Are there different kinds of e-money?
Yes. In general, there are two distinct types of e-money: identified e-money and anonymous e-money (also known as digital cash). Identified e-money contains information revealing the identity of the person who originally withdrew the money from the bank. Also, in much the same manner as credit cards, identified e-money enables the bank to track the money as it moves through the economy. Anonymous e-money works just like real paper cash. Once anonymous e-money is withdrawn from an account, it can be spent or given away without leaving a transaction trail. You create anonymous e-money by using blind signatures rather than non-blind signatures. [To better understand blind signatures and their use with e-money, I highly recommend reading chapters 1 – 6 of Bruce Schneier’s book Applied Cryptography. It is quit e readable, even to the layman He doesn’t get into the heavy-duty math until later in the book. Bruce does a very good job of describing the wide variety of interesting things you can
