One of the core Bitcoin accounts on X (formerly Twitter) shocked its followers and cryptocurrency enthusiasts with a post on September 6 celebrating Bitcoin’s (BTC) lack of privacy, amid centralized exchanges delisting privacy coins for regulatory compliance.
Answering another post that said: “Privacy coins will be outlawed and delisted from all exchanges. For Europe it starts now”, the core account celebrated that “Bitcoin does not have to worry about this.”
Although there are no official Bitcoin accounts on any socials, because Bitcoin is not a company, but a decentralized system built by independent contributors worldwide, this specific account is highly influential.
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This happens as it owns the unique @Bitcoin handle on the most popular social platform. Registered on Twitter in 2011, the core account has over six million followers.
Criticism and cypherpunks
Criticism rose among crypto and privacy advocates after the shocking sayings, mostly due to Bitcoin being created in a pro-privacy environment, by an active movement called Cypherpunks. “Bad take as usual”, said David (@DavidShares, 15,000 followers).
“A cypherpunk is any individual advocating widespread use of strong cryptography and privacy-enhancing technologies as a route to social and political change. Originally communicating through the Cypherpunks electronic mailing list, informal groups aimed to achieve privacy and security through proactive use of cryptography. Cypherpunks have been engaged in an active movement since at least the late 1980s.”
— Wikipedia
Some other influential accounts, like Chris Blec (@ChrisBlec, 51,000 followers) and Seth for Privacy (@sethforprivacy, 24,000 followers) started questioning @Bitcoin’s credibility: “Who runs this account?”
Notably, the owner of the unique Bitcoin handle on X has not answered any of these comments yet, or commented on this matter again, by the time of publication.
Privacy coins being delisted
Following a series of previous delistings, Binance has announced that Monero (XMR), MobileCoin (MOB), Firo (FIRO), and Horizen (ZEN) will be delisted in Belgium by September 21:
“Binancians that reside in Belgium will no longer be able to purchase, or trade certain privacy coins on our platform.”
— Print-screen of a supposed email sent by the Binance team, shared by MisterCh0c (@Mister_Ch0c)
This is not the first time Binance or other centralized exchanges (CEX) have removed privacy coins for regulatory compliance.
In this context, this is also not the first time that privacy advocates have questioned the Bitcoin community on similar topics, as reported by Finbold on August 7, when the ‘Bitcoin Twitter’ raged as the Samourai Wallet (BTC only crypto wallet) announced a Monero-based feature to boost privacy.
