Why does it matter where your crypto taxes are calculated?
Your transaction history reveals your net worth. On someone else's server, it's a target. On your machine, it doesn't exist to attackers.
Breaches are not hypothetical
Cloud crypto tax platforms store your complete financial history on their servers. When those servers are compromised, attackers learn exactly what you own and what you've traded.
CoinTracker — 1.5 million users exposed
Names and email addresses of 1.5 million users leaked via a third-party analytics service breach. Listed on Have I Been Pwned.
CoinTracker — transaction summaries exported
A second breach via Mixpanel analytics exposed transaction-level summaries. Attackers now knew what users traded and how much.
Koinly — user emails leaked
User email addresses leaked via the same Mixpanel analytics breach. The number of affected users was never disclosed.
Waltio (France) — 50,000 users' financial data stolen
Profit/loss data and asset balances stolen. France saw 19 crypto-related kidnappings in 2025 alone — breached crypto financial data has real-world physical consequences.
French tax office employee — data sold to criminals
A government employee sold crypto investors' home addresses and financial data to criminal networks. The data was used to identify and target high-value individuals.
PrivateACB eliminates every one of these vectors. There is no server to breach. No analytics service to compromise. No employee with access to your data. Your financial data exists in one place: your encrypted database, on your machine.
2025 changed everything
New IRS and CRA rules mean crypto tax software isn't optional anymore — and what your software does with your data matters more than ever.
IRS: Per-account cost basis
Treasury Decision 10000 requires cost basis tracking per wallet and per account. The universal pooling method is no longer permitted. If you transferred crypto between exchanges, your 1099-DA may show $0 cost basis — making the IRS think your entire sale is profit.
IRS: 1099-DA reporting begins
Exchanges must file Form 1099-DA reporting gross proceeds. In 2026, they must also report cost basis. Millions of taxpayers will receive inflated tax bills unless they calculate their own cost basis with supporting documentation.
Canada: CARF automatic reporting
The Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework requires Canadian exchanges to automatically report user data to the CRA. First filings due 2027. Your transaction history becomes government-visible whether you file or not.
These rules create an urgent need for software that calculates correct cost basis. But that software will also process your most sensitive financial data. The question is: who else gets to see it?
The privacy-compliance gap
Most crypto tax tools fall into one of two categories. Neither solves the whole problem.
Cloud platforms
Generally support the latest IRS and CRA rules, including per-account tracking and 1099-DA categorization.
Your complete transaction history is stored on their servers. You create an account, upload your trades, and trust that their security holds. As the breach timeline above shows, that trust has been broken repeatedly.
Open-source tools
Run locally on your machine. No account, no upload, no server. Your data stays with you.
Most open-source crypto tax calculators have not implemented the 2025 IRS per-account basis rules (T.D. 10000). Some explicitly warn users not to rely on them for 2025+ US tax filing. Privacy-conscious users who need regulatory compliance have nowhere to go.
PrivateACB bridges the gap
Local-only privacy — no server, no account, no upload. Full 2025+ regulatory compliance — per-account basis tracking (T.D. 10000), 1099-DA categorization, Rev. Proc. 2024-28 safe harbor, CRA superficial loss with proration. Your data never leaves your machine, and your tax calculations meet the latest IRS and CRA requirements.
What stays local. What crosses the network.
PrivateACB is a desktop application. Here's exactly what happens with your data.
Stays on your machine
- Your CSV import files
- Every transaction record
- All cost basis calculations
- Capital gains and losses
- Tax lot inventory
- Generated reports (PDF, CSV)
- Your encrypted database
- API keys (encrypted via Windows DPAPI)
Crosses the network
- Exchange rate requests (Bank of Canada, FRED)
- Asset price requests (CoinGecko)
- License validation (one-time check)
Only public market data is fetched. Your trades, balances, and identity are never transmitted.
We never have
- Your name or email (no account exists)
- Your transaction history
- Your gains, losses, or tax liability
- Your exchange accounts or API keys
- Your database password
We can't be subpoenaed for data we don't have. We can't leak what we never collected.
Even "secure" servers can be compelled
Security isn't just about hackers. Governments have legal tools to access data stored on third-party servers — without naming you specifically.
John Doe summonses
The IRS has used John Doe summonses to obtain bulk user data from Coinbase (13,000 accounts), Kraken, Circle, and Poloniex — without naming specific taxpayers. The Supreme Court upheld this practice.
Government software partnerships
Some crypto tax platforms have direct contracts with the IRS to provide data analysis and tax calculation support. When your tax software is also the government's tax software, the line between "your tool" and "their tool" gets blurry.
PrivateACB can't be compelled
There is no server to subpoena. There is no user database to query. There are no analytics logs to hand over. Your data exists in exactly one place — your machine, encrypted with your password.
Private and compliant. 30 days free.