What is PrivateSend? Anonymous payments with DASH

Dash is one of the great cryptocurrencies of the crypto world, a place that it has come to occupy thanks to the work of its community and developers, who have made it possible for features such as PrivateSend to be possible to use and available to everyone.

Una of the reasons behind the creation of Dash It was the ability to make secure and anonymous transactions, something PrivateSend is concerned with. As its name says, PrivateSend is a Dash feature that allows private transactions. But not only that, but also said transactions are completely anonymous. In this way, nobody can know who are the parties that participated in said transaction.

To achieve this, Dash uses the well-known technique of "mix of coins". This technique consists of taking a certain amount of coins and mixing them with others. Thus, it seeks to completely hide what funds come from which direction and to which direction they go. The process is also reinforced by the number of mixtures that are made, since the greater the number of mixtures, the safer and anonymous the process is.

Imagine it this way, you have a $ 100 bill whose serial is related to you. Due to this serial, if you make a payment to a person they may know that you paid that person at some point. To avoid that, you want to make a mix of coins. In the process, you will receive the same $ 100 but in smaller denominations, while maintaining control of your funds at all times. So each new ticket you receive will come with a serial that they cannot relate to you. That way you can make the payment safely and anonymously.

How does PrivateSend work?

First of all, PrivateSend divides your transaction entries into standard denominations. These denominations are 0,01 Dash, 0,1 DASH, 1 DASH and 10 DASH.

To start the process, the wallet sends requests to masternodes for them to start mixing. The user must choose a denomination within the parameters that the network allows. It is also allowed to join several denominations to obtain totals of your choice. The user's request is made in such a way that the masternode receives the mix request but does not know who is sending it. This is the first step to ensure user anonymity.

The mix request is then put into a "mix queue", where there are requests from other individuals. Once the queue is full, the mixing process begins for all users. To perform this process, the masternode combines the entries and instructs the users' wallets to make the corresponding payments. This payment is made by the wallet to an address called direction of change. This change address is part of the addresses that the user's wallet can create.

Finally, to completely hide your funds, this process is repeated several times. With each repetition it becomes more difficult to determine where the funds originated and lead them to their identity.

PrivateSend use cases

The fact of having a payment system that takes care of your privacy and offers you anonymity is very important. The use cases of these systems are varied and among them we can mention:

Make anonymous payments or donations to organizations or individuals

There are many reasons why people want privacy and anonymity, and one of them is to be able to make donations to organizations or people without this meaning publishing our identity.

A good example of this type of donations can be, for example, those made to organizations such as Greenpeace, Human Rights Watch, Doctors Without Borders o Journalists Without Borders. All of them organizations recognized worldwide for their struggles and ideals, but also controversial by certain governments or people who describe their work as dangerous. In any case, if we want to financially support these organizations and take care of our identity in the process, Dash PrivateSend offers us the perfect solution.

Maintain the privacy of your expenses

Another reason to make use of anonymous payments is simply to maintain absolute privacy of your expenses. With PrivateSend you have the ability to keep your expenses under complete anonymity and privacy. In this way, tracking them can be a futile and expensive task for anyone who tries it.

Advantages and disadvantages of PrivateSend

Advantages

1. It is a process integrated into Dash. There is no need to use a special wallet or access other services, PrivateSend is an official part of Dash.
2. Being integrated to Dash, the algorithm and protocol of use of PrivateSend is well elaborated and revised. Any security issue can be quickly fixed by the official development group.
3. It offers a high level of security and anonymity.
4. PrivateSend usage fees are quite low compared to services like the coinjo. In comparison to other anonymous cryptocurrencies like Monero or Zcash, the fees are quite similar.
5. The coin mixing process is simple to perform and very fast.

Disadvantages

1. The process requires a full node to be able to be done safely. There are services like MyDashWallet that allow PrivateSend to be used without the need for a full node, but the process requires an intermediary that may or may not be secure.
2. It is poor compared to protocols like Monero or Zcash. These latest cryptocurrencies allow establishing an absolute level of anonymity that PrivateSend cannot offer at the moment.

However, if you are more into using Bitcoin you can use the coinjo, your protocol for privacy of which we have a complete guide here on Bit2Me Academy.