Quote from: franky1 on November 19, 2023, 11:11:46 AM

taint is a term even early adopter/dev bitcoiners use for the UTXO path back to its proven creation (coin-reward).. its a real thing.
even back then discussions were said about "blacklisting" "colouring" "tracing" coins

its actually part of the audibility of bitcoins open ledger, that each bitcoin has a origin/spending path

taint existed before mixer/obfuscation services existed
taint existed before any chain analysis company started operating
taint existed before any government cared about bitcoin

yep "taint" has been a buzzword in bitcoin for 12+years.. is not something the government invented

Bitcoin is not fungible, so dirty coins can easily be identified on the Blockchain. The transparency of BTC is not a bug but a feature. It's a great way keep an eye of the flow of transactions on the network. This can help detect malicious actors on-chain. Addresses don't have an ID linked to them, so there's no way to tell the coins belong to you unless governments use surveillance/analytics tools. Using a new address for each transaction, avoiding centralized exchanges, and using a mixer would be your best best to help protect your privacy.

Unfortunately, it's hard to remain anonymous when regulations are becoming stricter by the day. There so many limitations aimed to make your life impossible. Governments have done their part by shutting down as much centralized mixers as possible. The public now believes mixing is a very bad thing (thanks to government propaganda and misinformation). Non-custodial mixers will survive, but they will only be used by a small number of people. Expect privacy on Bitcoin to be a contentious subject for a very long time. No one can predict the future, so lets hope for the best. :/