The right to privacy is an essential human right. Coinjoin technology being pioneered by the Wasabi team solves the Bitcoin privacy issue in beautiful ways. “If you aren’t doing anything wrong you don’t have anything to worry about.” Bullshit. Behavior subconsciously changes when you know someone’s watching. Any all-seeing-eye discourages free thinking and stifles innovation.
Bitcoin as it stands is very much traceable and censorable. In fact, Bitcoin without sufficient privacy protections provides perfect permanent records of your entire financial life; with sufficient analytics every transaction past and future will be on display for all to observe. This information allows surveillance the likes of which a totalitarian state could only dream. Nevermind governments, you wouldn’t walk into a nightclub and have your savings in large bills popping out of your pockets on display for all to see. The internet is one giant nightclub full of vicious criminals hanging out over in the corner, scanning the room and exchanging tips on how to ruin your day.
Wasabi has pioneered new techniques to protect Bitcoin anonymity. Instead of rubbing your name off of a coin, what if you wrote many thousands of names onto it?
Imagine you have a coin with your name on it. You meet up with fifty people at a certain time and everyone puts their coins into a hopper in the middle of the room. The original fifty coins then get melted down, and out of the coinjoin machine come fifty new coins that each have all fifty names on them! Now your name is on fifty coins and you have fifty names on your coin. Repeated “coinjoins” only make someone watching more confused as more and more names get added to your coin.
If most Bitcoin has many names on it, the tracking done by governments, corporations and nefarious actors will be greatly hindered.
The upcoming Wasabi Wallet release is set to significantly improve the privacy of the entire space by making these operations seamless enough that access to coinjoin technology is accessible to all.
