Why you should NEVER give your adress and username at the same time

While browsing forums like reddit and even this one, I have seen many people sharing their public address, so they could receive some cryptocurrency from someone who was giving it out. Even if it doesn't look like it, these actions are extremly dangerous and could get you hacked.

The problem

If you give your adress on a public forum where you username is shown you could potentially be in trouble.
Let me explain.

You see, the beauty of public adresses is that there is no way for hackers to know who they belong to. That make's it harder for them to hack you, since they don't know who you are! How will they hack someone they don't even know about? If I show this transaction, what do you understand about it?

Well, you can tell me that someone gave 0.0018 BTC to someone else. But you can never tell who those persons are. You can never target any of these individuals. This is why all of this blochain tech is so awesome - anonymity.

This awesomeness all ends when you give your adress and your public username at the same time.
Let's say Sam has a ETH adress (5GNXXX) and he gives it out on a forum where we can clearly see his username (Sam123). If Sam shares his adress and then receives 1 ETH people will be able to track this ETH and most importantly people now now that 5GNXXX = Sam123's wallet.

In this situation, a hacker now knows that Sam's adress 5GNXXX has 1 ETH in it. This same hacker can now try to keylog Sam, social engineer or even try a phising scam on Sam, because he know's who he is and what he has!

You will tell me, @funmemes just tell Sam to transfer his 1 ETH to his main/other adress. This doesn't fix the problem, since we can track every transaction on the blockchain and no transaction can be erased. This is the situation now :

If Sam send his crypto to his main adress it doesn't change anything since the hacker know's who to target : Sam. This is even worst since the hacker now know's Sam's main adress.

The solution

• Delete any comment you left on threads, where we can see your username and adress

• If you already received cryptocurrency on that adress don't transfer it to an other wallet. I'd recommend you send it to an exchange (new account) and that you change it to fiat (cashout).

• Next time you want to publicly share your adress use a unique wallet AND a different username for that purpose and never, ever transfer crypto from that adress to your main one.

Conclusion

Be safe. Never say how much crypto you have. Never flaunt. And never share information about yourself (even if you think it's harmless, any small detail can matter). Better safe than sorry.