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 go against the decentralized and self-governed 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, preserving the original essence of cryptocurrencies.
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 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 forces us to hand our personal information to a third party in order to buy, use or unlock our funds. We should start boycotting companies that enforce such practices. We should start using cryptocurrencies as they were intended to be used: without barriers.
other acronyms of interest
why only Bitcoin and Monero?
Bitcoin: it's the initial spark of the decentralized money. A solid project with a strong community. It is the most well-known and widespread cryptocurrency.
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 with a very active community.
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 can'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.
search
Filtering services in kycnot.me is very easy. In the main page, you will see 3 possible filters:
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.
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.
The scoring algorithm is open source, pull requests to improve it are welcome. It runs once every hour, this means it can't be modified as it will be recalculated by the algorithm hourly. You can visit a service's score breakdown to see how it is calculated.
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 donate using the following methods:
> If your wallet supports OpenAlias, you can use kycnot.me in the address field.
{{.Xmr}}
Click for QR Code
{{.Btc}}
Click for QR Code
Note: Donations should not be made with the expectation of receiving personal benefits for your service/product. If you did, I'll ask 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.
Click here for a quick guide on how to use Nostr comments.
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:
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. Tor and I2P sites are available (check the footer).
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:
api
KYCnot.me offers a public API to get its data.
If you make use of the API data, please mention kycnot.me as the source of the data.
example: /api/v1/service/localmonero
example 2: /api/v1/service/localmonero.co
rate limit: 5req/min (with bursts of 5)
referrals
I use referrals to help cover the site costs. The default website link is the referral, if there is any. But there's always a referral-free option, that is shown with a icon. Feel free to choose.
sponsored reviews
You will find some sponsored service reviews on the kycnot.me blog. These reviews are kept separate from the list, meaning that a service that sponsors a review will not receive any advantage on the list. The scoring algorithm is open source, it runs once per hour and cannot be tricked to improve a service's score. You can visit a service's score breakdown to see how it is calculated. Furthermore, services that are tied score-wise are sorted randomly to ensure fairness.
Sponsored reviews are a way to help fund server and domain costs, as well as the time invested in development and maintenance. I will never publish a review of a service I do not find trustworthy or that I have not tested before.
Reviews are performed independently from the service and then sent to it for review. The service may correct misunderstandings or clarify certain points to us, but it can never alter a truth about the service. If the service is not satisfied with the review, it will simply not be published. If the service is satisfied, it will send the sponsorship and the review will be published on the blog.
Any tests that are preformed in a review are performed as a regular user, without prior notice to the service and using personal funds.
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.