Silent Payments keep your Bitcoin private, and you safe from extortion
Silent Payments keep your Bitcoin private, and you safe from extortion originally appeared on TheStreet.
A common phrase you might have heard if you were born before the economic system was digitized and credit cards became the standard form of payment for Americans was 'cash is king.'
Cash is valuable to people, in large part, because it is untraceable. Oftentimes, criminals would take advantage of this fact to avoid taxes, buy illegal substances, and keep their true wealth hidden from onlookers. There are plenty of reasons someone may want us cash for completely legal reasons, including gifts for spouses that would be given away if included on a credit card statement, tipping, avoiding debt, and shopping at cash-only businesses.
Bitcoin is not like cash. It is a public ledger, where anyone can look up every transaction that has been made on the network. If someone knows your wallet address, there are no secrets, including your total balance.
Vik Sharma, CEO of Cake Wallet, spoke with TheStreet Roundtable's Jackson Hinkle to discuss what he is building to help people use Bitcoin 'on a daily basis' without fear that their data will be known to the world.
Bitcoin wallets do not display on the network with your name or any other personal information. Instead, they are a random sequence of numbers and letters. Still, there are a myriad of ways someone might be able to figure out whose address is whose.
One way someone might get that address is if you send it to them for a transaction. 'When you give somebody your address, they can see your activity, your balance, in that address. Everybody in Bitcoin says 'don't reuse the same address.' So now you have to generate a new address every time somebody wants to send you Bitcoin,' explained Sharma.
This is a hassle for people who want to keep their information private, and with kidnappings and extortion of crypto figures becoming more common, that number is increasing.
Silent Payments is a feature supported by Cake Wallet that allows users to receive Bitcoin without exposing their public wallet address. Instead of broadcasting a fixed public address, the recipient shares a silent payment address, which is similar in appearance to a normal address, but cryptographically different. 'Every time somebody else uses (the silent payment) address to send to you, a new address is generated on the sender side for you that only you can access,' said Sharma. This gives users unparalleled privacy when conducting Bitcoin transactions, without needing to understand complex technical steps or jump through extra hoops. In short, it allows Bitcoin to be used as cash currently is, something not possible with traditional wallets.
Silent Payments keep your Bitcoin private, and you safe from extortion first appeared on TheStreet on Jun 10, 2025
This story was originally reported by TheStreet on Jun 10, 2025, where it first appeared.
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