Bitcoin as well as most other cryptocurrencies are considered surveillance coins. This is in contrast to Privacy coins, which consist of only a small percentage of cryptocurrencies.
What are Surveillance Coins?
Any cryptocurrency which has an open blockchain ledger where the sender and receiver can be ascertained is considered a surveillance coin. This is because analytic techniques can be used to determine many attributes of the transactions, including the transaction amount, the sender address and the receiver address. Blockchain analysis along with metadata or data provided by exchanges can allow for the identification of the parties to the transaction.
Privacy Coins
Privacy coins differ from surveillance coins in that the sender, the receiver and the amount of the transaction are masked to prevent any identification of the parties to the transaction. The most well-known privacy coin is Monero.