Most of the currencies in the crypto world, including Ethereum and the Bitcoin run under transparent blockchains. This means that the transactions in them are traceable as well as verifiable by any person around the world.

More to that, when you send and receive addresses for these kind of transactions, they could be traced back to a person’s identity in the real world. This is totally different with the Monero cryptocurrency. This is because it uses cryptography to create a shield in sending and receiving addresses as well as the amounts which have been transacted. This ensures the privacy of the activity of all users.

In that case, this article will be aimed at giving you an insight on the history of Monero, background check on the founders as well as feature some few cases of its use to give you a better understanding of the Monero cryptocurrency.

History of Monero XMR

Back in the year 2012, the Byte coin which was the first ever crypto note to be implemented in real life was launched. Basically the crypto note works under the protocol of fueling the various decentralized currencies in the crypto world. Somehow, the crypto note is similar to the application layer which runs the bitcoin but still there is a very clear line that distinguishes the two.

The Byte coin had promised its supporters and users that it was going do its best in the market although there was still so much which was going wrong with the coin at that moment. This being the case, there was the need to fork this byte coin blockchain where new coins in the chain were invented.

Originally, Monero was launched by a certain user from the Bitcoin-talk forum. Then, the Monero was introduced under the name BitMonero meaning that it was a compound of the Bitcoin and Monero. Later, the supporters of this currency opted for the shortened name Monero for convenience.

In the year 2014, when the XMR Monero was launched, it was introduced as an open source, high privacy oriented currency which was designed to operate as per the blockchain concept. The head staff of the Monero is chaired by 7 developers although only 2 of them have come out in the public openly. The other five have chosen to remain anonymous, and they would like their status to remain that way. The two are Riccardo Spagni and David Latapie.

Understanding Monero

Unlike most currencies which have their ledgers publicly showing the activities and transactions of the participants on every network, Monero has made their blockchains somewhat opaque intentionally. In that case, the identity of every sender and recipient as well as the amount transacted is made anonymous by disguising the original address of the participants.

Apart from the anonymity feature, Monero comes along with what we call the egalitarian concept which allows for equal chances of the participants in the mining process. Actually, when the founders of the Monero launched this currency they did not take any stakes for themselves. Instead they banked on the overall contributions made by the supporters and the community in order to make further improvements on this virtual currency.

When you join the Monero, you get paid for all the activities by joining the available Monero pools or even individual mining processes. The best part is that the Monero mining process is compatible with the standard computer and there is no special hardware or software needed like the application-specific integrated circuits. With any of the leading operating systems in the market like the Android, Windows, Linux or Mac operating system, you can comfortably run the Monero.

Monero’s Privacy Protocol

With the help of the stealth addresses and ring signatures, Monero works toward alleviating the privacy concerns of all its users. The ring signature are put in place to conceal the identity of the sending participant form the other group participants. These ring signatures, in case you may be wondering, are digital signatures which come from one of the members in a group but ensuring that they do not reveal the identity of the member who authenticated the transaction.

The Monero uses diverse combinations of the account keys of every sender then joins them up with the public keys in the blockchain to make the ring signatures. In that case, with this routine, things happen to be very unique at the same time private. This whole level of technology ensures that the identity of the sender is absolutely hidden. Whatever the case, it is impossible to know which member’s key in the group was used at a particular instance to come up with the sophisticated signature.

On the other hand, the stealth addresses are also used as additional privacy procedures. Here, the platform creates random one time addresses unique to every transaction made in place of the recipient. This conceals the address of the actual destination in the transaction and the address of the participant who is on the receiving end. Not forgetting that the Ring Confidential Transaction ensures that amount transacted is also made anonymous.

This whole procedure was made functional in January 2017 after being able to hide the identities of both the sender and the receiver as well as the transacted amount successfully. Today, the RingCT has been made a mandatory thing in all transactions which are carried out across the Monero network.

Special Features of Monero

Monero is in high demand in the market. This is because it has a few unique properties which makes it outstand among other cryptocurrencies. The question is… What does this Crypto note algorithm has to offer?

To start with, the fact that transactions made on the Monero are made private and confidential to individual users, it means that you are fully responsible of your money. No one will be able to see or access what you spend on. In addition to the privacy, the Monero currency is fungible. By fungible I mean that it is interchangeable with other goods or assets of the same type. This means that Monero can be substituted mutually without any difference between the two coins. In this case, the history of the transactions made with Monero are fully untraceable therefore participants can never be held responsible of any events they transact with their Monero.

Monero has gained so much popularity recently, especially with this high level of privacy. All in all, this has led to the rise of some questionable marketplaces like gambling and the dark web. Despite that, Monero still remains the 13th largest currency in the crypto world as per the market capitalizations.