Why · What · Only Bitcoin and Monero? · About listings · ToS reviews · Support · contact · comments · transparency · privacy · disclaimer

why kycnot.me?

Cryptocurrencies were created to revolutionize the way we pay for goods and services, aiming to eliminate reliance on centralized entities such as banks and governments that control our economy.

Exchanges that enforce KYC (Know Your Customer) and AML (Anti-Money Laundering) rules operate similarly to traditional banks. Users are required to provide identification, such as a photo of their ID, to use these exchanges. Moreover, most of these exchanges are centralized, meaning that users do not own their keys. In short, this implies that the cryptocurrencies belong to the exchange and not the user. These requirements contradict the decentralized nature of cryptocurrencies.

With KYCNOT.ME, I hope to provide people with trustworthy alternatives for buying, exchanging, trading, and using cryptocurrencies without having to disclose their identity. This preserves the essence of cryptocurrencies, which is decentralized and self-governed.

what's KYC?

KYC stands for "Know Your Customer", a process designed to protect financial institutions against fraud, corruption, money laundering and terrorist financing. Or at least this is what they want you to believe.

The truth is that KYC is a threat to our freedom. KYC is a direct attack on our privacy and puts us in disadvantage against the governments. True criminals don't care about KYC policies. True criminals know perfectly how to avoid such policies. In fact, they normally use the FIAT system and don't even need to use cryptocurrencies. Banks are the biggest money launders, the HSBC scandal, Nordea or Swedbank are just some examples.

KYC only affects small individuals like you and me. It is an annoying procedure that obligates us to hand our personal information to a third party in order to buy, use or unlock our funds. We should start boycotting such companies. We should start using decentralized exchanges and decentralized wallets. We should start using cryptocurrencies as they were intended to be used.

other acronyms of interest

  • AML: Anti-Money Laundering
  • CFT: Combating the Financing of Terrorism
  • SoF: Source of Funds
  • ToS: Terms of Service

why only Bitcoin and Monero?

Bitcoin: it is the most well-known cryptocurrency. It's widespread and has the biggest market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies.

Monero: if digital cash was to exist, it should be like Monero. Fungible, private by design, fast and pretty low fees. Also, one of the oldest cryptocurrencies around.

No other currencies will be added. Most sites listed here also accept other cryptocurrencies, such as Ethereum or Litecoin.

listings

request

You can request a new listing by visiting the Request page.

listing process

The listing process is usually slow. I first need to review the service, read online reviews, gather evidence and history of good reviews / opinions, test it myself (i don't always do this), read the terms of service, privacy policy, etc...

I do this on my own free time, so I'm slow at it. If you feel like a pending service deserves to be listed, you can contact me and I will try to speed up the review process.

what is an attribute?

An attribute is a feature that a service has. An attribute can be either good, a warning, bad or informational. Attributes are not limited, the list of attributes will grow if needed, you can see a full list of the attributes available on the Attributes page.

You can click on any point to see a detailed description of what it means. The point page also shows all the listings that have that point. This is also a useful way to find listings that have a specific feature.

Filtering services in kycnot.me is very easy. In the main page, you will see 3 possible filters:

  • Type filter: Lets you choose between seeing all the listings (default), only exchanges, or only services.
  • Search bar: The search bar is the most powerful filter. You can use it to perform a full-text search on the listings. The search will look for the text you enter in the name, description, keywords and category. The search is not case-sensitive.
  • Currency filter: Lets you choose between seeing all the listings (default), only listings that accept a certain currency. If you choose more than one option, it will show all the listings that accept all of the selected currencies.

kyc Levels

KYCnot.me has a KYC level system. These levels allow you to quickly identify the kind of KYC practices a service may have. There are 4 levels going from 0 to 3. The higher the level, the more invasive the KYC practices are. You can click on the level on the service page to see a detailed description of what it means.

scoring

Each listing has a score that is calculated based on the attributes that it has. The score does not reflect how good an exchange is overall, but it seeks to give a score in relation to its KYC practices. An exchange could have an awful UI/UX, but if it is very NO-KYC friendly, it will still get a high score.

order

The listings are sorted in a decreasing order by score. For listings that share the same score (tie), the order is random every time within that score range.

pending

You can find the list of services that have been requested and are pending for approval here: /pending

verification

You will see that some services show a blue badge with a tick. This means that the service has been tested personally by me.

To check the service, I make a trade on the site, or test the service manually. With this, I can verify that the service does not perform KYC practices on regular basis, and that it is not a scam, at least at the time of the verification.

These checks are done randomly and without prior notice to the service. For this reason, and as the list is in constant growth, not all services have been verified yet and it takes me some time to verify them.

A verified service does not mean that the service is safe to use blindly, it just means that at the time of the verification, the service was not performing KYC practices on regular basis, and that it was not a scam. It is still recommended to do your own research before using any service.

terms of service auto-reviews

KYCnot.me has an automated tool that reviews the Terms of Service (ToS) for various services. This tool utilizes AI to analyze the ToS text, extracting key points and presenting them in simple, plain English. The aim is to make understanding the ToS for any service easier and more straightforward.

For this, I am using OpenAI's GPT4-turbo model, which proved to be the most reliable and provides the best results.

Important note: This automated tool is not perfect, it may detect false positives, or non-relevant lines. But, overall, it returns reliable and good results.

support this project

If you like this project, or any of my other projects, you can make donations using the following methods:

  • Monero

    > If your wallet supports OpenAlias, you can use kycnot.me in the address field.

    {{.Xmr}}
    Click for QR Code Monero address QR code
  • Bitcoin {{.Btc}}
    Click for QR Code Bitcoin Address QR Code
  • Lightning Network

Note: I fund this project entirely on my own, as an independent individual without sponsors or alternative revenue streams, I rely solely on donations and referrals (if you choose to use them). I am committed to maintaining the project's independence and integrity, thus I do not accept bribes or sponsorships. Please note that donations should not be made with the expectation of receiving personal benefits for your service/product. If you did, I'll be happy to return the donation to you.

contact

Due to misuse and the inability to manage them effectively, I have removed all instant messaging / email contact methods, since I was leaving many inquiries unanswered. Please feel free to reach out to me on any of the following social media platforms for any questions or concerns.

For more private communications, simply request via these platforms, and I will provide you with an email address or an alternative instant messaging option.

(nostr) comments

Each service has a dedicated comments article. The comments are suppored by Nostr, a decentralized structured data sharing protocol used to build social networks.

> Visit this page for a simple and quick introduction to Nostr.

To comment on a service's page, you just need a Nostr private key and a secure nostr siging extension (nip-07) for logging in. I recommend using Alby or nos2x

transparency

In order to increase trust from visitors, KYCNOT.me strives to be as transparent as possible. Here are some of the ways in which I try to achieve this:

  • Open Source Code - A commit history, and full disclosure of the scoring algorithm is provided.
  • Public comment section on each page, available on Nostr.
  • Endpoint to download the full database
  • Open scoring algorithmg. All services go under the same algorithm, meaning that the score is not subjective.

privacy

KYCNOT.me does not have trackers and never will. It does not make any third party connections from the frontend. No user data of any kind is collected. A "no-referrer" policy is enforced, so no site will know that you came from kycnot.me.

javascript

KYCNOT.me does not use Javascript. Everything is rendered server-side. This means that you can use KYCNOT.me with Javascript disabled.

Only things that require JavaScript to be enabled are:

  • Requests: The Proof-Of-Work captcha, that I coded myself, needs JavaScript for the verfication. The code is public, and you can read it yourself on the repo.
  • Comments: The comment section on each of the services, needs JavaScript since it needs to fetch and post to Nostr. The code that makes this interaction is also fully open source and can be reviewed in the repo as well.

disclaimer

This website does not provide any not financial advice. Always do your own research before using any service. This site is for informational purposes only. I'm not responsible for any loss of funds or any other damage that may occur by using any of the services listed here. Use at your own risk.