Topic: [XMR] Monero - A secure, private, untraceable cryptocurrency - page 25. (Read 4670972 times)

#2 - Monero

Monero is not a magic black box which provides perfect anonymity! If you use eg. flyp.me to buy XMR and then quickly sell this XMR on flyp.me again, it is blatantly obvious to flyp.me what you've done (if they keep logs), both due to the amounts and the specific Monero inputs used. In order to get decent privacy, you have to do something like this:
 1. Convert BTC to XMR (using your own Monero wallet, not a hosted wallet).
 2. In two or more transactions of random amounts, move XMR from that wallet to a different wallet/account.
 3. Optionally, you can repeat the above step with additional wallets/accounts for greater anonymity.
 4. Preferably in two or more transactions of random amounts, convert the XMR in your last wallet in the chain to BTC.
 
Ideally, all of the above should be performed over as long a period of time as you can tolerate.

 - Pros: Possibly the best anonymity, especially if you're able to stay within the XMR ecosystem to some extent
 - Cons: You should use Tor with Monero, but you have to set this up manually; it's all more difficult; you're exposed to exchange rate risk; transaction fees may be significant

Jameson Lopp discusses Bitcoin's unorthodox governance (or lack thereof), the utility of privacy wallets, the benefits of privacy coins like Monero

Russia-linked REvil, the notorious ransomware group believed to be behind the attack this month on meatpacker JBS, has removed the option of paying in bitcoin this year, demanding monero only, according to Brett Callow, threat analyst at Emsisoft.

Meanwhile, both DarkSide, the group blamed for the Colonial Pipeline hack, and Babuk, which was behind the attack on Washington DC police this year, allow payments in either cryptocurrency, but charge a 10 to 20 percent premium to victims paying in riskier bitcoin, experts say.

I'm sorry that monero is only mentioned when there are ransoms to be paid, in reality it is a very good project that helps protect your privacy

at the moment bitcoin is less respectful, you have to use tricks like coinjoin to be more safe

The law enforcement success intensifies speculation that Colonial Pipeline paid the ransom not to gain access to a decryptor it knew was buggy but rather to help the FBI track DarkSide and its mechanism for obtaining and laundering ransoms.

The speculation is reinforced by the fact that Colonial Pipeline paid in bitcoin, despite that option requiring an additional 10 percent added to the ransom. Bitcoin is pseudo-anonymous, meaning that while names aren't attached to digital wallets, the wallets and the coins they store can still be tracked.

It's possible that Colonial Pipeline chose to pay the higher ransom at the behest of law enforcement because bitcoin could be tracked and monero—the other currency accepted by DarkSide—is completely untraceable.

everything is going on matrix...

Atomic swaps
...

Atomic swaps
https://www.cryptoninjas.net/2021/05/29/comit-network-makes-monero-bitcoin-atomic-swaps-available-on-mainnet/

According to a release, this allows users to trade XMR for BTC without having to trust a third-party or intermediary (or even the trading counterparty). Users are able to seamlessly conduct trades globally without using a “regulated” financial institution.

The XMR digital currency is well-known for its private and fungible properties. Unlike other crypto-assets, the Monero protocol hides the sender, receiver, and amount for all transfers. This allows its privacy protections to expand to cover more transactions than are “involved in Bitcoin mixing, Ethereum mixing, and all other ‘privacy coins’ combined.”

Monero is the “recognized global standard” in private digital payments, the release noted.

everything is going on matrix...

https://forum.monero.space/d/79-how-to-join-the-monero-core-team-matrix-server-web

Accessing Libera.Chat Via Tor

Libera.Chat is also reachable via Tor, bound to some restrictions. You can’t directly connect to irc.libera.chat via Tor; use the following hidden service as the server address instead:

libera75jm6of4wxpxt4aynol3xjmbtxgfyjpu34ss4d7r7q2v5zrpyd.onion

The hidden service requires SASL authentication. In addition, due to abuse we have seen across other networks in the past, we have unfortunately had to add another couple of restrictions:

    You must log in using SASL EXTERNAL or ECDSA-NIST256P-CHALLENGE (more below)
    If you log out while connected via Tor, you will not be able to log in without reconnecting.

If you haven’t set up the requisite SASL authentication, we recommend SASL EXTERNAL. You’ll need to generate a client certificate and add that to your NickServ account. We describe how to in detail under our guide on setting up CertFP.

Connecting using SASL EXTERNAL requires that you connect using TLS encryption.

You’ll then want to tell your client to try the EXTERNAL mechanism. We lack comprehensive documentation for this, but it’s a feature in most modern clients, so please check their docs for instructions for now.
Verifying Tor TLS connections

A Tor hidden service name securely identifies the service you are connecting to. Verifying the TLS server certificate is strictly-speaking unnecessary while using the hidden service. Nonetheless you may verify the hidden service’s TLS server certificate by adding the following fragment to your torrc configuration file and configure your client to connect to palladium.libera.chat via Tor. The TLS server certificate used by the hidden service will validate using this hostname.

# torrc snippet:
MapAddress palladium.libera.chat libera75jm6of4wxpxt4aynol3xjmbtxgfyjpu34ss4d7r7q2v5zrpyd.onion

Older clients that don’t support SOCKS4a or later will need to use MapAddress with an IP address, and the certificate will not validate successfully. In this case validation will need to be disabled.

Note that the hidden service’s certificate changes periodically as it is updated. This means that the certificate fingerprint can not be reliably pinned.

We need more and better dex exchanges for Monero and other coins.

Is there any other active Monero forum other than bitcointalk with active community and conversation, not counting Monero reddit?