Bitcoin Forum

FYI this mind-blowing idea was given to me by someone, whom I wish not to expose at this point.
They can join the discussion and reveal their identity if they wish.

Have there been any attempts at creating a "cryptocurrency" that isn't based on money, but rather on human beings?

The goal:

To see whether we can create a cryptocurrency that lets every human vote on issues.

Possible angle of attack
Base the cryptocurrency on hashed fingerprints.

Each human in the world (mostly) has a unique unforgable fingerprint.
We distribute voting machines to all places of the earth (even on smartphones etc.)

These voting machines are in fact a p2p network using a public ledger/blockchain.

When a person votes, a cryptographic time-dependent hash of his fingerprint is created and distributed over the network.
The hashing algorithm depends on the issue that is being voted.

E.g. if we ask the world "Who do you love more, dad or mom?", the hashing algorithm turns each fingerprint into a unique vote for this specific question and broadcasts it into the network, and results are revealed.


Use Case
World government. Instead of the semi-centralized / hierarchical government structure we have today, we can have a truly decentralized, anonymous government for the entire earth.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1qlyf5/can_we_create_a_truly_democratic_cryptocurrency/

In my country , part of the UE , we have a small problem with water:
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_PUBLIC/3-23022011-BP/EN/3-23022011-BP-EN.PDF (http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_PUBLIC/3-23022011-BP/EN/3-23022011-BP-EN.PDF)
mostly access to running water and toilets.
*the paper is from 2009 but it has only changed by 5% in the last yeras

And you're telling me about fingerprint p2p voting system.

Actually, most people have ten. And you can easily make a computer program that can generate endless numbers of fingerprints.

In addition, you cannot "hash" a fingerprint directly, because each scan will be slightly different, which will make the hash of it very different and the hash will not match the original one.

There may be a way to do this, but I doubt it will have anything to do with fingerprints!

Yeah, fingerprints were just some initial idea.
I have no idea if the problem is solvable or not.

Why would you need a currency for voting?

You just add a private key (say in form of a certificate) everybody's ID. Then you have everyone upload their vote and sign it. Simple as that.

In Germany this is actually already being added to the IDs.

The hardest part is to get everyone to understand what a digital signature is.

It's a cool idea, but the concept conflicts with the goal; if it's decentralized law you're seeking, democracy is the last thing you want.  What you want is to decentralize lawmakers, not voters; the voters are already decentralized well enough.  Democracy's only purpose is to centralize law and give the illusion of choice; you still need a hierarchy for the creation of law and law enforcement, otherwise what's the point in a democracy?--you're better off passing laws with your peers.  Better than a democracy is a course in philosophy; then you can do out of free will what others can only do out of fear of law.

Also, who is going to pay for all these machines?  And who is going to wait in line for them?

The main problem with this is that you lose voter privacy.

Yes we can!
1. Use fingerprint to identify each person
2. anonymous voting by crypto method

The eye is much better than a fingerprint for identifying people accurately.

If we did this, then the US government would be able to vote for me. They have my fingerprint.

http://blog.dustinkirkland.com/2013/10/fingerprints-are-user-names-not.html

Those fingerprints will probably need a database of some sort. Correct?
Database gets hacked and you're gonna have a bad time.

Voting, which has surprisingly little to do with 'true democracy' is already easily achievable even on a global level without resorting to crypto currencies.

A crypto currency could however be designed to facilitate assigning functions by lot, which would be a far greater approximation of true democracy than voting. It could provide an incentive system for participation, as well as an audit mechanism.

 
anonymity of voting is the requirement for fair elections/voting


Zero-knowledge proof! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof

this is the way to provide the anonymity!

like Zerocoin by Matthew Green http://zerocoin.org/

Issues with water?  KEEP ON FRACKING BOYS WE DO NOT CONTROL THE WATER MARKET YET!

According the fundamentals of democracy - People are the source of any and all governmental power.

The power of people is abosulte. People create lawmakers [representatives] and other authorities. People give them credentials but they do not lose at this point their power.

So voters theoretical can make any decision despite of someone's will (president, parliament...), any law any case and so on. Theoretically.
Practically there are no fit tools for that. To hold referendums on every issue in the country is very difficult...

We used to accepting the paradigm of democracy that was adopted 250 years ago [representatives, elections one's in 5 years and so on]. but not aware of what is now a level of technological development is so high that allows us to step far ahead!

Who said that  democracy shoul be limited by one-in-5-years elections?

so we need to create and implement a system of crytpovoting in order to provide more democratic guarantees and  freedoms!


experience of other countries such as Ukraine (where I live) shows how important it is that the political system has to be protected from usurpation