Ensuring the privacy of financial transactions has been a major reason for the invention of cryptocurrencies. Financial transactions via banks and major payment providers are always visible to intermediaries and regulators to prevent fraud and ensure regulatory compliance. Don’t get us wrong—this is a good thing and necessary for many reasons, most importantly consumer protection. However, the public nature of permissionless blockchains requires a high level of encryption to protect the information stored on the blockchain; otherwise, ownership of assets and their entire transaction history would be publicly visible to the entire world. This is why cryptocurrency developers eventually have protocols in place to ensure privacy.