As Bitcoin adoption grows globally, privacy has emerged as a new focus.
This is no longer an abstract ideal, but a real concern for everyday crypto traders and governments alike.
This shift was on display at Bitcoin MENA, where wallet developers discussed how the transparency of public blockchains could clash with real-world financial needs.
In a conversation at The Street Roundtable, Vikrant Sharma, founder and CEO of Cake Labs, explained how Bitcoin wallets are adapting to the tension.
Increased privacy awareness among Bitcoin users
Sharma said more Bitcoin users are becoming privacy conscious. Instead of being alarmed, they became more informed about how transaction history and balances can be easily tracked on-chain.
For many people, it has become increasingly undesirable to publicly reveal their full financial history, especially those who use Bitcoin for payments or donations.
“People want to use Bitcoin on the go, but they don’t want to reveal their history, balances, etc. So I think this sector will definitely grow with Bitcoin.” Sharma said.
He pointed out that this awareness is driving demand for privacy-focused wallet features.
To address this, Cake Labs has implemented tools designed to reduce the linkage of transactions, such as Silent Payments and PayJoin version 2.
Sharma said Cake Wallet is the first Bitcoin wallet to support both features, demonstrating a broader commitment to pragmatic opt-in privacy rather than complete anonymity.
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Silent payments are the solution
Silent Payments aims to solve one of Bitcoin’s most common usability challenges: address reuse. Although best practices do not recommend reusing addresses, constantly generating and sharing new addresses can be tedious.
With silent payments, users share a single, reusable “silent” address. Every time someone sends funds, the sender’s wallet automatically generates a new unique on-chain address derived from the recipient’s key.
Only the recipient can detect and use these funds, so observers cannot link payments or track balances.
Sharma cited online donations as a clear use case. Instead of posting a static Bitcoin address that makes all deposits public, users can publish a silent payment address that protects their privacy by default.
Ease of use remains the main hurdle
Despite growing interest, technical limitations have slowed implementation.
“The demand is there, but synchronization issues are keeping people away.” Sharma added.
Currently, silent payments require wallets to scan the blockchain to identify incoming transactions, a process known as synchronization.
This can be resource-intensive, especially for users who don’t open their wallets frequently.
Sharma compared this process to privacy-focused blockchains like Monero, where wallets have to scan blocks to find related transactions.
To improve usability, Cake Labs is integrating a new lightweight server model. This greatly reduces synchronization friction and improves the experience for non-technical users.
As these improvements roll out, Sharma expects the use of privacy-focused Bitcoin to continue to grow.
