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jcismylord
22nd July 2017, 12:34 PM
Hi guys, I am trying to educate myself about bitcoins, watched about a dozen of videos or so - mostly advertising kind of videos, praising videos, people are so excited and up-bid, and enthusiastic and so on.

Yet, some features of bitcoins don't appear to be very appealing to me.
Maybe because I am new.
Perhaps some of you can dispel some of my "concerns", and here they are:

1. Bitcoin reliance on word-wide-web.
Imagine (hypothetically) if the global network is cut in half.
The two parts will continue working separately, adding blocks to their own version of the chain.
Once the connection is reestablished in between the two and two versions are reconciled, then only one of the versions of the chain will survive.
All accumulated transactions of the chain that lost will be canceled out.
You think that will never happen? Why then the recommended wait time for large transactions is at least one hour ( or six blocks ) for the sync to propagate over the entire world?
So, if Internet is censored and divided into country-zones what will happen to wallets and to ability to transact?
Even more - what if networks start filtering out bitcoin peer-to-peer traffic?

2. Claimed Inflation immunity. Is it really-really immune?
These days new bitcoins come into existence from mining.
The bitcoin inflation is limited by the fact that the mining rewards are cut in half every four years.
Sounds like a promise.
So, how this promise is different from promises of central banks or governments of the world?
What guarantees there are that this rule/principle will never be broken in the future?
Compare that to PMs.
The difficulty of finding and then mining the PMs out of the ground provides a rock-solid protection from inflation.

3. Maintaining the global bitcoin system is not free
The system needs a world-wide network of millions of computers, constantly solving complex mathematical puzzles in order to produce new blocks to chug alone.
Neither electrical energy no computers are cheap.
Compare that to a brick of silver doubling as a door stop. Does it need electrical power to support its existence?

4. Bitcoin system depends on complex glitch-free software
Which means that there could come a day when a software glitch or a malicious attack corrupts the entire distributed ledger, destroying all wallets, transaction history and the entire system
Compare that to a brick of silver. Will it get corrupted? Will it dissolve into thin air?

5. Bitcoin system is also called crypto-currency, owing to the fact that it is totally dependent on encryption. The encryption may be unbreakable today, but will it be unbreakable tomorrow? Future advances in technology and in mathematics may open up wholes in the encryption, similar to what happened to “unbreakable” German ENIGMA system, which would spell a doomsday for all crypto-currencies. One of such advances, such as quantum computing is already on the horizon and is already coming very close to cracking the kind of encryptions that is behind the bitcoins. Who knows, maybe such machines already exist even today, hiding in a basement of some shady government agency.

6. This is more philosophical, perhaps no need to answer this - bitcoin is yet another system both made and maintained by humans.
Therefore it got to be as imperfect and as corruptible as humans who made it are.
Compare that to PMs were made by God and ordained by Him to be money.

These kinds of questions are not addressed in any youtube videos I watched.

Dachsie
23rd July 2017, 08:34 AM
The original post was excellent.

I have listened to many YT videos touting cryto currencies over the last year or so. I try to just pick up facts and gather my questions just from deducting reasoning.

I think one needs physical portable "money" in one's possession. One also needs honest reliable family members to know of money storage places. I am OK with paper currency if the U S government will make redemption of gold and or silver very easy should one want to redeem the paper currency. I am also, I think, comfortable with the kind of dollars created by the U S Presidents who were all assassinated.

I listen to a YouTube channel called Jsnip4.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxavMVdUk1w

He works as a computer programmer in Florida. He bought a few BitCoins early on as well as a few other cryto currencies. I doubt if his initial investment amounts for more than a few hundred dollars. But recently he has been trying to buy a home and he is coming out of the foreclosure on his credit record so he has been renting a nice house for what I think was very reasonable rent. But he hates being uner homeowners association rules HOA and he seems to be very irritated by what he calls "riff Raff" neighbors and "Jabonies."

He must spend at least an hour a day just managing his crytos. He recently skimmed off some of his profits to his savings account at his bank and it was in the amount of $95,000 and he still has invested all of his original investment plus much more in profits that he is just leaving in crytos for now. So this large balance in the bank made him able to qualify for a nice large house with a pool for his family of four.

He got news that he could close and move in early this weekend so he moved in to his house over the last two days.

He is a person who seems to have invested little and profited much and harvested his profits to the fullest advantage.\

I personally think he should have tried to purchase a modest house on a large tract of land and waiting until he could find it and pay cash for it and not have to get under the weight of a big mortgage again, but he was set on that special house and would not seem to listen to reason and seemed to be really irritated by the neighbor's kids etc.

Snip4 is constantly sort of promoting how wonderful crytos are and how they have worked out so great for him. It sure looks that way on the surface but I just think there are many ifs, ands, and buts.

If you only risk on your intitial investment what you can easily afford to lose, and you read up on all the ins and outs of doing it wisely, and have about one or two hours a day to manage your accounts for maximum profits and you skim off to your bank accounts and ultimately to your possession, it could be a profitable hobby. For people who do not know what they are doing they will not be able to get the profits at the right time into their own possession and those people will be just be getting caught on one fee or time trap after another.

PatColo
23rd July 2017, 04:42 PM
I see vlogger Victurus Libertas put this vid up today; haven't watched yet, but his stuff is usu worthwhile.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/wKu-T6uDP3s/hqdefault.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEXCNACELwBSFryq4qpAwkIARUAAIhCGAE=&rs=AOn4CLAUa29N3yjH28mcWHdcPFn2kqmQgA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKu-T6uDP3s) 40:39
A Lesson In Cryptocurrencies, Steemit and more! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKu-T6uDP3s)

107 views
1 hour ago

Spun Gold
24th July 2017, 01:26 AM
Hi jcismylord

From what I understand, the bitcoin networks runs as a wholly global unit
sot that the network cant be cut in half.

If there is a catastrophe someplace on earth, the places that are still
functioning will have the bitcoin network up and running.

The accumulated transactions are recorded on the blockchain and
can never be canceled out.

governments or corporations or controllers may try to shut down the internet, but there is
a secondary dark web that can not be shut down.

Inflation won't happen with bitcoin, but in a way, it may happen with all the other
cryptos being created. Bitcoin is losing investment due to the other coins and tokens and platforms.

The most advanced tech that could make bitcoin obsolete is here. https://iota.org/
it has a Tangle, not a blockchain, and is free. NO FEES.
I'm investing a little in it.

The advantage of crypto over PMs is that they are easier to transport over borders
and better for micropayments.

If there is way more gold in the world then we are told, then there is no protection from
gold's deflation. It is so heavily manipulated, hard to know.

Cryptos are not as easily manipulated by the overlords. At least not yet. There are too many
of them, and many are decentralized.

The quantum computers on the horizon may be able to attack crypto,
but the developers are aware of this and working on solutions.

I see cryptos as currency and gold and silver as commodities.

hope this helps somewhat...

Dachsie
24th July 2017, 06:52 AM
Regarding the security of Veritaseum, it appears that it can be "hacked." Not sure about veracity of this report.

I could not get audio with this video...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FElxYS9HAo8


VERI HACKED! $8M STOLEN!�� NOW CATCH THEM! Cryptocurrency News Veritaseum Analysis Reggie Middleton
Brandon Kelly CryptoTrader
Brandon Kelly CryptoTrader
7.9K
587 views
Streamed live 54 minutes ago

Have you asked: How to Buy Bitcoin, Earn Free Bitcoin, How to use Bitcoin, How Bitcoin Works, What is Bitcoin, How to Earn free Bitcoin ?? If so then you found the right channel. We are a global community and you are welcome to join! The crypto world is full of 2017 new tech capabilities and amazing hacks, a few of them include Bitcoin, Ripple, Litecoin, Ethereum Classic, NEM, Dash, IOTA, ZCash, Bytecoin, Waves, Steem, Golem, Siacoin, Stellar, Antshares, NEO, XEM, NEM, - amongst others!

It is my goal and my vision to make bitcoin trading easy and understandable for everyone, and to bring people together from all over the world so that one learns from another, and one helps the other succeed. Welcome to the community - and Enjoy.

PatColo
24th July 2017, 08:01 AM
I since watched the viddy below, very worthwhile. The first ~20m is bitcoin&Co; latter half is Steemit. Guest is another "self taught programmer" who woke up around 2011 & bought some bc (I think he said price was around $20), and I thought this may be the Jsnip4 guy in Dachsie's reply #2, but it's a different guy. The "hacking" question came up; guest said the main risk is "user error" where the user's private key is compromised, and he suggested one solution is entering your $ transfer arrangements on an offline comp/device, then sending when it's back online.

The steemit (https://steemit.com/) half was also interesting, it's apparently also "block chain" based somehow; but I think you'd need to be a steemit user to really "get it", with the steemit dollars thing & the 'bots' function & all. Seems it's kind of a twitter-YT-FB-reddit replacement, in that they also host vids, but where users are incentivized with $ for good content, or, likes/shares... I may need to listen again! In fact I will look further into it, coz the guest mentioned steemit's public (though I didn't find a ticker symbol from a quick search, maybe it's under a mother-corp's name?) and he believes has a big future, winky wink.:cool:

Steemit Quick Start Guide (https://steemit.com/welcome)
Steemit FAQ (https://steemit.com/faq.html)


I see vlogger Victurus Libertas put this vid up today; haven't watched yet, but his stuff is usu worthwhile.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/wKu-T6uDP3s/hqdefault.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEXCNACELwBSFryq4qpAwkIARUAAIhCGAE=&rs=AOn4CLAUa29N3yjH28mcWHdcPFn2kqmQgA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKu-T6uDP3s) 40:39
A Lesson In Cryptocurrencies, Steemit and more! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKu-T6uDP3s)



107 views
1 hour ago

Dachsie
24th July 2017, 08:36 AM
I wonder if Steemit dollars can be converted to U.S. dollars. I am always thinking 'Show me the money." Plato o plomo!

Another "pitfall" that I perceive, from a far distance in never having participated, is that when there was recent big downturn in BitCoin value, it was important to have your cryto "money" parked in the right place where it was safe and could not be hurt by what was going on. If you are not careful to always have your money parked in a totally safe place, you can lose your money.

Another pitfall seems to be that you have to know what entities to start the process to a trade. Once you enter into the process of a trade, there's no backing out or is very hard to back out. If you deal with the wrong entity all sorts of bad things can happen including having your trade consummate and end up in low value to you.

______________

Again, I would comment that you do not risk an amount of your money that you cannot afford to lose and you do it as an enjoyable hobby and are careful to skim off your profits over and above your initial investment, then it can also be a profitable hobby.

___________

I remember how tens of thousands of people saved their money for retirement in 401K financial instruments and ended up losing all their savings.
The way the things were set up is that they would give you a choice of like 30 different funds to which you could allocate portions of your savings.
Now those choices of funds were rigged from the beginning but the poor workers are ignorant of what is a good fund and what is mediocre at best and which is absolute garbage. None of the choices fed to the workers were good, many were mediocre, and most were rotten to the core. This was how the banksters transferred the retirment savings of many people to their coffers.

It seems there is something similar going on in the crypto craze. There are more and more currencies coming into existence. Many do not know how to judge whether one is good. One way I've been given to understand is that if there will only ever be a top limit on the number of coins ever to be issued and sold. There are other criteria for judging and some of those can change from day to day. Bad actors and bad players will catch on to this fast moving train so the risks of choosing a bad currency only increase with time.

Sometimes, especially in online world, people negatively criticize something because they are jealous of how some people are really making a lot of money and are getting ahead and becoming "free." Some of these people can cause a lot of trouble.

The whole premise being conveyed about crytos is that it is a wide open safe secure way to get ahead and get ahead bigtime and there is room for everyone. So come on in, the waters fine. That is the same kind of propaganda that goes with ponzi schemes of all kinds.

I believe if there is a way for those who rule the world to take control of cryptos and grab all the profits and ruin the most number of people involved, they will do that.

But we humans get greedy and we lose sight of how the ways we choose to spend our time, perhaps more and more and more of our time, can consume our soul and destroy our peace and balance in life.

jcismylord
24th July 2017, 09:40 AM
Hi jcismylord

From what I understand, the bitcoin networks runs as a wholly global unit
sot that the network cant be cut in half.

If there is a catastrophe someplace on earth, the places that are still
functioning will have the bitcoin network up and running.

The accumulated transactions are recorded on the blockchain and
can never be canceled out.


You don't seem to understand the fundamentals.
You just repeated the piece of common propaganda that is exactly the point of my contention.
Look, there are many slightly different versions ( or local copies) of the ledger distributed over the network.
Every 10 seconds the bitcoin network gets together and basically VOTE on which version is the "official".
The official version is determined by the 51% vote of all the participating computers.
All unofficial versions are then discarded as computers update their local copies.
Next, if the network is fractured, then each part will continue on, and will have their own "official" ledger.
When connection is restored, then the official ledger must be chosen, meaning that there will be a vote among computers, and only one of two ledgers will be voted as official, which means that all transactions of the ledger that lost will not be there to be found in the official ledger. They will disappear.
Exactly because of that, the bitcoin official videos recommend, even now, even today, TO WAIT at least six blocks for the big transactions to settle, to make sure that the transaction you've made was not cancel out, because the longer you wait, the more settle your transaction is, as the potability of you being on a isolated cyber-island gets smaller and smaller.



Inflation won't happen with bitcoin, but in a way, it may happen with all the other
cryptos being created. Bitcoin is losing investment due to the other coins and tokens and platforms.


I just showed you why and how the inflation can happen.
Care to rebuttal my argument instead of just repeating the propaganda?



The quantum computers on the horizon may be able to attack crypto,
but the developers are aware of this and working on solutions.


Look, I have been a professional programmer for about 45 years.
It looks to me that you blindly believe that "the glorious developers" are all but shiny angels with wings.
That "they" , the developers are honest, and trustworthy and reliable out-of-this-world beings, and they will solve all the mathematically unsolvable problems.

The truth is that guys like us are NOT really that honest and not really that trustworthy. We are just like as all other people are, and look, when it comes to bitcoins - you are completely DEPENDENT on the software to make your little transactions or to even see what is in your account.
You are at mercy.

Even more - it looks like because the technology is so very complex and technical and beyond the usual area of expertize of most people, the thoughts, believes and perceptions are not own-derived, but just IMPLANTED via blind belief and bind trust towards the perceived "experts".
The same "experts" that often hold stake and are far from being impartial.

The truth is that the software that you use to access bitcoins can be taken control over and/or influenced and altered in so many ways and what are you going to do when it happens?

Compare that to a brick of silver. There is nothing complex about it. Everybody can understand it. You are not at mercy on some anonymous guy's software to access it or move it around from a place to place.

Horn
24th July 2017, 10:13 AM
Yes, Bitcoin aint as attractive as Dogecoin, and No we cant dispell any Holy Originator myths.

Choose your own Gods.

Thankyou.

Dachsie
24th July 2017, 02:03 PM
As far as what could happen to BitCoin, this was pretty good...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-bPj8Wm9q0


Bitcon is digital FIAT currency backed by nothing
TheHealthRanger
TheHealthRanger
156K
189 views
Published on Jul 24, 2017

As the Health Ranger explains, Bitcoin is "digital fiat currency" backed by nothing. Isn't it interesting that so many people pushing Bitcoin are critics of the U.S. dollar being a "fiat currency" yet don't realize Bitcoin is DIGITAL fiat currency?

jcismylord
26th July 2017, 11:35 AM
As far as what could happen to BitCoin, this was pretty good...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-bPj8Wm9q0


Bitcon is digital FIAT currency backed by nothing
TheHealthRanger
TheHealthRanger
156K
189 views
Published on Jul 24, 2017

As the Health Ranger explains, Bitcoin is "digital fiat currency" backed by nothing. Isn't it interesting that so many people pushing Bitcoin are critics of the U.S. dollar being a "fiat currency" yet don't realize Bitcoin is DIGITAL fiat currency?

He is right. Good video. Very good points.
Here is a quote I liked: Nothing prevents developers who run bincoin networks from changing the algorithms without your consent.

Ares
26th July 2017, 04:08 PM
Here is a quote I liked: Nothing prevents developers who run bincoin networks from changing the algorithms without your consent.

Yes there is, as none of the other nodes would recognize the new algorithm. They've had problems for years (1mb hard coded transaction block size limitation) and it's taken a lot of compromise from the developers as well as miners to agree on a solution.

Yet this guy thinks that miners don't have a say in what algorithm gets used? Really?? lol

It's pretty easy, the devs can make a change all day long, but if mining pools, miners do not install that wallet with the new algorithm it does not change.

Ares
26th July 2017, 04:54 PM
Hi guys, I am trying to educate myself about bitcoins, watched about a dozen of videos or so - mostly advertising kind of videos, praising videos, people are so excited and up-bid, and enthusiastic and so on.

Yet, some features of bitcoins don't appear to be very appealing to me.
Maybe because I am new.
Perhaps some of you can dispel some of my "concerns", and here they are:

1. Bitcoin reliance on word-wide-web.
Imagine (hypothetically) if the global network is cut in half.
The two parts will continue working separately, adding blocks to their own version of the chain.
Once the connection is reestablished in between the two and two versions are reconciled, then only one of the versions of the chain will survive.
All accumulated transactions of the chain that lost will be canceled out.
You think that will never happen? Why then the recommended wait time for large transactions is at least one hour ( or six blocks ) for the sync to propagate over the entire world?
So, if Internet is censored and divided into country-zones what will happen to wallets and to ability to transact?
Even more - what if networks start filtering out bitcoin peer-to-peer traffic?

Being that it's purely hypothetical yes it would cause a fork in the blockchain with 2 separate but equal ledgers. When / if the internet is rejoined the nodes would discover which node is the most up to date and regain consensus. If the Internet was split, so would the wallets and wallets in network A, would only update in Network A, same with wallets in Network B. Once the network was rejoined a consensus would be reached and all transactions would be consolidated into the same blockchain from both Network A and B.

But if that would ever happen you would have other issues since data centers are Geo-redundent it would cause all sorts of global economic problems.

Your second question isn't even possible, since Bitcoins network traffic is SHA256, how would you go about filtering a legitimate SHA256 traffic from bitcoin SHA256 network traffic. At the network layer they would look the same, because they are.


2. Claimed Inflation immunity. Is it really-really immune?
These days new bitcoins come into existence from mining.
The bitcoin inflation is limited by the fact that the mining rewards are cut in half every four years.
Sounds like a promise.
So, how this promise is different from promises of central banks or governments of the world?

because Bitcoin is decentralized, you would have to convince the miners (the computers updating the blockchain) to agree to inflation.


What guarantees there are that this rule/principle will never be broken in the future?
Compare that to PMs.

See above

The difficulty of finding and then mining the PMs out of the ground provides a rock-solid protection from inflation.

Until we start mining the asteroid belt for precious metals. Or did you forget what happened when the Comstock lode was discovered and subsequently mined?


3. Maintaining the global bitcoin system is not free
The system needs a world-wide network of millions of computers, constantly solving complex mathematical puzzles in order to produce new blocks to chug alone.
Neither electrical energy no computers are cheap.
Compare that to a brick of silver doubling as a door stop. Does it need electrical power to support its existence?

Yes as does our current financial system.


4. Bitcoin system depends on complex glitch-free software
Which means that there could come a day when a software glitch or a malicious attack corrupts the entire distributed ledger, destroying all wallets, transaction history and the entire system

Extremely unlikely considering that the ledger exists on any computer who has a bitcoin wallet. If you're a software developer you'll know that a protocol is not the same as standard software. Protocols are very specific, just like TCP/IP, Bitcoin is a protocol. So having the entire global ledger wiped out would only happen if we had a catastrophic global event, meteor impact, Yellowstone erupting etc.


Compare that to a brick of silver. Will it get corrupted? Will it dissolve into thin air?

Yes, if you drop a brick of silver in a vat of acid, it will dissolve it. It won't dissolve into thin air, but will dissolve into a non monetary form.


5. Bitcoin system is also called crypto-currency, owing to the fact that it is totally dependent on encryption. The encryption may be unbreakable today, but will it be unbreakable tomorrow?
As far as a Quantum computer being able to crack SHA256, unlikely.

1) quantum computers, if ever they come into existence with a lot of qubits (which I personally doubt, but ok), can TOTALLY CRACK the current public key systems based on prime factorization (RSA, Diffie-Hellmann) or based upon discrete logarithms in groups (elliptic curve crypto). The algorithm to do so is known, it is Shor's algorithm. By TOTALLY I mean totally: just ANY key can be cracked in a matter of milliseconds, on the condition that the quantum computer has more qubits than (a few times) the key length. If such a quantum computer exists, there is simply no difficulty in cracking the key, it doesn't take "days" or anything because the difficulty goes LOGARITHMIC with Shor's algorithm.

2) however, for hash functions, and symmetric crypto like AES-256, it can be shown that a quantum computer can AT BEST use Grover's algorithm to crack it. Grover's algorithm doesn't crack entirely a hash function, but essentially HALVES ITS BIT STRENGTH. So a SHA-256 hash (with 256 bits) would not require 2^256 trials like on a classical computer, but "only" 2^128 trials on a quantum computer, which is STILL IMPOSSIBLE to do practically. Most people think that quantum computers will, if ever they exist, run much slower than classical machines, so 2^128 trials on a quantum machine will be much harder to solve than 2^128 trials on a classical machine.


Future advances in technology and in mathematics may open up wholes in the encryption, similar to what happened to “unbreakable” German ENIGMA system, which would spell a doomsday for all crypto-currencies.

No it wouldn't, because each currency uses a different algorithm. Litecoin uses Scrypt, Bitcoin uses SHA256, ZEC uses Equihash, many other cryptos don't even use a proof of work algorithm at all and use a proof of stake algorithm. So you would have to devise a new strategy for every single coin as if one becomes compromised people will go to the next best one.


One of such advances, such as quantum computing is already on the horizon and is already coming very close to cracking the kind of encryptions that is behind the bitcoins.

See above as to why that is not true.


Who knows, maybe such machines already exist even today, hiding in a basement of some shady government agency.

Unlikely, but sure lets play devils advocate. How would it crack a proof of stake crypto currency where there is literally no hashing going on?


6. This is more philosophical, perhaps no need to answer this - bitcoin is yet another system both made and maintained by humans.

Wrong, it was made by humans, but maintained by DECENTRALIZED machines.


Therefore it got to be as imperfect and as corruptible as humans who made it are.

Being that it's decentralized you would have to get every node or 51% of the hashing power to agree to corrupt it. After watching the segwit adoption compromise, I'll leave with a "Good luck!" comment on that one.


Compare that to PMs were made by God and ordained by Him to be money.

Which has been corrupted beyond even recognition as money by the general population.


These kinds of questions are not addressed in any youtube videos I watched.

Hope my answers help

Ares
26th July 2017, 05:15 PM
He is right. Good video. Very good points.
Here is a quote I liked: Nothing prevents developers who run bincoin networks from changing the algorithms without your consent.

I watched that video.... Mike Adams is woefully unknowledgeable to be discussing Bitcoin.

First he calls Bitcoin a "Fiat Currency".

BULLSHIT, Fiat means by government decree. Meaning The government has decreed a Federal Reserve Note as currency by Fiat.

Fiat money is a currency established as money by government regulation or law. Where is the law establishing Bitcoin as a currency? :rolleyes:

I like Mike Adams so his gibberish on crypto currencies is rather disappointing.

He then goes on and claims that you cannot trade Bitcoin for gold or silver..... wrong again....

https://www.jmbullion.com/about/payments/

https://www.bitgild.com/

Look further online for bullion dealers who will accept Bitcoin for bullion.


The "civil war" he's talking about has been addressed. Segregated Witness will be implemented. Current segwit adoption rate is at 70%, they need 85% for it to activate.
http://segwit.co/

jcismylord
26th July 2017, 07:15 PM
Hope my answers help

Your answers certainly did help.

thank you for taking time and for providing such a in-depth explanation.

I realize that the "proof of work" puzzle is probably impossible to crack even for hypothetical quantum computers

I specifically had in mind the potential crackability of the of the public key system, which would give the attacker ( the government ) access to people wallets.

I see your points and I see the logic behind.

I can't say I agree with everything, but that is to be expected, as we all entitled to our opinions.

Thanks.

Ares
26th July 2017, 07:35 PM
Your answers certainly did help.

thank you for taking time and for providing such a in-depth explanation.

I realize that the "proof of work" puzzle is probably impossible to crack even for hypothetical quantum computers

I specifically had in mind the potential crackability of the of the public key system, which would give the attacker ( the government ) access to people wallets.

That's the beauty of Bitcoin, and the Bitcoin protocol implementation. The Public key is totally useless without the private key. You can't even send a Bitcoin without the Private key confirming the transaction to the Blockchain. Without the Private key, the blockchain will reject the transaction and it'll never make it into the ledger. i.e. no funds ever leave the wallet.


I see your points and I see the logic behind.

I can't say I agree with everything, but that is to be expected, as we all entitled to our opinions.

Thanks.

I've been in crypto currencies since 2012/2013 and have read extensively on how they work. If you come up with any other questions I'll do what I can to get them answered.

I'm also an active miner and have mined more than my fair share of different currencies.

Dachsie
27th July 2017, 08:45 AM
Just learned something new about Etherium. Its wallets can be hacked and stolen from.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/qvp5b3/how-ethereum-coders-hacked-back-to-rescue-dollar208-million-in-ethereum

How Coders Hacked Back to ‘Rescue’ $208 Million in Ethereum
Jordan Pearson

Jordan Pearson

Jul 24 2017, 4:21pm
"We were in the zone. We'd done this before."

On Wednesday, an anonymous hacker (or hackers) stole $32 million worth of ethereum's cryptocurrency, ether, from three multi-signature wallets thanks to a vulnerability in the contract for the wallets.

A volunteer group of coders calling themselves the White Hat Group took it upon themselves to "rescue" the funds in the other 500 vulnerable wallets before the hackers could get them. They did this by breaching the wallets using the same vulnerability as the hackers and funneling the funds into the group's own account.

On Monday morning, the group was in possession of $86 million USD worth of other people's ether, and $122 million in tokens—the digital assets that are sold off in Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs), fundraising events that have raised millions in mere minutes. That's about $208 million worth of digital assets in ethereum, in total.

By Monday afternoon, tens of millions of dollars worth of tokens and ether had been returned to their owners. They say they plan to give all the funds back to their owners by July 31st.

This is the story of how it all happened.

*

Alex Van de Sande didn't know what he was in for.

As an interface designer for the Ethereum Foundation, the organization that leads protocol development for the eponymous cryptocurrency and app platform, he was a notable attendee at an annual ethereum workshop at Cornell University that kicked off on Monday. The last time de Sande attended, in the summer of 2016, the worst hack in ethereum's short history had just occurred: Hackers exploited a bug in the code of a crowd-directed investment fund called the DAO and stole $53 million worth of ether, the platform's currency.

In response, de Sande became the public face for an ad hoc group of coders who called themselves the Robin Hood group. They exploited the same bug that the hackers had used to siphon away most of the remaining ether from the DAO before the hackers could. It was an extremely controversial move, robbing people for "good," before a hard fork split ethereum into two versions and wiped out the effects of the DAO hack on the new version.

This year, though, the workshop had gone swimmingly. On Wednesday afternoon, a coding workshop had just wrapped up, and de Sande as well as other ethereum developers were evaluating student projects. As 2 PM rolled around, déjà vu struck with a vengeance. Someone in the room got a call from another ethereum developer and dropped a bomb. The foundation's wallet, they said, was being hacked at that very moment.

Thinking the developer had meant the Ethereum Foundation, the room scrambled to find out what was going on, de Sande told me in an interview. They quickly discovered that the foundation's wallet had all of its funds intact, but a vulnerability in a popular ethereum client called Parity had let hackers treat multi-signature wallets created with the latest version of the client as personal ATMs.

Multi-signature wallets are popular among companies because they have multiple key-holders and require a majority to sign off on transactions. The hackers cleaned out three of these accounts to the tune of $32 million worth of ether.

"It wasn't affecting us directly, but we could see that 500 other wallets could be affected, and a few of them were holding more than one million dollars," de Sande told me on a phone call from New York. "That's when we got really worried. We were talking, and a few people said, 'Our money is safe but somebody can attack these other wallets at any moment. And somebody has to do something about it.'"

The first funds had been taken eight hours before de Sande and the others in the room at Cornell realized what was going on. They were running out of time. At any moment, the hackers could clean out the rest of those 500 wallets. So, he and the rest of the developers logged onto a dedicated Skype group for ethereum security issues.

Ares
27th July 2017, 09:09 AM
It's why I do not use a parity multi-sig wallet for my own Ether. Mine rest within the ether blockchain only using a Blockchain interface application, and as such isn't really a "wallet".

Dachsie
27th July 2017, 09:13 AM
Dachsie always likes good tedious clarification in communication.

"Fiat money is a currency established as money by government regulation or law. Where is the law establishing Bitcoin as a currency? "

The word "fiat" simply means a formal authorization or proposition; a decree: "adopting a legislative review program, rather than trying to regulate by fiat" synonyms: decree, edict, order, command, commandment,

___________

A cryptocurrency (or crypto currency) is a digital asset designed to work as a medium of exchange using cryptography to secure the transactions and to control the creation of additional units of the currency.[1] Cryptocurrencies are classified as a subset of digital currencies and are also classified as a subset of alternative currencies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocurrency

______________


"On March 25, 2014, the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS) ruled that bitcoin will be treated as property for tax purposes as opposed to currency. This means bitcoin will be subject to capital gains tax. "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocurrency#Legality

__________________

"decentralized control[6] as opposed to centralized electronic money/centralized banking systems.[7] The decentralized control is related to the use of bitcoin's blockchain transaction database in the role of a distributed ledger.[8]" op cit same Wikipedia article

I think it can be argued that there is a hierarchy of control and there is something at the top as regards degree of control. There would have to be. I think we have discussed "he/she who controls the algorithm..." and that to me suggests hierarchy or centralization of some kind.

____________

Something no one talks about much is how to convert crypto "profits" to U.S. dollars into one's non-crypto hands.

Mike Adams seemed to use a derogatory adjective saying something like "you have to find some ______person who will trade to you U.S. dollars for cryptos." Adams also seemed to indicate that such trades are separate from the blockchain environment. Jsnip4 has done a couple of videos on this and it seems one has to do such a trade very carefully following wise steps.

I personally do not have concern about thefts and hacking since a [wise] participant should only do an initial investment that can be afforded to be lost, i.e., no risk, all just hobby and fun. Also am not impressed with huge "profits" as profits are only profits when they end up as something that can be used by you to buy real property or tangible personal property or real non-digital services that directly accrue to you.

Obtaining this property and paying captial gains tax on it is a whole nother ballgame.

Ares
27th July 2017, 11:03 AM
I think it can be argued that there is a hierarchy of control and there is something at the top as regards degree of control. There would have to be. I think we have discussed "he/she who controls the algorithm..." and that to me suggests hierarchy or centralization of some kind.

Nope, but if miners / mining pools do not install the wallet with the new algorithm it does not get implemented. Like I've said previously core can make changes all day long, but if no one installs it and runs on that version it does not get used. It's happened a couple of times before where core and the miners have not agreed on the direction of Bitcoin. Miners have a vested interests (and are really who are in control of the blockchai/ Bitcoin) as some have spent millions on mining equipment and electricity.
So to even indicate that there is a degree of control from the top is short sighted.


Something no one talks about much is how to convert crypto "profits" to U.S. dollars into one's non-crypto hands.

That's why you don't convert it into a worthless currency like an FRN, if you purchase goods / services outright with crypto currencies you completely sideline any ridiculous IRS rules.


Mike Adams seemed to use a derogatory adjective saying something like "you have to find some ______person who will trade to you U.S. dollars for cryptos." Adams also seemed to indicate that such trades are separate from the blockchain environment. Jsnip4 has done a couple of videos on this and it seems one has to do such a trade very carefully following wise steps.

While I like Mike Adams on health discussion matters he doesn't have a firm of a grasp of crypto currencies that he thinks he does.


Obtaining this property and paying captial gains tax on it is a whole nother ballgame.

That's only if you report it. If you trade all crypto's in ZEC and cash out good luck trying to track down the transactions. ZEC was designed from the ground up to be an Anonymous blockchain. The sender, receiver, and the amounts (if you choose) are completely encrypted within the ZEC blockchain rendering the transaction useless to outside observers (i.e. governments).

monty
27th July 2017, 11:26 AM
Mike Adams seemed to use a derogatory adjective saying something like "you have to find some ______person who will trade to you U.S. dollars for cryptos." Adams also seemed to indicate that such trades are separate from the blockchain environment. Jsnip4 has done a couple of videos on this and it seems one has to do such a trade very carefully following wise steps.
I don't know why anyone would want to exchange them for FRN's, silver dollars yes. Many places accept them for goods and services.

I and Madfranks and perhaps others on this forum have exchanged crypto currency directly for silver/gold.

Dachsie
27th July 2017, 11:57 AM
"I don't know why anyone would want to exchange them for FRN's, silver dollars yes. Many places accept them for goods and services."

Somewhere I summarized why Jsnip4 YouTube channel person needed to exchange his crypto profits for FRNs. He had a foreclosure on his fairly recent credit report. He dealt with that and cleared up his credit record but still needed to show a good amount of balance in a bank account before his application to buy the house he was wanting. He did convert to what was accepted as a $95,000 direct deposit to his bank account. Technically he never held FRNs in his hands and all the transfers were handled electronically. You cannot qualify for a mortgage and buy a house with crytos or silver or gold. You need digits on deposit in a bank and the digits don't happen any way but by "dollars."

I still say "show me the money",

Plato o plomo!