Address Clustering (Common-Input-Ownership Heuristic)

Core idea

Groups addresses likely controlled by one entity based on shared transaction inputs, since multi-input spends imply common private-key control. Extended with change-address heuristics to grow the cluster.

When to use

Moving from individual addresses to identifying a single wallet, entity, or exchange controlling many addresses.

Avoid when

Heuristic, not definitive; CoinJoin and shared-wallet services can produce false clusters. State the confidence level in reports.

Example

Several addresses used together as inputs in one transaction are attributed to the same controller and merged into a single entity cluster, then refined with change-address analysis.

Related

Change-Address Heuristics (UTXO Analysis), Transaction Graph Analysis (TGA), Exchange / VASP KYC Correlation