Crypto currencies continue their fluctuating trend, and altcoins have not significantly recovered from yesterday’s values. Following the opening of the US markets, BTC fell again, returning to its pre-rise level of the day’s first hour. So, what did Vitalik Buterin do to fire up the rockets of a lesser-known altcoin in this environment?
Privacy Altcoins and Crypto Mixers
Privacy-focused cryptocurrencies are often accused by governments of serving only criminals. It’s undeniable that crypto mixers and privacy tokens are frequently used by criminals, but this is not the case for the general user base. People may want to maintain their privacy without being criminals.
For instance, recent legal steps regarding website cookies allow people to choose not to leave traces on websites if they wish. Or, due to personal data protection issues, unauthorized distribution of information like mobile phone details is being prevented from being used for marketing purposes, among others. Then why are people who want to hide their movements on public blockchains considered involved in crime?
A politician or journalist trying to survive under oppressive regimes might want to hide their financial movements. Or, every year, many people are robbed or kidnapped for their crypto currencies, and to avoid the same fate, investors might use mixers to hide their assets. There are dozens of legitimate reasons for this usage. Vitalik Buterin generally touched on this topic.
Railgun Token (RAIL)
Ethereum co-founder today shared on his X account that the Railgun token has seen a 140% increase in the last 24 hours. The token, using the abbreviation RAIL, is not yet traded on centralized exchanges. Vitalik wrote today;
“Privacy is normal. Railgun uses a privacy pool protocol that makes it much harder for bad actors to join without compromising users’ privacy.”
Arkham Intelligence reports that Buterin showed his support today by transferring a significant amount of ETH to Railgun. Data shows the vitalik.eth address carried about 325 thousand dollars worth of 100 ETH. Additionally, according to Arkham’s analysis, the address interacted with the protocol almost every month, though the amounts were small.