Importance of privacy

One often hears the sentence "I have nothing to hide" when talking about privacy. Even if you are not one of the cybercriminals who use Bitcoin for blackmail and other criminal activities, privacy on the Internet is of enormous importance. Freedom of expression is threatened by the loss of privacy. Through statistical evaluation of your visited websites a lot can be said about your personality. Among other things a relative exact determination of your age and your gender is possible. Fear of this surveillance then leads to so-called self-censorship. Many people no longer write publicly what they think out of fear of surveillance. If many people act like this, this already leads to large-scale censorship and this without the freedom of opinion being directly restricted by law.

Privacy in the crypto space

While many people are aware of the importance of privacy in this context relatively quickly, it is less obvious why privacy plays a role in trading crypto currencies. In order to understand the importance of privacy and the role of instant exchanges, we first need to know what kind of data a traditional Exchange will collect. As traditional exchanges I refer in this article to all exchanges that, in contrast to the instant exchange Flyp.me, need an account.

The traditional exchanges of course know the email address of the user. Often, however, also his name and possibly even his address. When a hack takes place, this data is stolen and then available to cybercriminals. The user has no possibility to protect himself against it. The best protection here is still not to have the data collected in the first place.

From my point of view, the more dangerous data are those collected in the background. For example, an exchange can evaluate which trading pairs a particular user is interested in. The prices the exchange offers him could then be slightly higher than those of the other users, since he is probably willing to pay more. Traditional exchanges often sell more Bitcoin than they actually own. If all users wanted to withdraw their coins at once, the Exchange would have a huge problem. Then, however, they can simply block a user's account and thus prevent him from withdrawing his coins (which actually belong to him!)! This can also lead to market manipulation. By selectively deactivating wallets of a certain currency, an exchange can have a significant influence on the price of a crypto currency.

The solution for these problems are so-called instant exchanges like flyp.me and shapeshift. These allow users to trade crypto currencies without creating an account.

Comparison of the best instant exchanges

ShapeShift.io

ShapeShift is probably the oldest and best known of all instant exchanges. However, ShapeShift recently introduced the KYC (=Know your customer program) and since then you can only trade if you create an account. ShapeShift also uses Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager. For all these reasons, ShapeShift is completely flawed in the privacy analysis.

ChangeNow.io

ChangeNow is an instant exchange that uses in the background several well-known exchanges like Poloniex and Bittrex to offer its services. The exchange loses speed and by using two exchange servies for one trade, the fees increase. In addition, instant exchange can ask the customer to disclose his data at any time. The instant exchange relies on Google TagManager and also uses the Facebook like button. All this damages the privacy of the users enormously.

Changelly.com

Changelly.com may also be known to many users as instant exchange. However, you also need an account for changelly, which damages your privacy. In addition, Changelly.com uses Google Analytics, Google TagManager, Facebook like button, Reddit share and other services that affect the privacy of the user.

Flyp.me

Flyp.me is the newest of the instant exchanges listed here. It is the only instant exchange that does not need an account and there is no danger of a sudden KYC test. Flyp.me does not use a single tracker on its website! Neither Google Analytics nor the Facebook like button can be found on the site. No user data is transmitted to external services. This is exactly how you imagine a private, secure, instant exchange!