Bitcoin Forum

As we all know by now, bitcoin is not really anonymous (though I agree it's close).  But Zerocoin is.  And Zerocoin will kill bitcoin, you mark my words.

Excerpts from a blog on Zerocoin below from The Economist.  See link for full article.
 

TonyT

http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2014/01/cryptographic-currency

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Jan 26th 2014, 15:55 by G.F. | SEATTLE


MATT Green would like you to think of Zerocoin, a Bitcoin-like alternative currency in the process of finalising its specifications, as a bulletin board in a shared space—like an office tea room. Pin a ten-pound note to the board and you may later remove any other similar note from the board so long as you can prove that you pinned a like amount at any previous time. Such a pool of cash would launder a transaction, disconnecting the serial number on the note you pinned from the one you claimed.

Bitcoin was designed, in part, to ensure complete and permanent transparency about each transfer of value from one party to another, while uncoupling it largely from the concept of an independent identity. Researchers have shown it is possible in many circumstances with the current version of the common Bitcoin software code, widely used on servers and client software, to track transactions well enough to group them by the parties engaged. Tie that to an exchange, which converts legal tender to and from Bitcoins, or a wallet service, which stores the coins on behalf of members, and external authorities could issue warrants and finger individuals. 

Dr Green and three colleagues at Johns Hopkins University—Christina Garman, Ian Miers, and Aviel D. Rubin—released a paper in April 2013 that charted a different path relying on zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP). In Zerocoin, originally proposed as an extension to Bitcoin that could be incorporated into the currency's basic protocols, a Zerocoin is minted by a party who creates a unique serial number for a coin and then generates a random number. The two numbers are combined with a cryptographic function called hashing that is effectively impossible to reverse: only the possessor of the serial number and random number can produce the resulting hash.
 
Dr Green explains that this proof gives no insight to other parties as to which coin is possessed by the owner even though the serial number has been revealed. The random number remains private and cannot be deduced. But because the owner knows it, the ZKP provides full assurance to the rest of the currency ecosystem of that ownership as all other parties can duplicate the ZKP without knowledge of that secret number. "We are proving to you that we are talking about something that is in the set of previous transactions," says Dr Green.

Dr Green says he has no particular political agenda for Zerocoin. Instead, it's the academic delight of perfecting a system which takes Bitcoin's pseudo-anonymity into something approaching full anonymity. His group wants to sort out now how to fairly administer the early generation of coins and the like, but "if people want to go a different direction with it after it's out there, that's fine." Once the genie is out of the bottle, Dr Green doesn't plan to retain the stopper.

It is extremely difficult to gain traction in the crypt world and Bitcoin already has the market cornered.  Will be interesting to see what he future brings.

Let them show an implementation with a somewhat usable overhead, then we'll talk.

You do know that ZeroCoin is a protocol change to *coin?

It's not designed to be it's own crypto- currency unless the dev team has run out of patience with it being adopted and decided to fork.

From the github page:

Isn't zerocoin a privacy wrapper for other coins, like bitcoin?

In that case, how can it displace it?

Who would ever buy a coin called ZEROcoin?  :D

Meh, it sounds cool... Zero as in zero trace.  ;)

Black market websites might pick it up.

Bitcoin gained traction largely due to the black market community. Silk Road was a major thing in bitcoin's adoption.

They stated that they intended it to be its own coin now - zerocash, iirc. Of course it could be rolled into *coin later.

I also saw that their next paper update should be available shortly (end of Feb, supposedly, from their twitter account).

:-)

That's what I thought, to me Anoncoin is a more realistic option that actually seems to be making progress, for the record, I've realised I've mentioned it a number of times now and no I don't own any :P I would like to though.

You are correct. I've just read the article:


So they are forking due to lack of interest by Bitcoin.

So do I think that ZeroCoin can replace Bitcoin? No. But they will definitely swallow up SilkRoad like transactions which is good for Bitcoin.

The only "better" bitcoin out there as I see it is darkcoin.

It has world class developers behind it and its not just a bitcoin clone.
They take privacy and neutrality seriously, and it is not pre-mined in any way.
Jesus, I can't believe anyone buying into a coin that isn't open from day one.

Thats the only real competition to bitcoin I have found so far.

Zerocoin is probably not a bitcoin killer but could get in the top 5 cryptocurrencies for sure. if you want to learn more:


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=362468.msg3878992#msg3878992

You are obviously hyping up a coin you are holding. Darkcoin is nowhere near as innovative or comparable to Zerocoin.

Whether the answer is ZeroCoin or something else, I think that we have seen that there are enough problems already with the Bitcoin protocol and approach to mining that something else may be necessary to protect a buy in from loss due to government efforts to seize or trace funds, scams, and volatility.  There's no question in my mind that there's a tremendous need for an anonymous digital currency.  My investment in the protocol is to push the bleeding edge.  Get more people into this to try it out, find out what works and what doesn't, then

Ethereum is, in my mind, a great evolutionary step forward in digital currency.  However, putting everything behind the Bitcoin brand name is a strategy that I don't entirely agree with.  For the time being, I think that we need a whole marketplace of altcoins that employ and different technology and different ideas.

I'm not holding any darkcoin yet. I have been looking into what projects has competent coders behind it, and darkcoin, with their libbitcoin codebase is one of them.
And I'm sure there is others too. Without competent people working on the projects its just not going to make it in the long run.
Most altcoins out there is just another bitcoin clone. I doubt they can make it, specially not those who doesn't allow people to start mining from day one.

not a chance, as far as I'm concerned.

Nothing that isn't widely adopted has any chance of overtaking bitcoin.  less demand = less demand.  bitcoin has headwinds already in terms of regulation.  I can't wait to see what fincen thinks of zerocoin.

zerocoin is a niche currrency.  while I do think it has innovation, irrespective of whether it is good or bad, it is not going to gain the widespread adoption that bitcoin has due to it's very nature.

I think we'll see lots of niche currencies and they actually have a shot at some sort of market, as they serve a purpose not already served, relative to all of these other naked pump and dumps that bring no innovation and spring up like so many weeds in a field.

Zerocoin's "business model" is inherently flawed. It involves complex cryptography with anonymity implications so it has to be open source to be trusted, but if it is open source then it can be easily copied by Bitcoin. The only point to releasing it as its own currency is for a nice pump and dump.

Bitcoin probably wont ever implement full anonymity as many are trying to push it into the mainstream and acceptance by traditional finance and regulators. Current system is 'good enough' for bitcoin.

As for other altcoins copying zerocoin's code, they won't be as valuable and respected by the crypto community as the first mover. Look at all those early bitcoin copy cats, none of them ever came close in value and respect.

I don't believe that. It's the standard conspiracy theorist line but if you examine closely you will see that the core developers gave the original Zerocoin protocol a fair shake and rejected it for technical, not political, reasons.

Bitcoin, Litecoin, Dogecoin, etc, are brands, just like NIKE, SONY, and Apple.  When you look at Nike, they don't ever talk about the technology and features that go into each shoe.  Perhaps they have better materials and stronger springs--who knows.  In their advertising, they talk about self-improvement--ordinary people pushing themselves just like our great athletes do.

I help authors, speakers, a startups with branding.  In this cluttered, busy world, people won't remember much about us, so we have to be very clear about what we want them to remember about our coin.  Brands are communicated in images, advertisements, news stories, and even through the customer service experience.  

No doubt that Bitcoin got off on the wrong foot.

Did you not watch the NY hearings? All those 'big shots' of the bitcoin world were ass kissing the regulators and constantly hammering on that bitcoin has a public ledger. It was like their most important argument for requesting light regulation.  

Also, we already know by now that the bitcoin foundation is corrupt. Chances of full anonymity implementation of a mainstream bitcoin are very slim.

They said it because it was true. They didn't say that it couldn't change. If the core developers won't move on it, there are always other segments of the community who will. Ultimately miners and full nodes will decide.

Anoncoin is adding the zerocoin protocol. http://www.reddit.com/r/Anoncoin/comments/1x71aj/zerocoin_update/

Keep in mind zerocoin is more of a protocol than a currency. We don't know if or when the researchers might actually release a coin into the wild. It looks to me like they'd just release a set of technical specs. So if Anoncoin can pull it off, Anoncoin basically will be zerocoin.

The Zerocoin devs have already committed to releasing a currency. The next version of the Zerocoin paper will be presented in May at which point we can expect to see more info.

Isn't darkcoin (already released) anonymous and kinda defeats Zerocoin purpose?

Darkcoin uses the coinjoin protocol which is mostly anonymous, but there are lots of tricks and exploits for someone (especially a government)to be able to figure out a user's identity. So it's really not much better than bitcoin for anonymity.  It's just hyped.

I seriously doubt the dev's intentions for the Zerocoin protocol.  Take a look at them.  All are from the faculty at John Hopkins University: 2 PHD students and there supervisor professors, and I seriously question that such an institution would  be associated with research that leads to a commercial venture that would grant anonymity to terrorists or criminals.  This is an ivory-tower coin masquerading as something street.  I doubt further that the devs would have any long term commitment to a community in which they have no roots.

Yeah, Nxt is about to release zerocoin as well.

They could just release the source under a strict license that prohibits its use anywhere else.

Then the protocol would simply be reimplemented. It wouldn't be as trivially easy, but a community with billions of dollars could easily get it done.

I agree.  And I agree with Dalmar that anonymity by black marketeers spurred the creation of bitcoin, sort of like porn spurred the development of the mainstream internet.  Follow the money... I see a bright future for Zerocoin, and a not so bright future for bitcoin, especially after the Mt. Gox fiasco and impending regulation, see below.

TonyT

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/02/26/japan-studies-regulation-of-bitcoin-after-mt-gox-goes-dark/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

February 26, 2014, 8:40 am
Now, Nations Mull the Ways to Regulate Bitcoin