Top Anonymous Cryptocurrencies

Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto said that Bitcoin was an anonymous currency. Anonymity meant only the absence of the need to provide any specific data about yourself. In other words, in the process of Bitcoins purchasing, you won't be required to provide your id card or passport, mention your residence address, submit the income declaration, and other data. However, the very essence of the digital currency still entails a certain disclosure of the system's participants. Ultimately, it turns out that the cryptocurrency is anonymous only until the moment when users of this network inadvertently give themselves away. It is enough to make a purchase of a physical product in an online store and pay this bill in Bitcoins. Fortunately, truly anonymous cryptocurrencies have come to replace the generation of fake - privacy crypto coins. Let's look further at some of these anonymous cryptocurrencies that have made impressive progress.

Monero (XMR)

Monero was created in 2014, loudly declared its complete anonymity to the whole world, and quickly reached the TOP in terms of its capitalization. Many representatives of the crypto community consider Monero to be the most secure cryptocurrency. 

Advantages:

1. Decentralization. Lack of control, the inability to influence financial organizations (banks).
2. Independence. The currency is not a fork of Bitcoin, so it is not particularly susceptible to the influence of the Bitcoin exchange rate.
3. Emission restrictions.
4. Has a simple wallet.
5. The anonymity of transactions.

Disadvantages:

1. There are not many wallets that have been developed for Monero.
2. It is hard to develop applications that interact with its blockchain, you don’t know where your money came from and you can not check if it was involved in illegal deals (a so-called black side effect of anonymity).

Dash (DASH)

Experienced members of the cryptocurrency community know that Darkcoin, XCoin, and Dash are the names of the same cryptocurrency, which is specifically focused on the anonymity of transactions using the Darksend mechanism. The whole point is that the blockchain system records data about transactions, but the participant can choose the mixing option and its intensity – that is, your coins can be mixed with other users’ coins up to 8 times.

Advantages:

1. Low Commission fees. Sending transaction on the Dash network requires a fee, but it is much lower than fees set by banks or paid when using credit cards.
2. Instant transactions. This feature is made possible by the unique Instant Send technology, which takes about 1.5 seconds to confirm a transaction.
3. Involvement. Users can participate in the development of the network — thanks to the presence of DGBB (Decentralized Governance by Blockchain), users can offer their projects that can make the Dash network better.

Disadvantages:

1. Name of the coin. The name of the coin was changed several times, and mistakes were made when launching the project.
2. High competition. New startups are offering more advanced and multifunctional technologies to work with.

ZCash (ZEC)

ZCash or Zerocash is an open-source cryptocurrency that was created by the Zerocoin Electric Coin Company in 2014. During the development of this payment system, the privacy and selective transparency of transactions were in the first place. Several developers from different universities created the "Zerocash" protocol. It increases the anonymity of users in the payment system. The Protocol hides not only the origin of the payment but also its amount.

Advantages:

1. Privacy. Unlike Bitcoin, ZCash provides a higher level of data protection. Also, users can make public payments if they have nothing to hide.
2. Speed. Creating new blocks in ZCash takes less time. This means that all transactions on the network occur faster comparing to Bitcoin.
3. Mining. Mining of ZCash is much easier and faster.

Disadvantages:

1. Rate drop. Before the official launch of ZCash, many people believed that this currency could replace Bitcoin. However, the brainchild of Satoshi Nakamoto is still out of competition in the cryptocurrency market.
2. Linux support. ZCash developers officially support Linux only. They have previously stated that they did not intend to support other operating systems. Although this function has already been taken over by a third party.

Bytecoin (BCN)

The project appeared in 2012 and is based on the CryptoNote technology. The main goal of Bytecoin is to become an anonymous alternative to Bitcoin. Addresses of the transaction participants are closed with one-time ring signatures and the analysis of blocks will not be able to give any information since all addresses specified in the blockchain are unique and do not permit identifying patterns.

Advantages:

1. Safety. Users' electronic coins are protected by an advanced cryptographic encryption algorithm.
2. Speed. All transactions are instant and there is no commission.
3. Reliability. The coin has built-in protection against fraudulent actions, as well as against double embezzlement of funds and refund of payments at the end of transactions.

Disadvantages:

1. Low cost. The disadvantages of this project include the low cost of the coin, as well as the lack of clear prerequisites for its growth in price. Therefore, Bytecoin is not suitable for those who want to make a profit from investment activities in a short time.
2. Lack of earnings. Just a few cranes work with it, which limits the ability to earn it from novice users.

PIVX (PIVX)

Private Instant Verified Transaction or PIVX for short is a fork of the aforementioned Dash cryptocurrency. The PIVX cryptocurrency was created exclusively for mining with the help of the PoS (Proof-of-Strike) algorithm. The main goal of developers is to create a product focused on the crypto community. It is very important that users can quickly and anonymously carry out transactions with the new digital currency and that the management system is transparent and fair.

Advantages:

1. Strong support. It is actively used by a growing community, and represented in the most popular global social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Slack, Facebook).
2. Availability. The currency is available for purchase on the most popular cryptocurrency exchanges in the world.

Disadvantages:

1. PIVX works on a PoS 3.0 protocol and it is based on the Bitcoin Core 0.10x code base. It uses a 2-tier architecture with main nodes for decentralized control.

Komodo (KMD)

Komodo is a digital currency that combines the best qualities of ZCash and Bitcoin. It is based on a completely new security algorithm created by the project team. The consent mechanism, called delayed proof-of-work, makes it possible to certify transaction blocks using the Bitcoin blockchain.

Advantages:

1. Stability. Although this cryptocurrency has not gained as much popularity as Bitcoin, it has managed to acquire a significant number of loyal followers who are ready to support it and extract it.
2. Performance. Due to the project's youth and lack of load, all transactions are made fairly quickly.
3. Universality. You can work with currency both on desktop computers and on various mobile devices.

Disadvantages:

1. The high cost of mining equipment. As the complexity of currency mining increases, so does the price of the necessary equipment.

Particl (PART)

PART is a privacy coin that uses RingCT, CT, Bulletproofs and stealth addresses. The fact that it is built on the Bitcoin codebase makes it more flexible and allows RingCT to be used in decentralized applications.Particl is a cryptocurrency that can be used for various purposes. However, the main idea of Particl ecosystem and cryptocurrency is the building of a digital marketplace.

Advantages:

1. It does not collect personal information and hides the participants of all the transactions.
2. PART hides the amount that was used for a transaction.
3. There is the RINGCT which provides a high level of anonymity.
4. Particl makes it easy for developers to build new applications.
5. The Particl platform uses a custom Proof-of-Stake protocol.

Disadvantages:

1. You may need to set up TOR. It is required to protect anonymity and get privacy benefit, but its functions are not built in. Although, Particl can be used without it.

Verge (XVG)

Initially, the coin was called Dogecoin Dark, and behind its creation is the name of Justin Sunerok – a programmer who believed that Bitcoin didn’t cope with the role of an anonymous digital asset, and the slow blockchain’s speed didn’t not allow using BTC as a full-fledged payment tool. Thanks to five algorithms, the asset protects both the client and itself.

Advantages:

1. Popularization. Great popularization of the project among the masses at the international level, and openness of developers to the ideas of users from the world wide web.

Disadvantages:

1. Nothing new. The main drawback of cryptocurrency is that it does not offer anything innovative, it's neutral.

Horizen (ZEN)

This project is the result of a fork from a fork. Initially, part of the community separated from the Zcash coin by implementing a hard fork and creating the Zclassic coin. Another fork was carried out from it, which led to the creation of ZenCash. In August 2018 ZenCash was renamed to Horizen as it was a part of the brand renovation.The ZEN team is international and consists of more than 50 people from different countries and regions of the world. This is a cryptocurrency network focused on privacy and based on the Bitcoin consensus. It is a peer-to-peer network that allows payments between system participants to be made.

Advantages:

1. Privacy. The currency guarantees the reliability of information protection, but at the same time users can make public payments, there is no need to hide data.
2. Speed. Creating new blocks for a coin is simple enough. All processes are carried out much faster when compared with Bitcoin.

Disadvantages:

1. Instability. Exchange rate instability, frequent falls.

DeepOnion (ONION)

DeepOnion is an anonymous cryptocurrency that works through the secret TOR Internet network and on the X13 algorithm. The abbreviation " TOR " literally stands for The Onion Router. You can make various financial transactions confidentially by sending and receiving ONION coins using the DeepOnion e-wallet for transactions. With the help of the TOR network, you can reduce the risk of being hacked and prevent attacks by any unfriendly organizations, whether they are official or underground.

Advantages:

1. Prompt confirmation. Making payments and sending messages. There is no need to wait for hours, the entire broadcast process takes less than a minute.
2. High protection. Thanks to a reliable wallet with a high level of security, 100% anonymity of transactions are provided, including the exclusion of government surveillance.

Disadvantages:

1. ONION infrastructure is not developed very well, therefore it is not traded on top exchanges.

Spectrecoin (XSPEC)

The XSPEC cryptocurrency is based on the ShadowCash code. The anonymity of transfers is provided by a combination of such mechanisms as hidden addresses, which allow recipients to remain in the shadows.

Advantages:

1. Convenience. Easy to use apps on all devices.
2. Safety. Excellent reliability of the crypto wallet.
3. Earnings from the partnership. Remuneration is about 10% from operations on the service performed by attracted companies or individual users.
4. Low commission fee. A small commission percentage in transactions or exchange transactions.

Disadvantages:

1. Negative comments. There were many negative comments about this project on the Internet. This may be alarming, but they appeared before the service was restructured.

The most famous privacy cryptocurrencies are described in this article, but there are many other crypto projects with similar goals. They are emerging because personal data protection and privacy are urgent issues now. You are welcome to exchange them on SimpleSwap.

Stay tuned to be aware of new anonymous cryptocurrencies appearing in the Crypto World!

SimpleSwap reminds you that this article is provided for informational purposes only and does not provide investment advice. All purchases and cryptocurrency investments are your own responsibility.