There has been some discussion here about how anonymity/pseudonymity can be applied to a wider range of relationships. One possibility that Tim May and others have mentioned is to have escrow agents be anonymous. (I will use "anonymous" and "pseudonymous" more or less interchangeably because the former term is more familiar. But I am really referring to a case where the agents maintain a certain amount of continuity via secret keys and such.) (Let me make it clear that I am not arguing that there SHOULD NOT be anonymous escrow agents. I am questioning whether they are likely to be viable entities due to the problems I am listing here.) The obvious problem I see with anonymous escrow agents is that it is much harder for them to become and stay trustworthy. With an identified (non-anonymous) agency, you can have a lot of information on which to base your judgement. You can look at its assets, at its employees and hiring procedures, at its record. You look at the jurisdiction in which it operates and judge what protection the legal system may offer. You can look at other agencies in that jurisdiction and what their track record has been. I would guess that most of that information would not be available from an anonymous escrow agent, at least not in a validated form. Perhaps some of it could be done with credentials (a blinded statement from a reputable accounting firm that (this?) escrow agency has assets of $X). But generally thinking I think it will be very difficult to get nearly as much high-quality information about an anonymous escrow agent. This leaves the possibility of using its public record to judge trustworthiness. It may be able to offer certified statements (again, credentials of a sort) from earlier customers to show that it behaved honestly. Tim has suggested "pinging" such businesses, performing various dummy transactions to make sure that they are still behaving honestly. All this can help establish a record, but how well can this be extrapolated into the future? One of the problems with anonymity which has no underlying identity certification is that you are pretty much forced to adopt the stance that "the key is the identity." Your only channel of communication with the agent is via its key, and any message signed with that key has to be assumed to be coming from the agent. There is nothing else. The problem with this is that keys are not people. People, and businesses, have a certain continuity, a certain predictability. Keys do not. A key may change its personality, literally overnight, and you will not have any warning about this. In an identified business, if it changes hands, acquires new management, or has some other change which might lead to new behavior, you generally have some warning (especially if it is a business which is selling trustworthiness, in which case it will probably provide customers with an unusual degree of access to the business's internals.) But with an anonymous business this is not the case. An escrow agent who has been as steady as the sunrise for years may, without any warning, become totally dishonest. Hidden behind the shield of anonymity there is no way for its customers to discover the change. What are the motivations for an anonymous escrow agency to stay in business, to not take the money and run? Legal sanctions would presumably be ineffective. One proposal is that as long as the expected future stream of income is worth more than the current value of all contracts being held by the agent, it is worthwhile for it to be honest. There are a couple of problems with applying this. First, it is necessary to know about how many contracts the agent is holding at one time. But this will be complicated by the possible desire on the part of many customers to keep their activities secret (even beyond their presumed shield of anonymity). So there must always be the worry that more contracts are in progress than you suspect. This is especially true when you consider the possibility that other agencies may secretly be owned by this one. But more importantly, judging whether a future income stream is worth more than a present sum depends on knowing the escrow agent's personal time preferences. Some people like to have their money now, some are willing to postpone present gratification in favor of future income. Neither position is inherently right or wrong, but obviously a customer would feel more comfortable with an agent which favored future income. And the fact that an agent has been in business a long time suggests that this is indeed its view - if the agent is stable. But combine this with the ease with which a key can change its personality without warning and it suggests that even a long track record of stability could be fragile. The business is passed from father to son, it is acquired, it is coerced away, the owner experiences a change of circumstances due to illness or other catastrophe, and suddenly the agency has changed. Now, future income doesn't look so attractive compared to present money. Now, the owners have an incentive to close the business and (I firmly think the word applies) cheat their customers. Again, with an identity-based business these kinds of changes will be monitored closely by customers. And after a change like this the customers will be nervous and may go through a period where they don't fully trust the changed company. But with an anonymous agent there is no way of knowing when these things happen, and this uncertainty will constantly threaten the safety of the customers. Hal