Monero (XMR), the undisputed leader in transaction privacy, has now turned 12.

Since its launch in 2014, Monero has established itself as the digital gold standard for privacy.

Monero's long journey

Bitcoin, the original cryptocurrency, operates on a transparent public ledger, meaning that every transaction can be traced. Contrary to a popular misconception, it is not anonymous.

Monero was specifically designed to address this problem by concealing the sender, receiver and amount of every transaction by using advanced Ring Confidential Transactions and stealth addresses.

One XMR cannot be tainted by its transaction history. Furthermore, Monero is highly decentralized with a global community of researchers.

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This commitment to privacy, however, did not sit well with some regulators. Over the past several years, Monero reportedly survived 73 exchange delistings. Yet, instead of collapsing, Monero’s transaction volume and user base have remained remarkably stable.

Earlier this year, Monero experienced a minor revival, piggybacking off the success of rival privacy token Zcash (ZEC). On the technical front, Monero developers are pushing forward with the highly anticipated FCMP++ upgrade.

Celebrating Monero's anniversary

Major blockchain projects and industry leaders took to social media to pay their respects to the veteran privacy protocol.

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson offered his congratulations, posting: "Happy birthday Monero! Thanks for 12 great years of innovation and progress in the privacy space."

Fellow veteran cryptocurrencies also joined the celebration. The official Dash account humorously tweeted, "Happy birthday little bro!" while Litecoin chimed in with a simple "happy bday."