We have seen the emergence of thousands of cryptocurrencies in the past few years and they are all focused on solving various problems. Some are focused on privacy and anonymity, while others are working toward making the financial sector better. Some projects that focus on privacy and anonymity allow the public viewing of all the transactions that take place on the blockchain.
Some crypto projects’ privacy feature is optional, while others ensure that the privacy feature is strictly implicit. You can discover over a hundred interesting cryptocurrencies by reading “The Digital World of Crypto Riches.” The book provides a summary of Monero and other top cryptocurrencies in the crypto space.
Monero is one cryptocurrency that has gained so much acceptance and popularity mainly because of its privacy-oriented features. The team behind Monero believes that the ideal electronic cash needs to satisfy the three requirements below:
· It has to be private
· It should be decentralized
· It has to be electronic
They are working toward ensuring that XMR fulfills all three criteria.
The Monero Project
You can easily identify Monero in the list of cryptocurrencies with its token ticker symbol XMR. It was launched back in 2014 as a privacy-oriented and open-source digital currency on blockchain technology. It started not as Monero but as BitMonero — a combination of the word “bit” for Bitcoin and Monero, the Esperanto word for coin.
Well, five days after it was launched as BitMonero, it dropped the “bit” and retained its current name. Monero has witnessed several changes that were driven and implemented by its team of developers and community. It’s no surprise to know that only two members of its core development team revealed their real identity — Francisco Cabañas and Riccardo Spagni.
Basically, a blockchain contains all the transactions of users on any given network and it displays the details of all the transactions that take place on the network.
Some blockchains like Bitcoin are configured in such a way that anyone can view all the transactions on the network. But this is different for the Monero blockchain which is configured to be opaque. So, the Monero blockchain renders the details of all its transactions like the identity of senders and recipients of funds as well as the amount of funds involved in every transaction anonymous.
It achieves this simply by disguising the addresses that each participant uses for their transaction. This explains why Monero is seen by many crypto enthusiasts as the most famous privacy-focused digital currency on earth. So:
· They ensure the sender’s privacy by using Ring Signatures.
· Maintain the privacy of the transaction by using Ring CT also regarded as Ring Confidential Transactions
· They ensure that Stealth Addresses help to guarantee the recipient’s privacy
This is also why it has become popular for those evading international sanctions like North Korea and making payments on the Dark Web.
But there are still excellent reasons why we still need a private form of money that’s not in any way illegal. The permissionless nature of Monero means that no authority is capable of stopping anyone from making use of a digital currency. So, people who lack access to modern banking (unbanked persons) can get involved in a digital economy in ways they have never dreamed of before.
All that’s required to get involved is access to the internet as well as a device they can connect to it. Available records from World Bank show that there are about 1.7 billion adults who currently lack access to banking facilities. A good number of these adults also own smartphones, as well as good access to local Wi-Fi hotspots.
One excellent example is India which has many unbanked persons. This is one of the reasons why Monero will always be useful. But what gives Monero its value is the privacy feature. When you make transactions using Monero, no one can link you to the transactions.
Also, fungibility is another good feature of Monero as the crypto is completely fungible. It’s impossible to determine the specific transactions that each coin was involved in when using Monero’s advanced privacy features. There is no way to link a single XMR unit to a past crime because the transactions don’t have a history. This means complete fungibility.
Another striking feature of Monero has to do with its dynamic scalability. Cryptos such as bitcoin set a block size limit (to prevent spam transactions), but this feature was not there during the early days of its development. This has led to issues of scalability for most first-generation cryptos. Well, Monero uses a free block size mechanism without a “pre-set” limit in addition to a block reward penalty built into the system.
The need for privacy in our world where nothing appears to offer us true privacy has increased significantly. Cryptocurrencies like Monero that are privacy-focused will always be in high demand both for legal and illegal uses. It offers people the opportunity to transact almost instantly in any location without seeking the authorization of any government or regulatory body. In fact, this crypto could be a powerful tool in countries that have oppressive governments.
On the other hand, Monero could eventually be attacked by governments who are not comfortable with the idea of an existing private means of payment that anyone can use. This is because criminals have also fallen in love with it and used it on the Dark Web to purchase weapons, drugs and various criminal items. Governments like North Korea have embraced the currency to help them work around international sanctions.
Drug dealers, child pornographers, human traffickers and even international terrorist organizations can make use of Monero for making payments. Presently, governments have not been able to crackdown on Monero and their ability to do so will be a significant test of the “anti-fragile” feature of cryptocurrencies.
So, this crypto has the potential to be a handy payment method for different goods and services and could also be a strong tool of resistance. If you’re interested in using Monero to make a payment that you want to remain anonymous, it’s not really difficult. But you would require some Monero before making the payments and some of the best places to buy XMR include Binance, Kraken, Bitfinex and several others.
