Bitcoin Privacy Documentation by Alice Townes and Richard Downe
You can watch the video here: https://air.mozilla.org/data-privacy-legal-hackathon/ we start at 34:00.
This project was conceived on 2/7, begun from scratch the morning of 2/8, and presented on 2/9. The project was for the Data Privacy Legal Hackathon. Thank you to the organizers and sponsors, especially our gracious hosts, Mozilla.
We realized that there was no real privacy documentation of cryptocurrencies, and that people didn't really know how to start talking about them. We aimed to develop a structure and vocabulary for the discussion, including terms like "darkcoin", "bitcoin in the light", "provisional pseudonymity" and others. We also aimed to address the ethical question of private financial transactions, and we found that there were many honest and legal reasons to keep your bitcoin transactions separate from your identity, as well as the bad reasons everyone always talks about. Substantively, we came up with a list of ways in which identities and bitcoin addresses get linked, to keep users aware of how and when they are taking privacy risks.
We hope you find this helpful.
Thanks for reading!
Alice and Richard
Disclaimer: this is not legal advice and Alice is not your lawyer. IRS Circular 230 Disclaimer: To ensure compliance with IRS Circular 230, any U.S. federal tax advice provided in this communication is not intended or written to be used, and it cannot be used by the recipient or any other taxpayer (i) for the purpose of avoiding tax penalties that may be imposed on the recipient or any other taxpayer, or (ii) in promoting, marketing or recommending to another party a partnership or other entity, investment plan, arrangement or other transaction addressed herein.