Re: [Taler] Privacy concerns

[Christian Grothoff]

Dear Michael,

Fabian already gave you a good answer -- and really the reason why GNU 
Taler is a wallet with a balance in self-custody where you should hold 
funds for some time before spending.

I would like to add that of course you should use Tor (or a VPN, or 
public WiFi service, or Katzenpost, or ...) to hide/obscure your IP 
address when you want strong anonymity with GNU Taler.

Overall, GNU Taler provides a missing piece, but it needs to work with 
other pieces. For example, if you are using proprietary software, you 
also should not have strong privacy expectations. But merely because 
you're using a Libre operating system doesn't solve *all* surveillance 
problems. Still, I would claim that using a Libre operating system is 
better for informational self-determination and thus privacy.

That said, even if you do not do any of this, the situation with GNU 
Taler is *much* better for privacy than with existing payment systems: 
if you leak information on time and amount, it is still more plausible 
that someone else made the payment compared to using a traditional 
payment system with two-factor authentication, and IP address data is 
less identifying and not preserved for 10+ years like bank's KYC data. 
But of course, if you can, use physical cash, that will always be best!


Best regards,

Christian

On 5/5/24 21:50, Michael Kohn via Taler wrote:
> What is the threat model of Taler's security and how does it protect
> the "customer" (spender) against being identified by a real-world
> Government, i.e. one that has full acccess to all banking and network
> provider databases?