Bitcoin Forum

So a private key is any number from 1 to  115,792,089,237,316,195,423,570,985,008,687,907,852,837,564,279,074,904,382,605,163,141,518,161,494,336.... or a little under 2^256.  Using the ECDSA, a public key is created that is anywhere from 1 to 2^160.  And, if I remember what I read elsewhere correctly.  For any of those public keys, there should be about 2^96 corresponding private keys.

Therefore....

1) If I have a bitcoin address of "1EQG7J2q4VfAgMBhetEj3cd3PNGYmBLHh" and I wanted to brute force finding a private key that corresponds to that, I could theoretically start with the number 1 as the private key, and increment by one each time, and on each iteration compute the public key (plus derive the address) and validate if the two match.  I would need to do this about 2^160 times until I found a match.  

2) If I did find a match, even if the new private key  did not match the original private key used to create address, I could create a transaction to transfer bitcoin to another address.

Are those two statements correct.  

I just need to find one of the 2^96 numbers of the 2^256 that hash into 1P1ou9XxdpdM35JdWYRE7CHRa6E6mU7ziV, and I'm living on easy street!  

There are 2²⁵⁶ public/private key pairs. There are 2¹⁶⁰ bitcoin addresses. So, for each bitcoin address, there are 2⁹⁶ public/private key pairs that produce it.

To find the private key for a particular bitcoin address, you may still have to search up to 2²⁵⁶-2⁹⁶+1 private keys because you don't know which ones give duplicate addresses. However, assuming everything is randomly distributed, the probability of any private key generating a particular address is still 1/2¹⁶⁰.

I make the distinction, because it is possible that you could try all private keys from 1 to 2¹⁶⁰ and still not find a match. It is possible for all of the 2⁹⁶ keys for that address to lie somewhere in the range from 2¹⁶⁰ to 2²⁵⁶-1.

#1 is not necessarily correct.
#2 is correct.

Also, remember that 2²⁵⁶ >> 2¹⁶⁰ >> 2⁹⁶

Isn't the maximum value of private keys based on the p of secp256k1, which is  2²⁵⁶ - 2³² - 2⁹ - 2⁸ - 2⁷ - 2⁶ - 2⁴ - 1 ?  It's close to  2²⁵⁶, but not exact.  Not to be pedantic, just want to make sure my understanding is correct.

For the people who do not understand math, the chances of a collision are about as good as you win the powerball jackpot three times in a row by selecting "autopick" in the same transaction

Someone that doesn't understand math, probably shouldn't be explaining math to others.

You should also consider using something more universal than "Powerball", since there are many states, and many countries that don't participate in the Powerball Lottery, and so they can't relate to your example.  Regardless, lets take a look at the actual math:
 
2¹⁶⁰ = 1.46 X 10⁴⁸

Odds of winning the Powerball lottery are 1 in 1.75 X 10⁸
 
Odds of winning the Powerball lottery 3 times in a row are:

(1.75 X 10⁸)³ = 5.38 X 10²⁴

Sorry, but 5.38 X 10²⁴ is MUCH less than 1.46 X 10⁴⁸

Lets try again...

Odds of winning the Powerball lottery 5 times in a row are:
(1.75 X 10⁸)⁵ =1.65 X 10⁴¹

Odds of winning the Powerball lottery 6 times in a row are:
(1.75 X 10⁸)⁶ =2.89 X 10⁴⁹

So, it looks like the the chances of a collision with a particular address are about as good as you winning the powerball jackpot more than 5 times in a row.

I asked a very similar question last month. This should help satisfy your reservations:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=604002.msg6796461#msg6796461

I like to simplify it by thinking of the "needle in a haystack" scenario, whereby every time you remove a strand of hay it goes back on top of the pile. Combine that with natural human error (non-perfect vision, memory etc.) and you've got as much chance of finding someone’s private key as looking for a needle in a haystack.

Unless someone develops a super computer that is beyond our comprehension and/or uses a completely different system to any doped silicon transistor model we have today your private keys are safe if you follow safe procedures.

Yes, you are correct.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Private_key#Range_of_valid_private_keys

Thank you.  Wasn't trying to be that guy, but just wanted to make sure I understood correctly.