Topic: Are blockchain explorer threat to the privacy ? (Read 813 times)

I don't say that they will arrest you without evidence, I have never said or mentioned that. I say that they will try more to track you when they see that you are trying to protect your privacy, especially when it comes to public tor usage. I don't say people who use Tor are criminals, for sure, they aren't but there is a group of people who use that for criminal activities and that's more than enough excuse for governments to spy on you even if you don't do anything bad. Tor is also different from VPN. VPN is used by many people and they can't simply spy on so many people but Tor is used by narrow audience.
Just imagine, they see that John uses Tor, they automatically suspect John is hiding something or doing something wrong. This prioritizes John and they probably track your more carefully. But if you hide your Tor activity, like via a tor bridge and they don't know that you use Tor, they won't prioritize you and see you like a regular internet user and regular user is never their important target.

You can use Tor Bridge but it's not the best solution because Tor Bridges are meant for people who really need it, i.e. for people who want to access censored content from Iran and other countries. I don't promote VPNs but for basic privacy, some VPNs like Mullvad and IVPN are good solutions, they are probably less likely to be honeypot but you know, number one rule is to be critical and pessimist when it comes to tools you use for protecting your privacy, you should always assume worst case scenario.
By the way, showing your ISP that you use Tor is like yelling "I am protecting my privacy" in the street. Obfuscated servers are better choice.

I know that in the eyes of a surveillance state, I'm looking suspicious, but this happens to protect what I'm wishing to hide. But, nonetheless, just because some people think I'm doing something illegal via Tor, it doesn't mean they can arrest me without evidence.

You can't act beyond an extent. VPN providers are likely honeypots. If you connect to Tor via a VPN (which is not recommended), you might as well look suspicious, because:
- VPNs are not used by the "crowd" either.
- VPNs can hand over logs if the authorities request it, and see you're connecting to Tor.

You can't protect your privacy if you're "acting" you don't care. You obviously don't get to the streets and start yelling "I'm protecting my privacy" (as that would actually reduce it), but that doesn't mean you won't utilize privacy protecting tools like Tor, because the ISP will deem you suspicious. Your alternative is to let the ISP know what you're doing. Your choice.

Without going too much off topic, if you use Windows and/or Chrome you should assume your privacy is zero.

On older versions of Windows I understand it is still possible to lock down much of the privacy invasion, but on Windows 11 it is absolutely staggering just how much telemetry and monitoring is going on behind the scenes and how often it is connecting to Microsoft and whole host of third parties and reporting on what you are doing. Chrome is even worse, and I've said before many times on this forum that Chrome is literally spyware with a browser slapped on top. If you use Chrome, Google know everything that you do online.

Not only are you not protecting it, but you are making things actively worse by allowing Google to track and record all your activity.

Your explanation is plain and simple, good job!
By the way, it's funny, how people know only one side of privacy and think everything goes well behind the scenes too. There are many people who use window + chrome browser and Electrum connected to public servers. When you open your Google Chrome, visit mixer and send coins from your wallet to bitcoin mixer and then check the transaction on Blockchair.com, are you really protecting your privacy? Or maybe you are only paying extra fees to mixer owner? There is no privacy protection in this case because absolutely every necessary data is leaked to trace you, no mixer can't help if you don't hide your IP and don't run your own node or one connected to Tor. It looks like to buy a mask and put it in your bag and think that no one can see your face now.
We need a cyber security board, there are more than enough reasons for that!

I would not be in the least bit surprised if it emerged that many of the most widely used blockchain explorers are owned and operated by blockchain surveillance companies or indeed governments themselves. We already know that such entities run various third party servers which are used by light wallets, so I imagine the same is also true for blockchain explorers.

The irony that you made this statement just the day before FinCEN posted legislation to do just that.

Depends. If you are not using Tor, then you are probably leaking enough information via just your browser to de-anonymize yourself. Not just your IP address, but your browser fingerprint is almost certainly unique, and can be linked to everything else you have done in that browser, including login in to social media profiles and whatnot. I've explained this in more depth in this reply here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.62893651

          -  They can only find your address if I only know and understand how to use the blockchain explorer; they won't be able to find or comprehend who you are in real life. But if I'm not mistaken, the hacker can access it through the IP address if I'm not mistaken in my understanding of this.

Now, perhaps what others are doing for everyone isn't truly a mattress; in this case, the usage of others in Bitcoin mixing enters the picture to deceive those who have nefarious intentions to steal Bitcoins from other addresses.

Racism in United States is very different in any other country. USA is an artificial country where 99.99% of the population is immigrants and most of them think only others are immigrants while they are "true" "red blooded American". Which is actually funny if you think about it.
This has always created "conflicts" among different groups and minorities like people of color have always been the target of all groups.
Statistically speaking when it comes to US law enforcement, they tend to be "extra brutal" towards the minorities...

Oh, it has nothing common with North Korea and here I don't emphasize hoodie but the way this man tries to cover his face and hide from others, hoodie looks to be a part of it. If you think that you won't attract cops attention by this look, I think you should just try They won't arrest you, that's for sure but you know, you attract their attention more because of your unusual behavior and outfit. And why is it so hard for you guys to understand my point? Or maybe you understand but I don't get why do you disagree with it, maybe my examples are bad. Okay, I would say, if you want to hide that you are a millionaire, just don't buy Ferrari and buy a Toyota, just don't buy a luxury apartment and buy an average house or apartment.

I think that my logic in this case is very near to reality. If you use TOR and your ISP sees that, then a legitimate question arises: This man either does something illegal or wants to protect its privacy. But why does he want to protect his privacy? Probably he does something bad.
What do you think, what would ISP and cops think when you use TOR? Oh, he is a good man, he just wants freedom and to protect his privacy, that's all. Do you really think that cops or ISP think like that? If you hide your TOR usage from your ISP and connect TOR that way, then you protect your privacy and at the same time, no one has doubt about you because you look like an average guy from the outside.

No, privacy matters for me but you have to think outside the box. When you take care of your privacy online, you have to realize that you are different from the rest of individuals. When you realize that, you will also realize that people don't care about their privacy online and the fact that people share sensitive information in Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and so on, proves again that people don't care about their privacy. When you discover that majority of people don't care about privacy online but you care, you'll also discover that you probably look a little different from crowd for those, who watch everyone. In order to protect your privacy, you have to act like you don't care, like, using Tor bridges to hide your tor activity or VPN + Tor. If you want another level of privacy, then this advice doesn't apply to you.

I think both, white and black people are equally, brutally harassed and murdered by the US police. Do you see more black people arrested? Probably more black people commit crimes, I don't know, I don't think it's totally because of racism. From my personal experience, I have noticed that more black people sell drugs and steal bicycles or kidnap, shoplift. I am not a racist, I swear to god but I can also swear that probably 90% of black men sell drugs near my bahnhof, usually immigrants I bet. Local people (race doesn't matter), grown in local neighborhood, tend to be more polite and well mannered.

Tell that to the black people in United States (supposedly "not a dictatorship") that are regularly harassed and murdered for no reason by the brutal US police just because of their "looks"

I should add that I don't deny the need for protecting your privacy specially on the internet where the biggest privacy invading organization is the United States Military (ie. NSA) which is actively invading your every move. But you can't deny that in the eyes of a privacy invading regime, anybody who makes their invasion harder is doing something wrong! They may even go as far as calling it "breaking the law"...

yeah

1) pay your tax no government issue
2) live in a country that lets you own btc.
3) if you have lots of value on the address never open it in public.

why is that for number 3 simple I now know you have 30 btc or 10 btc or 100 btc.  this makes you a perfect person to do  wrench attack on.

Um. Unless you live in North Korea or some other dictatorship, both of those people won't be stopped by a cop just because of their looks. Everyone is guilty until proven otherwise, you can't claim the "hoodie" guy is more guilty because of their look.

You cannot pretend like privacy doesn't matter to you, unless it really doesn't matter. You cannot protect your privacy by evading privacy protecting tools. That's just sad if it works that way in your country. If the government merely catches me using Tor, it is beyond insane to me to blame me guilty. It is however not insane at all if it blames me for browsing illegal sites (which is possible to notice if you don't route your traffic through Tor).

That's the problem, why do you want privacy? Maybe because you are hiding something? Yes, yes, for sure.

Look at this image of Man in hoodies hiding and look at this [url=https://d2gg9evh47fn9z.cloudfront.net/800px_COLOURBOX24232202.jpg]man walking in the street.

Be frank! What do you think, who will attract cops' attention, the first man or the second man? Cops will think that the first man is either criminal or hiding something and they will go after him, no one thinks that the first man protects about his privacy. But the second man, he looks like a typical guy walking in the street, he won't attract their attention and will walk away without problems. That's why is that guy using TOR is a valid question and if you want to protect your privacy, you have to pretend like you don't try to protect your privacy. Easy solution, hide your TOR activity.

That's too complicated of a task. It's lke going after torrent users. Those who get "caught" downloading torrents are those who don't download using VPN software, making them easy to identify. Many VPNs aren't secure and store logs, but they are enough to drive off prying eyes looking for easy victims. Unless they are really interested in you and target you for major crimes, they won't waste their resources just to get information.   

It's not exclusively about government agencies requesting that information from block explorers. It's generally the fact that they might possess it. I suspect a lot of people use block explorers to double-check their transactions. I'm sure there are companies, surveillance first and foremost, that would pay for that kind of information.

How can they have a crackdown on P2P exchanges? Which government has even attempted to do that?

I guess we are thinking too far that the governments (where the bitcoin is illegal) will track those users who are searching the block explores and then relate those BTC belonging to them and ask them to give justifications. Doesn't look like it is enough evidence with the government agencies to prove that we are the owners of those addresses.

They will rather have a crackdown on the P2P exchangers operating in the country and through them try to figure out who exchange bitcoin to fiat and vice versa and ask them to come in the court of law for explanation of these transactions.

Don't forget the name of your thread. You asked if blockchain explorers are a privacy threat but what you are talking about here is a matter of the security of your coins. Their job is to gather information and sell and share this information with anyone willing to pay for it. That someone could be a government agency who might be looking for data on their citizens. After that, you could be asked why you haven't declared you own those coins or paid your taxes, etc., etc. If Bitcoin is illegal in your country, there is more trouble for you.   

Well they'll never be able to do that with a VPN, since it's literally just someone's HTTP proxy in another country. And this is where I think it really comes handy. Because block explorers are all websites, you can mask your fingerprints to them just by connecting your VPN or even switching to a homemade HTTP proxy.

Correct. It's called "cormorant".

It is.

Nothing.

Sparrow uses a single Bitcoin wallet called "cormorant" for all wallets you create using Sparrow. Each time you create a new wallet in Sparrow, it will add new descriptors to the same cormorant wallet, and each Sparrow wallet will only pull the relevant data it needs. You can import as many different descriptors in to this Bitcoin cormorant wallet as you like - each Sparrow wallet will still only pull the data for the descriptors set up in that specific Sparrow wallet, which as we've established, does not accept individual public keys.

Well, good to know that Sparrow is pretty much centered on HD wallets and apparently doesn't want to support all descriptor features of Bitcoin Core. A bit sad, but I can accept the rationale. Alternatives exist (Electrum and Bitcoin Core).

I might still not give up and try to push Sparrow to its limits. My idea is based on the observation when you connect Sparrow to Bitcoin Core. When you create a wallet in Sparrow, there's actually a bitcoind wallet created (behind the scenes). I haven't checked yet, but this might be a descriptor wallet. Now what happens in Sparrow when you extend this bitcoind descriptor wallet within Bitcoin Core with some other fancy, maybe single key, descriptors? Will Sparrow break or swallow the bait?

Yes and no.

It does support descriptors, but if you try to import a descriptor which only includes a single public key, such as:

You get the following the error:
Yeah, Craig has said as much on GitHub. It's a fairly niche use case, and I can understand the reasons behind not supporting it, so I'm not too bothered.

Just an update. I asked on their telegram and they don't plan to implement this feature. They only develop features for HD wallets.

Importing a individual private key is not possible, it only offer the option to sweep it.

For an HD key  are you refering to BIP 32 xpriv ?



In that case is possible to import it.

In case of of xpubs, and you can specify the script type and the Derivation path





It can use both ot them

I haven't tried it yet with Sparrow, but I read from Sparrow's feature page that it should understand output descriptors for a wallet. As far as I understand those descriptors it should be possible to construct a watch-only wallet of individual addresses that aren't linked with each other by some determinism.
Question is: does Sparrow allow multiple output descriptors for one wallet and does it understand (or pass verbatim to bitcoind) all the syntax of Core's descriptors?

Same might be possible for importing private keys into Sparrow, as the documentation of Bitcoin Core's descriptors says that anywhere where a public key is valid a WIF private key is also valid and same for xpubs can be replaced by xprvs if necessary or desired.

Another question is if Sparrow needs to be connected to a bitcoind instance instead of an Electrum server which probably most users prefer?

It can take a while, but I'll have to dig deeper into this. Don't hold your breath...

Correct. I think we discussed this in another thread a while back:


I do still require to import a single address or single private key from time to time, and so I use Electrum for that. I would still like Sparrow to have this option, but I have since discovered you can indeed sweep an individual private key in Sparrow - you just can't import it. Sentinel is another option for watch-only addresses, as you say.

If you were running this set up and still needed to use watch-only addresses, then you could of course import the addresses directly in to Bitcoin Core, since you can't do it on Sparrow.

This is the only way to maintain high privacy. I totally agree.

As a sidenote, I think but may be wrong, that Sparrow doesn't allow the user to watch-only specific addresses but only xpubs. That's why I suggested Sentinel. Electrum also allows that if I am correct. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong. Because in fact I want to also keep track of some addresses. So I am particularly interested to know whether I can do it with Sparrow which is my no.1 wallet software. For now, I run dojo server and I have connected Sentinel to it.

Finally, as you said, the easiest way to be private would be to run bitcoin core and then connect sparrow to bitcoin core. This doesn't even require an electrum server.

Lots of bad advice in this thread.

If you do anything at all on a computer you do not own, you should assume you have zero privacy and security at all times. You have absolutely no idea if that machine is infected with malware, has a keylogger, or whatnot.

If you look up an address on a block explorer, that address is linked to your IP, alongside everything else linked to your IP which is more than enough to personally identify you.

If you look up an address via a VPN, then that address is linked to your VPN's IP address yes, but also to your browser fingerprint. Your browser fingerprint is almost certainly unique enough to identify you unless you have taken a range of very specific and technical steps to make it less so.

If you look up an address via vanilla Tor, then that address is linked to your Tor exit node's IP address, and the browser fingerprint is non-unique. This is probably fine, but also depends what else you do with that same Tor identity.

As soon as you start looking up multiple addresses, then in addition to the caveats above, these addresses are all linked together.

Using a watch only wallet such as Electrum or Blue wallet, not via your own node, is worse (not better!) than using a blockchain explorer. Not only is it far easier for blockchain analysis companies to run servers for these wallets rather than a blockchain explorer service (and we know many do run such servers), but your wallet will query all your addresses (even unused ones) which reveals all your addresses simultaneously and provides a more certain link between all these addresses (as well as your IP address as above).

If you want privacy, run your own node. From there, you can either run your own blockchain explorer service, you can run your own Electrum server, or you can even just use a wallet such as Sparrow which links directly to your node with no further software required. If you aren't running your own node, you are relying on a third party, and that third party can compromise your privacy.

Correct me if I'm wrong but that sounds like a more centralized version of Tor project as it relies on the Mullvad company which is commercial VPN service. What's worse is that Mullvad is based on Sweden which is the addition to the Five Eye "spy network" that are out to invade your privacy.
https://www.privacytools.io/guides/how-is-the-five-eyes-intelligence-alliance-related-to-your-privacy

I am surprised nobody suggested this before. Just run your own node and your mempool service upon your node (as I said before). Otherwise do what BlackHatCoiner said above. To add to his suggestion, you can also install Sentinel on your phone and connect it to a dojo node. It's slightly more complicated but it's a super clean way to monitor addresses and xpubs. Sentinel is a watch-only wallet made by the same team that develops samourai wallet.

To gain privacy. Next question.

Actually, changing the exit node is a matter of two clicks. You just click on the "New Tor circuit for this site", right next to reload of the current page.

If you want to check the balance of 50 addresses privately, then just create a watch-only wallet in Electrum and import them there. Connect to your own node obviously, it will take a minute or two to synchronize.

How about using a Mullvad browser  (https://mullvad.net/en/browser) instead of TOR ? You will get the same features but then it is not the TOR.


Nothing is being done manually, so it won't be hassle for the blockchain analysis companies. They have the built in specialized software's / programs to keep processing as much data they get and for sure, when asked by the authorities, they will filter out the big wallets and their associated IP addresses.

True that. But from that point on people knows that you own that amount of Bitcoin - in a way or another - and also may be able to track it back to its source(s).
And while you're right, the money can be hidden again, that information can already be a problem for some.

Of course, this doesn't make you wrong, just it's still not 100% the same as they never knew about your stash.

---

To OP:
While they cannot hack the coins, they can gather information about who has what and what is the trace of that money.
However, if I'd be your friend I would let you check. The more random checks from my IP, the more confused the block explorers may become, so why not? I myself I've checked on block explorers way more of others' transactions than mine.

And to the question of the topic:
Some blockchain explorers are/were even known to be honeypots. Some store information, some maybe not so much. Some people check their transactions, some check others', or others' too. So block explorers cannot have great overall info about everybody using their services. Plus, some users care more than they should, some much less than their should. I think the people should learn to be more careful about their privacy; then (yeah, if ever) block explorers will be just fine. Until then, yes, they are somewhat a threat to privacy. But not much more than the users themselves are a threat to their own privacy.

Born again virginity is not possible?

But making a btc amount private again can be done.

Note the coin yes to a large degree but not the address.

1JdC6Xg3ajT3rge3FgPNSYYFpmf53Vbtje will never be private.

1956jUdYPFwiBSzt9AECdWj3KE4WV7taiM will never be private.

https://btc1.trezor.io/address/bc1qmu9aky8nfqt7jrcp8pmzav5aurc5tj29w3y3d5



will never be private


but the coins can be made private if you want.

The question is what privacy?

The privacy that someone who has crypto funds has access to a certain PC (or a PC on a certain network)?
Well, not really all they know is someone had access to that machine. Could be someone at that house for a party, could be a friend who was waiting for the other friend to finish something before they went to go grab a beer, etc.

Since that PC / or network already had someone on it who used crypto it's not like there were not signs for crypto use coming from there anyway.

I guess a better question would be why would you use a block explorer for addresses you own / control?
Every wallet will show you your balance and if not why would you really want to bother typing in an 25 character BTC address in someone else's PC?

And truth be told, it's your money its none of your relatives business how you check and deal with it.
Worrying about who knows what past a certain point is well pointless.

Also keep in mind a while ago your privacy it's like your virginity, once you loose it you are not getting it back.
If you (or anyone) has been doing things that made a lot of your information public it's not going to disappear because you change want your are doing and how you are doing it.

-Dave

If you check your balance on electrum instead of using a block explorer, the only difference would be that you get the information (your balance and your transactions history) from one of electrum's servers instead of a block explorer.
If you don't select a server manually and let electrum select a server automatically, checking the balance using electrum can be even worse than using a block explorer. Because you may connect to a new node every time you open electrum.

I suggest not checking your balance outside of your home, even though they don't know who you are at the moment since you check your balance in the Explorer, they might check it again and if they find out that you have lots of money in your wallet, this could be a threat to you and you family, have you read the news a few years ago a person sell bitcoin to the unknown person who maybe he meet online, and those people barge into his home, and takes his bitcoin, same happens in my country since he is posting and teaching about bitcoin, they knew he has money on the wallet, thank god he survives from stab wounds, he is just saving you from death or from bad people.

I rarely use block explorers because I am paranoid about how much information they might be collecting about me. If I need to check my balance I can just open up my wallet. I don't rely on just a single block explorer when I need to look up detailed information. I always change up which explorer, browser, and IP address I use so it is difficult for any single party to have enough reliable information to fingerprint me.

Why you need to check it on computer of your relative?

That home has Internet connection and I think you have smart phone too. Nowadays, we mostly have smart phones for using. You can do it all by yourself and only need Internet connection, directly from your sim or your relative home.

You can import the public address in a wallet software like Electrum wallet, on your smart phone. It will be a watch only wallet with it you can not spend your bitcoin but can check balance and transaction history. It's safe.

Creating a watch-only wallet

It is slightly more complicated than that since you'll have to store all those addresses and also update/expand your list of 50 addresses each time you want to add a new address of your own. For example add 10 random addresses for each address of your own.
You are also forgetting that people use the web interface (not the API) to check their addresses and checking 50+ addresses manually is a very hard and time consuming process!

Besides, why go through this much trouble when there are easier ways...

Discussions on this topic have been going on for a long time and I would rather, as a precaution, try to avoid such blockchain explorer sites as much as possible.


I like this version of why shouldn't use blockchain explorers.

Nowadays, when almost every site collects data about us, especially those related to cryptocurrencies, I am inclined to assume that blockchain explorers do something similar and they will not necessarily use this information to harm users. Those who gain access to this data can be dangerous, for example, by hacking or stealing data from sites like blockchain.com. Therefore, I think that you should always take precautions when dealing with cryptocurrencies, leaving less traces of yourself that may remain on the blockchain explorers.

He is absolutely right.

Sometimes I also use public explorers    pursuing exactly the same aims as yours, but to preserve my privacy I blend the info of my interest into the dynamic  bunch of the relevant stuff that doesn't belong to me. Say if I look for balance on my address  I do  that simultaneously for a few dozens of non-owned addresses , sure making request  via VPN.

Absolutely true. small balance = small attraction and attention

large balance = large attraction and attention

@pooya87

it is easy to simply make a check list of 50 addresses

click and look at them and only own one address.


thus no one knows if any of them are yours.

That's why it is called "analysis" not "foolproof". It's a matter of probability, for example if you and only you check addresses A, B and C multiple times in a month then someone else checks address B once, there is a good chance that all A, B and C belong to you and not the other person.

Another matter that should not be overlooked is the fact that they now know there is a link between A, B and C even if they don't know the real IP address (ie. using VPN).

Privacy is something different from bitcoin security. I see that some people recommend using Tor, but Tor does not provide a new IP address for every time you open your browser, so this blockchain explorer gives a piece of data and if there is a party willing to pay the costs and can obtain information from Microsoft, Apple, Google, then just using Tor will not save you.

Quick tips to enhance your privacy when using Tor:

increase your knowledge, properly configured your settings, Don't torrent, and avoid installing browser add-ons.

Wow these so called "Block Chain Analysis" companies has so much time to watch my IP addresses, link my bitcoins to my IP and then what ?
Even though i do not have much bitcoins, but even i have, they can't get my bitcoins.

Also all the top wallets are publically avaiable as to which address contain how much bitcoins. Sometimes if i also search other addresses, not belonging to me. Also, there will be people who would be using VPN to check the addresses on blockchian explorers. I think that this data wil be a big mess rather than anything useful for analysis.

That's absolutely true, but I ll add 2 more things here:

1. They can safely assume with a high level of certainty that the owner of IP XXX.XXX.XXX owns the keys to access the addresses you search for. They can't be sure, since you could be looking for an address you found online or for many other reasons. But yes, they could track multiple addresses and link them to you.

2. Running your own node and your own mempool explorer upon your node, solves a lot of issues.

To be fair you are not disagreeing with the warning you were given. Your statements are correct but they are about security and have nothing to do with privacy. Privacy is about your identity, the list of addresses you own which also includes your total balance and being able to link these two together.

When you visit a blockchain explorer, the owners of that site can create a link between your identity (IP address, browser finger print, etc) and the address you checked there. Eventually they can build a database which would determine which addresses belong to you and how much bitcoin you own.

This means that every time you carry out the process of checking transactions and balances on a bitcoin address using the explore site, you must turn on the VPN to avoid the possibility of our IP being copied because the browser used to browse the site cannot be trusted.

It doesn't matter to me that in order to protect privacy I have to use a VPN, because they above have answered the same thing regarding VPN and Tor.
Regarding using a master public key, I don't think this will solve the impasse regarding privacy that is questionable when checking transactions using the blockchair.com site and other sites with the same function.



I agree to this in order to protect privacy and avoid having my wallet tracked.

The only way to achieve privacy and to avoid having your wallet tracked is by running your own node. Because your node will have all addresses.

This will harm your privacy too.
With creating a watch-only wallet using your master public key, the owner of the node you connect to can know that all the derived addresses are owned by the same person.
If you connect to the node with your own IP address, you may even make the situation worse because the owner of the node can link all the addresses to your IP address.

It can have an impact on privacy, you'll not lose your coins that way but you can lose your privacy. You should use Tor or vpn to hide your ip address if you want some form of privacy when you constantly use blockchain explorers. It is better to use your master public key to set up a watch only wallet on your online device to check your addresses and transactions.
Yes and it is possible for it to be exposed when you use blockchain explorers to check your address balance or transactions you've made.

I am a member who is studying and will continue to study technical things because I really enjoy this field.
Browsing the blockhair.com or mempol.space sites for these two purposes has no impact on privacy as long as the access is done on your own device. When that is done, we do not enter the private key but the public address.

My guess is why he insists on what you are doing, because there are other things that your relatives are worried about to prevent you from frequently browsing the explore site to see transactions and check the balance. When someone sees a large amount of the available balance in your Bitcoin address, it might pose a danger to you which could threaten your personal security.

Public key and public (address) which bitcoin enthusiasts are calling address are not the same, although you can use anyone that you like to track your bitcoin transaction.

For master public key, I will not advice you to use it to track your bitcoin transaction on any explorer for privacy reasons. It is better to get a watch-only wallet instead.

For anonymity, use Tor.

If you do not care about privacy, you may not care. But take a look at this:



If you do not use Tor, knowing your real identity can be easier with IP address and it is not good to trust any site.

I'd prefer the authorities knowing that I used Tor, as you can give deniable plausibility by saying that you're using it for educational purposes or whatnot. Your bitcoin wallet address being tied to your identity though, is a far bigger problem.

But yea, you don't necessarily need to use Tor. Maybe a proxy or a VPN. In the end it will totally depend on how tight you want your privacy to be.

Blockchain explorers can't harm your wallet, can't steal your coins, can't harm you, they are just explorers. The only concern here is that if you type your address in their search bar with your naked ip address, there is a chance that explorer will log this, i.e., explorer will save the data that you were checked address X. But you can search a lot of address, right? How can they know which one you really own?
I don't know if your friend knows it and told you but when you use Electrum wallet that is connected to other nodes, there is a chance that when you make a bitcoin transaction, those nodes log your IP with it. I say, there is a chance, we don't actually know. By the way, this is nothing to worry about but if you are super cautious and worry too much about your privacy, then run your own node.

That's what I am saying here for decades that the fact that you use Tor is an issue itself. For quick checkup that doesn't require a lot of bandwidth, one should use Tor bridge. Or use a VPN you trust.

As long as there are no chance to know the public key by others, there are no risk involved.

I think your friend is concerned about the IP log that may the explorer log when you are entering any address or transaction to check details. But as long as it does not have a lot of btc stored in any address, I don't think anything will trigger the admin of these explorers to check a specific address and the locations it was searched. Even if they get the location, there are no concrete evidence for them to hunt you down.

Well that depends on the Point of view of each of us, some are more paranoid some not.

Lets say that you want to check the addresses of satoshi, Your IP become linked to  address of satoshi? I don't think so...

But what if you check for a specific Transaction ID or some new fresh address just to see if your balance appears there, Does your IP become linked to that address/TXID ? maybe.

All depends on how much chain analysis does those pages. Personally, I prefer the mempool.space explorer, It's a little more visual and intuitive.

Those explorers never will have access to your found of course, but maybe there is going to be a little of tracking

When you use any blockchain explorer you IP address is logged with them and they know that this IP address access this btc address multiple times.
They can give this data to blockchain analysis companies who will put one tick in the box that since this IP address searches this btc address multiple times, so one possibility is that btc address belongs to that IP. I hope you already know that tracing you by the IP address is not difficult at all.

Its better to have a read only wallet configured where you can see your balances (For example , Blue Wallet) or if using the explorer is the only way, then better use it through TOR or VPN.

tor brings about other issues i.e. why is that guy using TOR

lets try to track him.

It's a lot more of a privacy issue. If you frequently search a wallet address on a block explorer, they could make the assumption that the wallet is yours knowing that your searches are pretty much tied to your IP address(hence potentially your personal information with the help of your local ISP). There's a reason why you see some people recommend using Tor when using block explorers.

Well if you are on your own pc and it is not a legacy address there is not much to worry about.

If it is a public area you could be filmed and people would know that the address belongs to you.

Which could be illegal to have an address in some countries or people could see a large balance.


this belongs to me

https://btc1.trezor.io/address/bc1qmu9aky8nfqt7jrcp8pmzav5aurc5tj29w3y3d5

it is only 50 usd  so I don't fear someone knowing it is my address.

If someone is able to take away your bitcoins just by knowing your public keys or bitcoin address then bitcoin will be a utter failure in no time so your friend/relative has no idea about that.

But talking about privacy anyone who knows your Bitcoin address can track your wallet balance which you may not like it and if someone close to you got that information then it might get uncomfortable for you.

I mostly use the blockchain explorers like https://www.blockchain.com/explorer or https://blockchair.com/ to view my wallet transactions confirmations or sometimes to even check the balance etc.

Recently i was away from home and was check my balance on one of these explorer at my relative home. He is also involved in cryptocurrencies so he knew what i was doing. He told me not to checl my balance through these sites as these are public sites and it can be a threat to your privacy.

I told him that i was putting my public address in these explorers and no one can hack my coins knowing only the public key. Only the private keys needs to be hidden while public keys can be entered anywhere to check the balance or given to anyone if they want to send us bitcoins.

Still he was insisting that you should avoid these explorers. I diagreed but what to know your point of view? What is the harm of checkng your transactions and wallets balances through explorers