How Monero's privacy features actually keep your information private.
Monero uses an obfuscated public ledger, meaning anybody can broadcast or send transactions, but no outside observer can tell the source, amount or destination. Monero uses a Proof of Work mechanism to issue new coins and incentivize miners to secure the network and validate transactions.
Monero is a secure, private and untraceable currency system.
How does Monero work?
Monero is a secure, private and untraceable cryptocurrency. It achieves this through a number of innovative features, like stealth addressing and Ring Signatures, Ring Confidential Transactions, Kovri, etc.
As a user, you'll first need a Monero wallet address. This is a 95 character string and comprises two sets of private and public cryptographic keys. In order to understand what role these keys play, let's go through a typical Monero transaction.
When Alice sends outputs (ie. funds) to Bob for example, Alice will use Bob's public view key and public spend key, as well as some random data to generate a unique, one-time public key. This key is visible on the Monero blockchain, but only Alice and Bob know who was involved in the transaction and how much XMR was sent.
Next, Bob's wallet scans the blockchain with his private view key, until the right output is found. Once the right output is found, Bob's wallet can calculate a one-time private key which corresponds with the one-time public key generated earlier. Joe can now spend the outputs using his private spend key.
Now that we understand a basic Monero transaction, let's take a closer look at the set of private keys included in each wallet. First, we have the private spend key which is a 256-bit integer and is used to sign Monero transactions. It also is one of only two private keys usually associated with a Monero wallet, the second being the private view key.
The private view key gives you the permission to view the contents of a Monero wallet address. This is why the Monero blockchain is considered private, because balances are not visible without the private view key.
Now that the basics are covered, we should now turn our