Bitcoin payment is completely anonymous … is it really anonymous?

When we conduct transactions on the Bitcoin network, we may be unable to bear the assumption that since we are using cryptocurrencies, it is completely safe for us to transfer money to another party.
In the field of cybersecurity, there is a symbolic abbreviation to express security-CIA. No, this does not refer to US federal agencies, but to confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
· Confidentiality expresses the “typical” definition of security-the content you send to another party or stored on your computer can only be disclosed to the person you choose, not to others.
· Integrity expresses the idea that any information you send should be exactly the same no matter where it is-it should not be changed on the way.
· Usability expresses the definition of security, that is, a system / user should be able to access or contact another system / user when needed (that is, a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack threatens availability.
So, from the perspective of cryptocurrencies, it is safe for us to use bitcoin, right? Our transactions are crypto, protected, and not modified, and the network cannot drop because it is so decentralized, so We must be completely safe!
Only considering the above three factors, it is clear that our use of the Bitcoin network is quite safe. But let us expand our meaning of confidentiality from an unrelated perspective-do you use Bitcoin for confidentiality?
Confidential transaction
Let us put it another way-you are a person, not the data you send. Can someone find more information about you, such as where you live, how many bitcoins you send, how often you use the network, who you have paid for before … The answer may seem counterintuitive, but these are definitely Not within the scope of discovery. (Insert: From a legal point of view, privacy and confidentiality are technically different; however, they cover very similar concepts in “Daily Terms”, so we will use these terms interchangeably here, if you want to (To know how lawyers use these terms, please provide a link below).
It’s time to dive into the details. First of all, when you use a computer on the network, for example: your computer has an IP address. It is a 32-bit or 128-bit identifier that tells the receiver to whom to respond. For example, suppose your computer is located at 17.xxx .yy.zz and you are looking for 20xx .yy.zz (a fake address for privacy). Did you know that from the simple message above, you can find that a device from Apple is trying to call a device from Microsoft. (Look at why this is).
IP address reveals your identity
Why this is important-your computer has an IP address, and when you talk to someone on the Bitcoin network, and every time your IP address attempts to connect, it is possible to find your IP and even record it. Your telecommunications company (Verizon, Cox, Charter, CenturyLink …) is assigned specific addresses and assigns these addresses to its customers. Given the date and address, the telecommunications company can discover who (at least which router in the home or business) tried a particular connection. Can you solve this problem? Of course, there are some potential methods (vpn, proxy, Tor, etc.), but there is no way to prevent an IP address from being associated with your connection. In short: it can increase anonymity, but it is not foolproof.
What about your wallet address? Suppose you try to send a certain BTC this week, and after a few weeks, you will send them and another BTC at the same time. These transactions will always be stored on the blockchain and can be searched. The person looking for your address can know how much money you sent, when, and to whom. Another possibility to disclose your address is to request a donation or payment on your website. Many small websites are operated by donations-if you post your wallet address and ask someone to help you manage the website, your identity (or at least the identity of the website owner) can be tracked forever through this address . All of this is coded and permanently encapsulated. To achieve higher anonymity, you can try to use a new wallet address in each transaction. In fact, this is Bitcoin.org’s recommendation.
Break the identity
Can’t bitcoin hybrids help you break your identity? They can help-it does make investigating your identity more difficult to track, but as the amount increases, the use of these services will be limited. You must also essentially trust mixed operators-they can easily lose, steal or mismanage your input BTC. There are other options, such as CoinJoin, which can be paid anonymously. CoinJoin takes multiple transactions from multiple consumers and merges them into one transaction, effectively hiding the original information about who used how much bitcoin. This does not require any modification to the Bitcoin network protocol and can be used now, but it is vague and difficult to use-again, it is not foolproof.
Is there any hope? Of course, this is not the end of the cryptocurrency road, but to remind people to be careful when surfing the Internet. If you choose to deal with trusted suppliers and other users, then you have nothing to worry about in online activities. This is just to emphasize that it is possible to use a pseudonym (using a name or identity other than yourself), but anonymity (an identity that is completely unknown) is almost impossible. It is difficult to say that someone finds that your probability of a specific transaction or other interaction on the Bitcoin network is 0%.