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/178_104/fincen-chief-q-...
- deoxxa 13y agoI've always found that interesting. Sometimes you look at a dollar and think "where has this been?" - with bitcoin you can answer that question as far back as "who created this money" (to various degrees of pleasure or dismay.)
- sliverstorm 13y agoBut a bitcoin is completely abstract. It hasn't been anywhere, the way a dollar has.
- brazzy 13y agoIn most cases the question makes no sense, as bitcoins do not have identity.
- stopcyring 13y agobitcoin laundering / zerocoin solve that.
- jlgreco 13y agoCan zerocoin actually be used at this point? Last I heard it wasn't anything more than a proposal yet.
- verroq 13y agoThen you are placing trust on the laundary on not selling you out.
- throwaway2048 13y agoor stealing your bitcoins
- Drakim 13y agoExactly. All a government would need to do is set up a laundry service with the lowest fees and they would be able to track and map a lot of juicy bitcoin usage.
- stopcyring 13y agostart your own laundry. use several laundries.
- dustcoin 13y agoBitcoin itself can be used anonymously if one is careful. However, there should never had been any expectation of anonymity when exchanging for another currency that is not anonymous, like a USD bank transfer.
- sliverstorm 13y agoMuch like Tor; the weakest link is when you enter or exit.
- nwh 13y agoThe entry to Tor is never really an issue, at that point the data is several layers of encryption deep. You are right in that exits are a problem though, unless the target is a a hidden service.
- haakon 13y agoExit nodes aren't really a problem either, if you realize that Tor's purpose is to protect your anonymity. An exit node may see your traffic, but can't see where it comes from, thus protecting your anonymity. If you need confidentiality in addition, you need to use tools designed for that (such as SSL).