Well-known whistleblower Edward Snowden reiterated his long-standing concerns about Bitcoin's privacy features, or lack thereof, in a recent post on It is the cornerstone of enhancing user privacy on the Bitcoin network.
“The clock is ticking” for Bitcoin, Snowden says
Snowden expressed frustration with the slow pace of privacy improvements within the Bitcoin protocol. “I have been warning Bitcoin developers for ten years that privacy must be provided at the protocol level. This is the final warning. ‘The clock is ticking,'” Snowden posted on X, commenting on the Wasabi Wallet announcement yesterday.
I have been warning Bitcoin developers for a decade that privacy must be provided at the protocol level. This is the last warning. The clock is ticking. https://t.co/r7w7gdrHRp
– Edward Snowden (@Snowden) May 2, 2024
Developed by zkSNACKs, Wasabi Wallet is a pioneering solution that aims to enhance the privacy of Bitcoin transactions through its on-boarding coordination service. However, in a recent blog post, the Wasabi Wallet team detailed their decision to discontinue this service effective June 1, 2024.
“After years of tireless dedication to improving Bitcoin privacy, zkSNACKs, the lead developer of Wasabi Wallet, has shut down its onboarding coordination service,” the post read. The developers highlighted ongoing regulatory pressures and the need for legal clarity as the main reasons behind their decision.
Although the coin joining service has been discontinued, Wasabi Wallet will continue to operate as a traditional BTC wallet. The team assured users of continued privacy improvements through other features such as client-side filtering, Tor integration, and custom currency selection, though they acknowledged that these measures do not guarantee complete privacy on their own.
This development comes amid increasing scrutiny and legal challenges facing cryptocurrency privacy tools. Notably, federal prosecutors in New York recently charged the founders of another privacy-focused wallet, Samourai Wallet, with facilitating more than $2 billion worth of illegal transactions. The action is part of a broader crackdown by US authorities on wallets and mixers linked to illicit activities.
While Snowden hailed Bitcoin in February as “the most significant monetary advance since the creation of the currency,” his concerns about the privacy built into Bitcoin have been consistent. In November 2021, he praised the developments of Zcash, another cryptocurrency known for strong privacy features.
“Zcash has purposefully advanced what cryptocurrency can do, and that's what I admire about it,” he said. “My primary criticism of Bitcoin, many years later, remains that they have not addressed the massive on-chain privacy issue.
In contrast, Samson Mu, a prominent figure in encouraging nation-state adoption of Bitcoin, Its importance has been underestimated The importance of wasabi advertising. Mao said: “I don't understand why everyone is crying about this. Wasabi is open source. You can run your own formatter too. This is like Pirate Bay saying they won't seed torrents anymore. Yes good and smart move.”
At press time, Bitcoin was trading at $61,900.
Featured image from Literary Hub, chart from TradingView.com