I realise that the kind of idiots who like Bitcoins will be the same fools who drool over Google, and that these same monkeys won't see any problem with providing an algorithm which generates a secret to a third party for execution,
Bitcoin mining doesn't involve any secret information.
I'm not sure why you're slagging "idiots who like Bitcoins" so much, either. Sure, Bitcoin has attracted some cranks, anarchists, people who don't trust government-issued money, and speculators who will say all manner of things in attempts to influence the price of Bitcoins (both up and down), but have you actually looked at the crypto and the system of incentives built into the Bitcoin system? It's brilliant, and it's basically the micropayment system that everyone wanted back in the 1990s, but couldn't have because it didn't exist.
For example, authors are charged almost $3,000 to publish a single article in PLoS Biology.
I've never heard anyone make a convincing case for why it actually needs to cost that much. I suspect those numbers are just a symptom of fat, money-hungry publishers adopting fat, money-hungry procedures.
FOSS developers already have systems for massive, worldwide peer review of open-access technical publications (their source code). If established publishers can't figure out how to charge *substantially* less than $3000 for an article, then I suggest that they get out of the business entirely.
I think you misunderstood my observation. I'm not saying they could replace the Bitcoin network with an incompatible one; I'm saying they could implement their trusted-third-party-based offline security model using the *existing* Bitcoin network.
It would be a lot like if I paid you in Casascius coins. You could accept them immediately as-is (trusting the hologram and the fact that you've seen me in person), or you could open them up and load their contents into the Bitcoin network before proceeding further.
To clarify, I mean that there probably isn't a single secret that's on all the MintChips. There is probably one private key per MintChip, but you are correct that the security of the whole system appears to depend on all of these private keys remaining secret from their users. Good luck with that, indeed!
Let me repeat that, the security of offline transactions is based entirely on a secret which is on every single mintchip.
I don't think that's true. I had a look at some of their protocol documentation---which isn't all that detailed---and it looks like they're probably using PKCS#7 signatures and X.509 certificates.
Let me get this straight: MintChip is a proprietary, patented, centralized, unpublished cryptosystem, where a trusted-third-party (the Mint) signs a certificate saying "this private key was stored in a tamper-resistant hardware token that is designed not to double-spend", so we're supposed to just be able to assume that any valid MintChip transaction signatures are trustworthy, even offline. As soon as one person extracts a private key from a MintChip token (which they will, given that there's a monetary incentive), the fundamental assumption that the whole system relies upon is destroyed.
Your organization appears to know this, which explains why you emphasize that MintChip is intended for "low value" transactions.
Fine, so the security of the whole system depends on the security of these hardware tokens, and yet you're "not in a position to release" any tangible information about them? Why should anyone invest in this system? Because you're The Mint?
You have the threat model wrong, too. Why on earth would you want to emulate cash? Cash is easy to counterfeit. It only remains useful because there's a high risk vs. payoff associated with uttering counterfeit cash. On the other hand, MintChip is supposed to be used online, so even if we detect a counterfeit, there's not much chance that the fraudster will actually go to jail. There's also a much larger number of potential fraudsters (basically, everyone connected to the Internet).
MintChip also doesn't deliver on its privacy claims. "No personal data is exchanged in the transaction." That's not true at all. According to your documentation, every MintChip has a *single*, 16-digit ID that's generated by the central authority and used in all transactions, so there's no reason why these IDs couldn't be tracked the way companies already track credit card numbers.
The funny thing is that this all could have been implemented on top of Bitcoin. Make some tamper-resistant hardware with some Bitcoin private keys inside it, and sign a certificate saying "the keys for these addresses are in tamper-proof hardware". For low-value transactions, they could be accepted at face value, but if we wanted greater certainty, we could inject the transaction into the Bitcoin network and wait for a few confirmations to avoid double-spend fraud.
Wait, what? Why would I want my democracy's rules to be determined by the same people who've proven they don't care about the rules?
As a check against the government's power. Right now, all you need to do to disenfranchise a group of people is to make something they regularly do a felony.
It sounds more like a giant loophole that lets the established government disenfranchise arbitrary groups voters: just pass a law that makes something they tend to do a felony.
The days are numbered where we'll need a special-purpose OS just for "mobile". I'm much more interested in things like KDE Plasma Workspaces, which is essentially designed to provide different user interfaces to the same apps, depending on whether you're on a desktop, a laptop, or a tablet.
It's fine as long as you don't need to use that software commercially. But in the commercial world you need to be able to edit the source code of the software to make any use of it.
That's exactly what happened to MtGox in October 2011. In Bitcoin, you don't technically send coins to an address, you send them to a script which must evaluate true in order for the coins to be spent again. MtGox wrote some code that generated a bogus script, which could never be satisfied, so the bitcoins were effectively destroyed. Oops!
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Guilt under what section of what law, specifically?
I realise that the kind of idiots who like Bitcoins will be the same fools who drool over Google, and that these same monkeys won't see any problem with providing an algorithm which generates a secret to a third party for execution,
Bitcoin mining doesn't involve any secret information.
I'm not sure why you're slagging "idiots who like Bitcoins" so much, either. Sure, Bitcoin has attracted some cranks, anarchists, people who don't trust government-issued money, and speculators who will say all manner of things in attempts to influence the price of Bitcoins (both up and down), but have you actually looked at the crypto and the system of incentives built into the Bitcoin system? It's brilliant, and it's basically the micropayment system that everyone wanted back in the 1990s, but couldn't have because it didn't exist.
Considering the hamfisted way our (Canadian) politicians have been running things, I wouldn't be surprised.
For example, authors are charged almost $3,000 to publish a single article in PLoS Biology.
I've never heard anyone make a convincing case for why it actually needs to cost that much. I suspect those numbers are just a symptom of fat, money-hungry publishers adopting fat, money-hungry procedures.
FOSS developers already have systems for massive, worldwide peer review of open-access technical publications (their source code). If established publishers can't figure out how to charge *substantially* less than $3000 for an article, then I suggest that they get out of the business entirely.
Online movements can help speed up changes that are already gaining momentum.
You know, like the open-access movement.
How do you think I lasted 30 years in IT?
If they ever take my stapler...
Not at all.
It would be a lot like if I paid you in Casascius coins. You could accept them immediately as-is (trusting the hologram and the fact that you've seen me in person), or you could open them up and load their contents into the Bitcoin network before proceeding further.
To clarify, I mean that there probably isn't a single secret that's on all the MintChips. There is probably one private key per MintChip, but you are correct that the security of the whole system appears to depend on all of these private keys remaining secret from their users. Good luck with that, indeed!
Let me repeat that, the security of offline transactions is based entirely on a secret which is on every single mintchip.
I don't think that's true. I had a look at some of their protocol documentation---which isn't all that detailed---and it looks like they're probably using PKCS#7 signatures and X.509 certificates.
Unfortunately, they aren't willing to publish enough information to actually analyze the security of the system to determine whether it's trustworthy (nothing about how the chip itself is secured, for example), but they have released enough information that we can figure out some limits on its security, and it doesn't look all that great. I'll probably get modded down for karma-whoring here, but here's what I posted on that forum, after looking at the limited documentation they provided on their website:
Let me get this straight: MintChip is a proprietary, patented, centralized, unpublished cryptosystem, where a trusted-third-party (the Mint) signs a certificate saying "this private key was stored in a tamper-resistant hardware token that is designed not to double-spend", so we're supposed to just be able to assume that any valid MintChip transaction signatures are trustworthy, even offline. As soon as one person extracts a private key from a MintChip token (which they will, given that there's a monetary incentive), the fundamental assumption that the whole system relies upon is destroyed.
Your organization appears to know this, which explains why you emphasize that MintChip is intended for "low value" transactions.
Fine, so the security of the whole system depends on the security of these hardware tokens, and yet you're "not in a position to release" any tangible information about them? Why should anyone invest in this system? Because you're The Mint?
You have the threat model wrong, too. Why on earth would you want to emulate cash? Cash is easy to counterfeit. It only remains useful because there's a high risk vs. payoff associated with uttering counterfeit cash. On the other hand, MintChip is supposed to be used online, so even if we detect a counterfeit, there's not much chance that the fraudster will actually go to jail. There's also a much larger number of potential fraudsters (basically, everyone connected to the Internet).
MintChip also doesn't deliver on its privacy claims. "No personal data is exchanged in the transaction." That's not true at all. According to your documentation, every MintChip has a *single*, 16-digit ID that's generated by the central authority and used in all transactions, so there's no reason why these IDs couldn't be tracked the way companies already track credit card numbers.
The funny thing is that this all could have been implemented on top of Bitcoin. Make some tamper-resistant hardware with some Bitcoin private keys inside it, and sign a certificate saying "the keys for these addresses are in tamper-proof hardware". For low-value transactions, they could be accepted at face value, but if we wanted greater certainty, we could inject the transaction into the Bitcoin network and wait for a few confirmations to avoid double-spend fraud.
Way back in 1999, Bruce Schneier posted a list of nine cryptography "snake oil" warning signs (http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-9902.html#snakeoil). I see 3 of the 9 warning signs here already.
Too soon.
1. Stop deleting peoples' accounts when you suspect that the name they are using is not their legal name.
2. There is no step 2.
nor do I understand why you think accusing (?) the rich of possessing this quality is scapegoating them.
I misread it as "the rich will mostly prefer fraternity over liberty". I need more coffee, it seems.
Stop scapegoating "the rich" for every problem that ever happens. It's no worse than scapegoating "the jews" or any other minority.
As a hypothetical? Doesn't the U.S. basically do this with pot smokers already?
FYI, prisoners vote in Canada.
Wait, what? Why would I want my democracy's rules to be determined by the same people who've proven they don't care about the rules?
As a check against the government's power. Right now, all you need to do to disenfranchise a group of people is to make something they regularly do a felony.
It sounds more like a giant loophole that lets the established government disenfranchise arbitrary groups voters: just pass a law that makes something they tend to do a felony.
Y'know, like copyright infringement.
So NVIDIA wants documentation about how Apple's hardware works? Funny, that.
The days are numbered where we'll need a special-purpose OS just for "mobile". I'm much more interested in things like KDE Plasma Workspaces, which is essentially designed to provide different user interfaces to the same apps, depending on whether you're on a desktop, a laptop, or a tablet.
GPL is a horrible piece of sh*t.
It's fine as long as you don't need to use that software commercially. But in the commercial world you need to be able to edit the source code of the software to make any use of it.
Defamation.
How does one destroy a bitcoin?
Send it to a nonexistent address...
That's exactly what happened to MtGox in October 2011. In Bitcoin, you don't technically send coins to an address, you send them to a script which must evaluate true in order for the coins to be spent again. MtGox wrote some code that generated a bogus script, which could never be satisfied, so the bitcoins were effectively destroyed. Oops!
Bitcoinica lost 43,554 BTC (valued at about US$200K) in the same incident.
I guess the moral of the story is that if you are going to flee to another country, try some place like Canada or Sweden first.
Should we really be blaming the victim like that?