De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR • Hacker News Board

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#51

Post by swores » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:20 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #46

sfjailbird wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't BTC privacy achievable these days with coinjoin, lightning network etc.? In that case no much reason for monero.

It still seems fantastical to me that lightning network is presented as "something running on BTC", when it is "something running completely separately, instead of BTC". Transactions on Lightning network are not transactions on BTC, and have none of the guarantees of BTC (and in fact have no reliable guarantees of no double spending). The only way to get BTC-like guarantees of no double-spending for Lightning network…

If what tsimionescu says about Lightning is wrong, can somebody kindly reply to them explaining why rather than just downvoting which doesn't help anyone. (Maybe there's a reason they were downvoted that isn't their being wrong, but I don't see what that would be.)

(And sorry for going against the guidelines and talking about downvotes, but I'm really just asking for someone to either confirm what they said is right or explain why it isn't, I'm not caring about the votes themselves.)

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#52

Post by jijijijij » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:26 PM UTC

welsandjeremy wrote: post #3

The recent ByBit hack and subsequent takedown of the exchange that was used to convert the USDT and BTC to Monero essentially proves that XMR is private from even western governments.

It's evidence at best.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#53

Post by password4321 » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:28 PM UTC

I don't have a link but I vaguely recall some criminal being tracked down because they cashed out the exact same value of Monero they received for their crime in a single transaction. I believe this falls under item 1 in the article but the reference link does not even discuss Monero.

I am interested in any references to tracking Monero in criminal court cases. So far it seems to be one of the most effective ways to "keep getting away with it".

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#54

Post by john_alan » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:39 PM UTC

I work in applied cryptography and XMR is my preferred cryptocurrency.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#55

Post by password4321 » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:41 PM UTC

What is the least amount of effort to setup a Monero address like a tip jar, deferring transfers and if necessary even checking the balance until setting up something more full-blown later?

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#56

Post by lawn » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:47 PM UTC

candiddevmike wrote: post #22

TarikHassan3 wrote: post #2

Great article, and I'm glad to see privacy being a focus in a cryptocurrency, but I would like to see some other sources that aren't also promoting the token. That said, I do think it's got the brightest future of any coin besides BTC for the very reason.

Preface this by saying I am not a fan of any cryptocurrency, but I really struggle to understand why Monero has a smaller market cap than BTC. It has to be inertia related right? Monero just seems like a fundamentally better piece of technology. Are there scaling issues with Monero, similar/worse than BTC?

> Are there scaling issues with Monero, similar/worse than BTC?

While there are scaling issues with BTC it's severely worsened by the fact that BTC had refused to scale on-chain.

Monero is technically much harder to scale but since it doesn't have the same self-imposed restriction it can handle more transactions than Bitcoin can.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#57

Post by tromp » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:53 PM UTC

swores wrote: post #51

tsimionescu wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It still seems fantastical to me that lightning network is presented as "something running on BTC", when it is "something running completely separately, instead of BTC". Transactions on Lightning network are not transactions on BTC, and have none of the guarantees of BTC (and in fact have no reliable guarantees of no double spending). The only way to get BTC-like guarantees of no double-spending for Lightning network…

If what tsimionescu says about Lightning is wrong, can somebody kindly reply to them explaining why rather than just downvoting which doesn't help anyone. (Maybe there's a reason they were downvoted that isn't their being wrong, but I don't see what that would be.) (And sorry for going against the guidelines and talking about downvotes, but I'm really just asking for someone to either confirm what they said is right…

See https://blog.breez.technology/lightning-btc-iou-62e3a712c913 for instance.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#58

Post by jijijijij » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:53 PM UTC

ddtaylor wrote: post #47

I was interested to see some AI providers support crypto as their payment. I think we are entering a future where AI regulation puts more people on the darknet.

Very cyberpunk and all, but how are AI regulations driving people to the darknet? You think those highly centralized billion dollar compute operations will secretly offer hidden services so people can ... what? Generate fucked up shit without restrictions? Lol, you could probably do traffic analysis with thermal imaging from a satellite.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#59

Post by ofjcihen » Wed, May 28, 2025, 6:56 PM UTC

FabHK wrote: post #15

Fun fact: After some $330m of BTC were stolen last month, Monero spiked 40%+, presumably because the proceeds of that theft were laundered. https://x.com/zachxbt/status/1916756932763046273

I wonder how common this kind of swapping is. Its an interesting financial vehicle when a valid and legal investment strategy is to try to time the laundering of different assets.

Re: De-anonymization attacks against the privacy coin XMR

#60

Post by proxynoproxy » Wed, May 28, 2025, 7:05 PM UTC

tromp wrote: post #29

candiddevmike wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Preface this by saying I am not a fan of any cryptocurrency, but I really struggle to understand why Monero has a smaller market cap than BTC. It has to be inertia related right? Monero just seems like a fundamentally better piece of technology. Are there scaling issues with Monero, similar/worse than BTC?

Yes, it scales much worse: * node resources scale with the size of the UTXO set (unspent outputs), which in Monero's case balloons to the entire TXO set (all outputs, orders of magnitude larger) * a typical 2-input 2-output transaction is 4 times larger * wallets have to track all outputs to choose random decoys for transaction inputs One can argue that this is the price to pay for significantly better privacy, but t…

Don’t forget that opaque blockchains can have invisible inflation. Transparent blockchains will always be worth more, as the user can verify that inflation has not occurred. This applies to grin as much as xmr.