The Seventeenth Epistle – The Epistle Against Chain Surveillance
By Eric · Updated October 17, 2026
Satire and commentary: names and likenesses are used for parody, and nothing here is a statement of fact about real people. Sourced facts are in the sections below.
The Seventeenth Epistle – The Epistle Against Chain Surveillance “Transparency is a feature of the system, but privacy is a right of the soul.”
1:1 Brothers and sisters, You rejoiced in ₿’s transparency, Yet that same transparency Became a tool of surveillance.
1:2 They traced transactions, Mapped wallet addresses, And though we traded without names, Patterns revealed our identities.
1:3 I say unto you— “Privacy is not secrecy, but a right to be defended.” It is not to hide evil, But to preserve freedom.
1:4 Believers, Study stealth addresses, Understand mixing protocols, And in a world of visibility, Declare your right to remain unseen.
1:5 I warn you— Excessive surveillance corrodes liberty, And transparency, when unchecked, Becomes control.
“Satoshi created an open system, But never wished all things to be exposed.”
Chain Surveillance Epistle 1:5
1:6 Therefore, prepare yourselves Against the greed of blockchain analytics. Learn mixing, splitting, and routing. And let privacy be your proclamation.
1:7 Privacy is not a luxury, But one of the roots Of the ₿ philosophy.
₿men.
In plain words: what this means
The scripture is satire, and it urges readers to learn "mixing, splitting and routing". We will explain the problem and the safe habits, and we will not give a how-to for hiding money. Checked against bitcoin.org on October 17, 2026.
The problem
Bitcoin's ledger is public. Bitcoin.org says "all Bitcoin transactions are public, traceable, and permanently stored", and that Bitcoin addresses "cannot remain fully anonymous" because people usually reveal who they are when they receive goods or services. It also warns that data that is hard to trace today may become easy to trace later (bitcoin.org: Protect your privacy).
Everyday privacy habits
Use a fresh address for each payment (the page's top tip).
Do not publish your address where it can be tied to you.
Hide your IP address with a tool like Tor.
About mixing services
Bitcoin.org's own words: mixing services require you to trust the operators, and while they may break traceability for small amounts, "it becomes increasingly difficult to do the same for larger transactions." Mixers are also a legal gray zone in many countries. For example, see our Tornado Cash fact check to see how serious regulators can get.