Blockchain shared send minimum

Hey guys does anyone know if the blockchain shared send minimum of 0.2 btc is really the smallest amount you can send safely? Because I am wanting to use the service but am only interested in sending around .05 bitcoins. Should I be worried?


Comments


[1 Points] scruffwuff:

no


[1 Points] KansasBibleCompany:

I've had experience with this situation myself. For as low as 0.04 BTC, it worked out in the end with not much more than just a really long wait. Before that, I think I did more 0.10-0.20 BTC transactions too that went through perfectly. The Send Shared page mentions that the 0.20 BTC minimum is "recommended", whereas there is a hard 250 BTC limit on transactions (which are sent back if they exceed the amount). While I would be a bit careful, chances are that it will go through, and Blockchain staff may be able to help you if all else fails.

When I sent 0.04 BTC to my Send Shared address, it took a couple of days to arrive there, far longer than usual. The minimum amount to send was still listed as 0.2 BTC, but at the time I think BTC were worth $200-400 USD. This wasn't long ago, but the value of BTC has substantially increased in the short time since. You likely could have transferred as little as $20-40 through this a few months ago, but now the advised minimum is effectively >$200.

After I sent BTC to Blockchain, the transaction started getting confirmations, then the funds started being tumbled to various Bitcoin addresses. But there was no sign at all of a transfer from Send Shared to my destination account in the coming hours. Usually it takes no more than an hour, and sometimes it's almost instant. But neither my Bitcoin app nor BC's website showed any indication of the money being sent to my address. I just called it a loss when 8 hours passed, since that's when they claim to throw away the wallet data for that address. But oddly enough, the 0.04 BTC or so that I had figured were lost in transit ended up appearing in the destination account a day or two later. I had no idea how this happened, or if this is a normal experience on Send Shared.

There's a couple of things about how Send Shared works that may be worth noting in this case. According to the page linked to above, it works by repeatedly swapping and moving around users' bitcoin balances. But I'm not sure where the user sending 0.04BTC/~US$15 fits into this "food chain" of transactions. Do I need to have found a reasonable number of "peers" with similar-size transactions to be successful (which might explain why it took so long?) Or was some of my meager 0.04 BTC swapped out with pieces of someone's 200BTC in "Bitcoin mining profits"? As for data privacy, your Send Shared Bitcoin address and transaction data is intended to be destroyed after 6 confirmations or 8 hours. However, I think they can keep data for longer if there are pending problems with the transaction, or some limited data if the transaction is still waiting to be confirmed.

Why would they use/advise a lower bound on the required BTC amount in a transaction, though? Bitcoin network fees are likely a major reason why. There's a point when they'll start losing money...if you go below 0.001-0.0001 or so, the coin transfer fees on a tumbler will probably cost more than the money transferred. A good tumbler might need to make large numbers of BTC transfers not only to destroy the link between one Bitcoin wallet and another, but possibly also to simulate pseudo-"legitimate" patterns of use and movement. Unfortunately the $1000/BTC+ prices mean that the typical Bitcoin transaction fee of 0.00001 BTC is now equivalent to $0.10 or more. This can add up for businesses that execute lots of transactions, like bitcoin tumbling services. I don't know how many movements your typical Send Shared or BitcoinFog transaction goes through; they've probably found the optimal way to mix coins up (in public transactions) while minimizing transaction fees. Some argue that the transaction fee is a good way to discourage abuse/overuse of the Bitcoin network and prevent the block chain from being spammed. However, I really think we shouldn't underestimate the significance of BTC tumblers as a beneficial and unprecedented tool for people to exercise control over their financial privacy. These are probably challenges the Bitcoin network will deal with in coming years.

This all kind of makes me wish I could learn how these various tumblers are designed. While it would probably be controversial, it would be neat to see the former Silk Road code (or parts, like the tumbler) published under an open source license. Tumblers are one thing that new darknet markets don't seem to have gotten down yet, so I'd hope that if a good one was made available as a free library then market operators would be able to run their own. But hopefully in the meantime, Blockchain's limit issue hopefully won't be hard to fix. If it's just a matter of changing a parameter value to reflect the increasing Bitcoin value or similar, then hopefully it'll be taken care of soon. Shared Send is convenient and inexpensive, and I really want to be able to trust it again to transfer lower amounts.

Sorry for the insanely long post.


[0 Points] boobookittyface:

I just shared send less than that, more than .150