Full transparency builds trust, but did you know that anyone can see your crypto balances? This is true but it’s a good thing. These blockchains are only as good as the communities that drive them. I spoke about this on my page “What is Blockchain Technology?“.

A Blockchain explorer like https://etherscan.io is a public ledger for the Ethereum blockchain. Here you can see live transactions throughout the blockchain in real time. When you send crypto through the blockchain you will be given a transaction number which will be linked to a block and you can see the process of said transaction. Same with the transaction’s wallet addresses. If someone were to know your 42-digit wallet address, the blockchain makes the data available to everyone at any time. That way all transactions are transparent.

Surprisingly, this is considered a very safe way to transfer money and other assets in the way that transactions are confirmed and published for everyone to see. If a block is tampered with, that unique block becomes invalid. That block then gets removed from the chain.

Unlike traditional currencies, cryptocurrencies are anonymous but completely transparent. Ironic but true. It means that you can find any Bitcoin transaction at any point of Bitcoin’s existence. Senders and recipients are identified with wallet addresses instead of names. Like the gibberish we already mentioned above: 1CKXsyrhF9zfzizZb1x9zwkHczjxNRc6by.