[daheza]

But how do you get the bitcoins without giving someone a credit card / debit account? It's a part of the chain that seems like it could all be traced back to one person. Person A buys bitcoins using their credit card. The bitcoins are then used to pay for the VPS. Are there any only bitcoin marketplaces that accept gift cards?

[Qub3d]

Bitcoin tumblers [0] are a thing:

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocurrency_tumbler

[ithought]

On Paxful, you can buy a variety of ways that are essentially anonymous.

[TylerE]

Rob someone on LocalBitcoins, obviously.

[elastic_church]

Just buy the bitcoin. The objective is to unlink the transaction later. Using cryptocurrency should be a completely benign action, and if there's any ounce of thought in your mind that makes you think it is an admission of "I'm doing something sketchy", then that's more reason to buy cryptocurrency and use it everywhere for completely benign things. Just like most contrived trends, you do it ironically until it is an actual habit.

For unlinking, Monero (cryptonote technology) is the private cryptocurrency to use today. The primary different between competitors is that Monero is private by default. Other 'private cryptocurrencies' are public by default with an optional privacy gimmick (see mixers, Dash, Zcash). Transparency is the optional gimmick in cryptonote.

You want to keep a balance of Monero, and use services like Shapeshift, over TOR, to pay for invoices priced in bitcoin.

Exchanges like Kraken allow you to buy Monero directly nowadays with USD. So bitcoin isn't part of this equation anymore, the network effects supporting bitcoin's incumbency were extremely overstated.

But if that infrastructure isn't yet available in your area, buy Monero on an altcoin exhcange after buying bitcoin. Or even shapeshift Bitcoin for Monero, just to top up your balance.

This is the separation of cash and state, so don't worry about what they think, this is a parallel infrastructure that doesn't leverage their financial institutions.