<p>Well, that depends. First, never reuse addresses if you are doing this.</p>

<p>Second, if you are not mixing, the transactions will, with no exception, be traceable. Would there be someone focused on you, he would see the bitcoins move around, and so most probably think they are spent. But if he is really interested in you, he will probably keep track of the coins and whenever you really spend one of them, he will probably notice and try to track the owner of that address to see what you did with them.</p>

<p>He will probably only stop keeping track of those coins if he sees them being spent by someone that cannot be you, or if he cannot track them anymore as they are split up and combined with many other coins.</p>

<p>You must be quite paranoid considering your few questions here. I can maybe advise you to buy bitcoins for cash like via localbitcoins.com. Apart from the guy you trade with, no one will know you bought coins.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T08:13:32.343Z
Firstly, I do not reuse addresses when I carried out those steps described in my original post. Secondly, I fail to see how someone could suspect I was the one who all along moved Bitcoins from one computer to the next when during the transfers, the Bitcoin-Qt wallet was connected to the internet via VPN gateways/exit nodes that are different for each transfer. I have made sure that each VPN gateway/exit node is located in countries that are at least 1,000 to 2,000 kilometers apart.
user5556
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T08:17:21.903Z
Well, *if* there would be people tracking you, they probably aint stupid and know that you could be doing that. Furthermore, when you would f.e. add the coins to a web wallet or an exchange, they would also travel across the globe and they will also keep an eye on those coins.
Someone seriously wanting to find you would probably keep track on everything until it is no longer possible and only when he found something he will consider the odds of it still being you.
That's what I would do though.
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T08:17:27.937Z
You wrote "or if he cannot track them anymore as they are split up and combined with many other coins." Are you saying that one of the surest way for someone to stop tracking the flow of my Bitcoins is to use a Bitcoin mixer?
user5556
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T08:20:42.323Z
Well, yes. When you put coins in a mixer, they will be split up in many small parts and you will receive many small parts from many different other users.
That's what a smart mixer might do. So mostly none of your own coins come back to you, meaning that it is a real dead end. The only thing one could do to track across mixers is when he sees your transaction of 100 BTC being split up in 10,000 parts, look for another transaction that combines little parts to 100 BTC.
But I would consider smart mixers to have some latency and maybe sent the 100 BTC in small parts to different addresses.
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T08:28:24.723Z
The smart way to mix would be to send small amounts to the mixer from time to time and not one lump sum of Bitcoins, am I right?
user5556
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T16:38:25.320Z
Yes, that's correct.
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-21T10:49:36.490Z
@user5556: When you're tracing bitcoins, you totally ignore intermediary hops that have no known identities or other transactions. So if you see bitcoins go from A to B to C to D, if you have no information about B or C, and they were only used as intermediaries between A and D, you ignore them. The very first, most obvious step someone tracing your bitcoins would do would make this pointless.
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-21T13:05:25.570Z
@David Schwartz: _The very first, most obvious step someone tracing your bitcoins would do would make this pointless_ Sorry, could you explain what you meant by it?
user5556
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T02:12:53.947Z
@user5556: The very first thing someone trying to trace your Bitcoins would do is ignore these transactions. They would immediately replace A->B->C->D with A->D.
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T08:16:59.100Z
@DavidSchwartz Well, there's a difference between tracing a bunch of bitcoins and tracing a person. If you want to trace person X that has some bitcoins and these make the chain X->B->C->D, when the coins arrive at D, it is very likely that they no longer belong to person X. You want to find the transaction that transferred them from X to another person or service if you need to know what X did with the coins.
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T14:34:23.950Z
@David Schwartz: _They would immediately replace A->B->C->D with A->D_ Your example presupposes that A does not use a mixer. If A uses a mixer, then it is pretty difficult to trace D back to A, am I right?
user5556
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T15:56:20.423Z
@user5556 Well, with a good mixer, there won't be a "trace" from A to D.
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T21:06:02.090Z
@StevenRoose: Right. That's the difference between a mixer and what the question is asking about.
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-22T22:00:31.063Z
@DavidSchwartz Haha, yeah sorry, totally forgot about the OP :)
Steven Roose
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-06-17T07:58:49.417Z
2013-06-17T07:58:49.417Z
Steven Roose
<p>I installed the wallet from Bitcoin's official website on 4 computers each running Microsoft Windows 7.</p>

<p>Moreover on each of the 4 PCs, I installed OpenVPN client, meaning each of the computers access the internet via VPN.</p>

<p>Suppose I do not use an online Bitcoin mixer to further anonymize my transactions.</p>

<p>Instead I transfer my Bitcoins from one computer to another, all the while making sure that the VPN gateway/exit node is located in a different country.</p>

<p>Question: can my transactions be traced back to me?</p>

<wallet>
Can my transactions be traced back to me even if I do this?
user5556
# Can my transactions be traced back to me even if I do this?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2013-06-17)

I installed the wallet from Bitcoin's official website on 4 computers each running Microsoft Windows 7.

Moreover on each of the 4 PCs, I installed OpenVPN client, meaning each of the computers access the internet via VPN.

Suppose I do not use an online Bitcoin mixer to further anonymize my transactions.

Instead I transfer my Bitcoins from one computer to another, all the while making sure that the VPN gateway/exit node is located in a different country.

Question: can my transactions be traced back to me?

**Tags:** wallet


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2013-06-17. Score: 2 | Accepted answer

Well, that depends. First, never reuse addresses if you are doing this.

Second, if you are not mixing, the transactions will, with no exception, be traceable. Would there be someone focused on you, he would see the bitcoins move around, and so most probably think they are spent. But if he is really interested in you, he will probably keep track of the coins and whenever you really spend one of them, he will probably notice and try to track the owner of that address to see what you did with them.

He will probably only stop keeping track of those coins if he sees them being spent by someone that cannot be you, or if he cannot track them anymore as they are split up and combined with many other coins.

You must be quite paranoid considering your few questions here. I can maybe advise you to buy bitcoins for cash like via localbitcoins.com. Apart from the guy you trade with, no one will know you bought coins.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Firstly, I do not reuse addresses when I carried out those steps described in my original post. Secondly, I fail to see how someone could suspect I was the one who all along moved Bitcoins from one computer to the next when during the transfers, the Bitcoin-Qt wallet was connected to the internet via VPN gateways/exit nodes that are different for each transfer. I have made sure that each VPN gateway/exit node is located in countries that are at least 1,000 to 2,000 kilometers apart.  
> **username_1**: Well, *if* there would be people tracking you, they probably aint stupid and know that you could be doing that. Furthermore, when you would f.e. add the coins to a web wallet or an exchange, they would also travel across the globe and they will also keep an eye on those coins. Someone seriously wanting to find you would probably keep track on everything until it is no longer possible and only when he found something he will consider the odds of it still being you. That's what I would do though.  
> **username_0**: You wrote "or if he cannot track them anymore as they are split up and combined with many other coins." Are you saying that one of the surest way for someone to stop tracking the flow of my Bitcoins is to use a Bitcoin mixer?  
> **username_1**: Well, yes. When you put coins in a mixer, they will be split up in many small parts and you will receive many small parts from many different other users. That's what a smart mixer might do. So mostly none of your own coins come back to you, meaning that it is a real dead end. The only thing one could do to track across mixers is when he sees your transaction of 100 BTC being split up in 10,000 parts, look for another transaction that combines little parts to 100 BTC. But I would consider smart mixers to have some latency and maybe sent the 100 BTC in small parts to different addresses.  
> **username_0**: The smart way to mix would be to send small amounts to the mixer from time to time and not one lump sum of Bitcoins, am I right?  
> **username_1**: Yes, that's correct.  
> **username_2**: @username_0: When you're tracing bitcoins, you totally ignore intermediary hops that have no known identities or other transactions. So if you see bitcoins go from A to B to C to D, if you have no information about B or C, and they were only used as intermediaries between A and D, you ignore them. The very first, most obvious step someone tracing your bitcoins would do would make this pointless.  
> **username_0**: @username_2: _The very first, most obvious step someone tracing your bitcoins would do would make this pointless_ Sorry, could you explain what you meant by it?  
> **username_2**: @username_0: The very first thing someone trying to trace your Bitcoins would do is ignore these transactions. They would immediately replace A->B->C->D with A->D.  
> **username_1**: @username_2 Well, there's a difference between tracing a bunch of bitcoins and tracing a person. If you want to trace person X that has some bitcoins and these make the chain X->B->C->D, when the coins arrive at D, it is very likely that they no longer belong to person X. You want to find the transaction that transferred them from X to another person or service if you need to know what X did with the coins.  
> **username_0**: @username_2: _They would immediately replace A->B->C->D with A->D_ Your example presupposes that A does not use a mixer. If A uses a mixer, then it is pretty difficult to trace D back to A, am I right?  
> **username_1**: @username_0 Well, with a good mixer, there won't be a "trace" from A to D.  
> **username_2**: @username_1: Right. That's the difference between a mixer and what the question is asking about.  
> **username_1**: @username_2 Haha, yeah sorry, totally forgot about the OP :)  

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