Some facts about Litecoin's privacy feature MWEB

Litecoin is one of the 'OG' cryptocurrencies that seems to survive like a cockroach through markets. It's deceptively simple, offering a relatively fast, cheap and reliable way to send and exchange. But what alot of people don't know is that recently implemented an 'optional privacy' upgrade (MWEB) that could see it adopt a unique usecase.

So what is MWEB?

MWEB is a privacy and scalability upgrade. The primary purpose of MWEB is to provide transaction privacy.

To make use of MWEB'S optional privacy upgrade, Litecoin users can move their litecoins into “Extension Blocks”. Conceptually these can be thought of as forming a parallel blockchain to the main Litecoin chain.

Any transaction conducted within these blocks will conceal the addresses and amounts involved from everyone except those involved in the transaction, enabling users more transaction privacy than they could easily achieve on the main blockchain.

Whilst this is not "total privacy" like say Monero, it was designed to be compliant with regulations. This is important if Litecoin wants to be a mainstream cryptocurrency. In other words exchanges can OPT OUT of MWEB in order to comply with regulations. Of course you could get around this by simply transferring your litecoin to your wallet.

However the ability for exchanges to OPT OUT hasn't stopped some exchanges from delisting Litecoin. For example last year some Korean exchanges delisted Litecoin despite knowing it could opt out of MWEB.

MWEB users have been growing at a rapid rate. Metrics show that active user addresses have increased steadily over 2022.

People often say Litecoin is alot like Bitcoin only faster. Whilst that's true I think Litecoin's privacy feature well and truly makes it stand out in today's market.