Why Monero

Traditional cryptocurrency is easily traceable. The whole premise is that crypto's a logbook of who owns how much, and who sent how much. That's not very good if you want anonymity.

After all, if a big old company like Coinbase decided to look into a person, they'd see every transaction that person made from their site, they'd see the bank details that were given to them, the KYC (know your customer) details such as passport/government ID/proof of residence, etc. From there, if they look at the wallet address that the person of interest frequently uses (wallet address = string of gibberish that is basically your ID on the bitcoin/dogecoin/shitcoin "logbook", i.e. your name) they'll see the transaction chain, from buying crypto, to sending it to your .cafe plug. If you're unlucky, your E seller might also use Coinbase or , and bam your transaction is linked directly to an illegal seller. If the seller is smart and isn't found out easily, then it's still possible to run some heuristics to easily identify the people that a seller had dealings with.

What's your saving grace? Your saving grace is that merely possessing HRT is not usually illegal in most countries (though it is in mine). What's your bane? If you live in a backwards ******** and your government is a friend of UKUSA then they've got some easy additional charges they could bring against you in case you fuck up and break a law (or the seller fucks up, imagine if the government cared to go after spiffy's clients after she got found out). Using Monero significantly reduces your risk. It doesn't make sense to use it if you're in a well-off country that has better things to do, but if you're paranoid, you should do use it.

What's Monero?

It's like Bitcoin but it's obfuscated. No one can know who sent what where (through the power of a hundred years of cryptography research).

The reason it works is that the "wallet address" (the string of gibberish that is effectively your name or ID) that you give out to people can be compartmentalized. If you're receiving from Coinbase, you only give that address to Coinbase, and from there they can't track it. Then if you receive from Binance, you give them a different address (name/ID), but the coins all go into the same wallet. When you go to send the coins (pay for your product), the receiver also doesn't show up in this "logbook" in a way that is traceable. Coinbase/binance can't go tell the govt. that X is buying Monero from us and sending it to Z, because all they know is that X bought from coinbase, and then another person Y bought some from binance, and they can't tell that Z received anything from anyone.

How to use Monero

I recommend using a GUI wallet for your PC (https://www.getmonero.org/downloads/#gui). You could also use the mobile wallets they recommend on that site, but I don't have any experience.

Setting up Monero GUI Once you've installed the Monero GUI wallet from the link, choose your language, and then press Simple Mode. Just Simple Mode. Read the disclaimer. If you have reasons for more paranoia, go back and do the bootstrap mode, but you're on your own for that.

Create a new wallet. Write down your mnemonic seed (in case you lose access to the monero GUI wallet). Don't be a dummy and read the things marked as (!).

In the end you should come to a nice looking dashboard. Wait for the bottom left area to say "Wallet is synchronized".

If you ever need more info on this software you can look here (https://github.com/monero-ecosystem/monero-GUI-guide/blob/master/monero-GUI-guide.md#create-a-wallet) or find something more up-to-date and easily digestible.

Stuffing your wallet

Identify some place you can easily put money in and get some type of coin out. Ideally you would get Monero/XMR, but really it doesn't matter what coin, just be wary of the fees you pay to get it. There are also some fees in a future step, but you can think of that later.

Kraken, Coinbase, Binance, for reputable places that would take your card, personally I have no issue with using the first one. These places require "know your customer" information (KYC), like an address or a passport or ID scan - it is a legal requirement for them to be able to operate. If you're not a fan of KYC, use Bisq if you don't mind some messing about. Bisq is good if you want to eliminate one more weakness in the process. Otherwise, you can maybe see if there are Bitcoin ATMs near you or something.

On these exchanges, go register, click around until you can buy a coin, preferably Monero directly, if you don't mind having it be known that you buy Monero, or just good old Bitcoin (or cheapest shitcoin, as long as you can exchange it) is also good. Take note of the fees you pay to purchase.

If you bought a shitcoin, then find an swapping exchange. I like changenow because it's no hassle, but the fees are a bummer sometimes (NOTE: Trocador also works and has lower fees, and others). On ChangeNow, choose the shitcoin you have, and choose to get Monero. Go on your Monero GUI wallet and under "Receive" click on "Add a New Address" and type in some descriptive name for this new address, can be anything. When the ChangeNow website asks for an address, give it the new address that you just made. From now on always use the labelled address on Changenow, this is like giving your name to them, so if you use it somewhere else, you might accidentally allow people to correlate it between themselves ("oh wow also bought some coins from us how interesting!!"). Send the cryptocoin that you bought to the address that ChangeNow gives you, and wait 20-30 minutes for the Monero to show up in the top left of your Monero GUI wallet.

If you bought Monero directly from kraken, coinbase, binance, bisq, or whatever, then you should go to your Monero GUI wallet and under "Receive" click on "Add a New Address" and type in the name of the website you bought your monero from. Go to transfer your Monero from the website, and when it asks for a wallet address to transfer to, give it the new address that you just made. From now on always use that address on that website, this is like giving your name to them, so if you use it somewhere else, you might accidentally allow people to correlate it between themselves ("oh wow also bought some coins from us how interesting!!"). Wait 20-30 minutes for the Monero to show up in the top left of your Monero GUI wallet.

Paying

Ideally, you'd go to an HRT website, fill up your cart, checkout, and then you'd pay directly using Monero. That's not always possible. A note here, "sending" in Monero is not like receiving, you don't need to generate new addresses each time because it is anonymous by default.

If you can pay using XMR: checkout, and where it asks you to pay, get the wallet address that the website gives you, and copy it into the Send tab of your Monero GUI program. Make sure the Amount matches exactly!! Also double check that the amount is consistent with the actual price of Monero at that time... for example if the site asks for 0.4 XMR, then go on google and convert that to dollars. After you press send, type in your password, and wait for 10 confirmations (it just takes time, so wait). Once it's gone through, go and email your HRT vendor that you paid. Some vendors, like Otokonoko Pharma will ask you in their email to use the format "Order number: and Transaction ID: ", you can just copy it and fill in the details: the order number from the email itself, and the TXID from your Monero GUI. To get the TXID, go to Transactions, find the one you just made, and click to copy whatever it says under Transaction ID.

If you have to pay using Bitcoin or something else: checkout, and where it asks you to pay, get the wallet address of the crypto type that the website gives you, and go to Changenow (or Trocador or whatever). Select XMR on top, and the type of coin on the bottom, usually Bitcoin or whatever the HRT vendor is asking for. Type in the precise amount into the bottom that the vendor is asking, and then proceed to payment. When it asks you to, paste the address you copied from the vendor in the receiving field, and then pay like normal to the wallet adress that the swap exchange gives you. (outlined above in If you can pay using XMR) In this case, you don't have to copy the TXID, but if you email the vendor that you've paid, and they ask for transaction proof, you can send them a link to an online blockchain viewer (like blockchain.com), just paste their own address into it first. I haven't found a better way to do it yet.