- - 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) 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-sovereign 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, thus preserving the right to privacy. I want to help preserve the - original - ethos 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. - - - Chainalysis found that only 0.34% of the transaction volume with cryptocurrencies in 2023 was attributable to - criminal - activity. Bitcoin's share of this is significantly lower with 25%. Illicit transactions with Euros accounted - for 1% of - the EU's GDP or €110 billion in 2010. [1] [2] - - - 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 - - SoF: Source of Funds - KYC: Know Your Customer - ToS: Terms of Service - - - - - 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. The request form requires javascript to avoid spam. Read more about the PoW captcha in this section.. - - - 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: - - - - - 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. - - - 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, meaning scores cannot be manually modified since they 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, since I can't test all the services frequently enough. - - - - - terms of service auto-reviews - - - KYCnot.me features an AI-powered tool that automatically reviews Terms of Service (ToS) for all the different - services. It breaks down the ToS content, highlights the main points, and translates them into - easy-to-understand language, aiming to simplify the comprehension of any service's ToS. - - - - For this, I am using OpenAI's GPT4-turbo model, which proved to be the - most reliable and provides the best results. - - - - Important note: The automated tool generally delivers reliable and solid results. But it might flag false - positives or irrelevant lines, if you find something's off, please contact me. - - - - - support this project - - - If you like this project, or - any of my other projects, you can support me through these - methods: - - - - - - - - - - - Monero - - - - > If your wallet supports OpenAlias, you can use - kycnot.me in the address field. - - - {{.Xmr}} - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Click for QR Code - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Bitcoin - via - silent - payments - - - - > If you want to donate without Silent Payments, request an address via any of the contact methods. - - - {{.BtcSilent}} - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Click for QR Code - - - - - - - - - - - - Tip via Lightning Network - - - - - - - contact - - If you have any queries or concerns, you can connect with me on any of the listed social media - platforms below. - - - For confidential communication (e2ee), please reach out via SimpleX link. - - - - - 💬 SimpleX Chat ? - - - 🪶 Nostr ? - - - 🦣 Mastodon - - - 🇽 Twitter (X) - - - 🐭 Lemmy - - - - - - comments - - - Each service has a dedicated comments section. The comments are suppored - by a self-hosted instance of Comentario. An open-source and lightweight (20kb) commenting engine. - - - - To comment on a service's page, you can log in with Twitter, Github or Gitlab. Anonymous comments are also possible, but these need to be approved before being public to avoid abuse. - - - The source code for Comentario is licensed under MIT license. - - - - 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. - - - * Comment section on each page, available on a self-hosted Comentario instance. - - * All changes are recorded on the changelog - * See any service's score breakdown: bisq example - * Open API to get all the listings data - - * Open scoring algorithm. All services go under the same algorithm, - meaning that the score is not subjective. - - * Test proofs: I am slowly adding proofs for each verified service, providing a PGP signed proof that I have personally tested the service. To see a proof, click the "verified" badge next to a serivce's name, inside the service page. - - - - - 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 require Javascript. Everything is rendered server-side. - You can use KYCNOT.me with Javascript disabled. - - - Only things that do require JavaScript to be enabled are: - - - Service Requests: The Proof-Of-Work captcha, that I coded myself, needs - JavaScript for the verfication. It is an open-source - 2.5kb javascript function. - - - Comments: The comment section on each of the services, needs - JavaScript since it needs to fetch and post to Matrix. The code that - makes this interaction is also fully open source. Read more in this section. - - - - - - api - - KYCnot.me offers a public API to get its data. - - If you make use of the API data, you should mention kycnot.me as the source - of the data. - - - - example: - /api/v1/service/bisq - - - - example 2: - /api/v1/service/bisq.network - - - - rate limit: - 5req/min (with bursts of 5) - - - - - referrals - - - - Referrals help me cover the site and maintenance 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. - - - - - disclaimer - - - This website does not provide any 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. - - -
- - - nostr? - - - Start by reading - the nostr basics - to understand how Nostr works. - - - - creating an account - - - - Creating a Nostr account is as easy as generating a private key. From - the private key, your public key will be derived. The public key acts as - your username. - - - - In this guide, we will use - Browser Signer Extensions - to generate the private key, these act as a vault for your private key, - and Nostr apps will interact with the extension, issuing sign requests. - This way, your private key never leaves your computer local storage. - - - - For this, I recommend you use - Nostr Connect - extension. Install it on - Chrome - or - Firefox. You can also find a list of available Signers - here. - - - - Then, open the extension, generate a private key and click save. That's - all, you are now part of Nostr. - - - Other ways to generate a key: - - - - Use key mining tools like - rana. - - - Use - nostr CLI - - - Use platforms like - primal, - snort or - coracle. - - - - - configure your profile - - - - Visit - Nostr Profile Manager - and configure your profile: - - - - Configure the Metadata fields. - - Add some relays. Check out - nostr.watch for a - list of relays. - - - - - use - - - - After your account is set up, you will be able to log in to any platform - that uses the Nostr protocol, and use it. Take a look here to find a client that suites your needs. - - -