Good lord. That's, what, almost 250,000BTCs lost from hacks.
Quarter of a million BTC? Small peanuts I say. Only $1,2 million at current rates. That's a pretty significant percentage of the existing bitcoin supply and even the total possible bitcoin supply. |
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How are you going to do a Bitcoin tx when neither party has access to the internet?
<sigh> Do some research on the matter. No thanks. No reason for a smartphone to have internet when you don't want it to. "Airplane mode" disables all radios at the device level. Kinda hard to be online when you have no signal.  Unless you intend to carry a second phone to actually make calls, texts or use the Internet while mobile; you're going to turn that mode off eventually. I'm not concerned about a live hacker taking my money, I'm concerned about a worm or virus that steals android wallets. That only takes a few seconds. So what is the difference between 1 phone + 1 phone being used as a dedicated bitcoin device vs 1 phone + dedicated bitcoin device. My point is the hardware already exists. It is called a smartphone. It has everything you need including connectivity and software. For most casual users a single device is fine for the paranoid just carry two. The aim here is to provide (maybe a niche but I think not) a device that has better properties then a smartphone for bitcoin. 1) cost - no smartphone I know of will be able to do a BTC transaction without costing over $100 or requiring a contract. I assume bitcoincard will be under $50 But I already have a smartphone, and I'd be willing to be that most bitcoin users do too. 2) size - no smartphone fits in the wallet No, but it fits in my pocket, where I happily carry it around with me everywhere, everyday. 3) security - maybe through obscurity but most of the smartphones that COULD run a BTC transaction are running Android and would be more susceptible to a hack then the bitcoincard. Malware may be on as much as 20% of all Android phones making it a bad place for the masses to store BTC.
This, I think, is a valid concern. Right now, my solution is to use my phone (blockchain.info iPhone app) to keep as much money as cash I would carry in my physical wallet - so not much. For big online purchases, I'd rather do them from my home computer, where I have access to more money via Armory offline wallets, etc. |
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I also setup a new 0.62 wallet on a Windows VM yesterday and it took about 30 minutes to get the whole blockchain.
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Nice list. I would add use a hardware security module to enforce
a) business rules (limits on # of tx per hour, size of tx, volume, etc)
b) delay larger tx (i.e. tx < 100 BTC processed instantly, 100 BTC to 250 BTC delayed 1 hour, 250 BTC to 1000 BTC delayed 4 hours, 1000 BTC to hot wallet max delayed 12 hours)
c) delay high velocity tx (once cumulative tx in last hour exceed 3x avg hourly volume delay all tx 1 hour, once cumulative tx in last hour exceed 5x hourly volume delay all tx 4 hours).
d) sign periodic status messages for delivery off the server (attack could block delivery but that in itself should trigger a warning to off site monitoring).
Full disclosure I am working on a HSM for protecting Bitcoin Hotwallets (Bitcoin Security Module).
I look forward to what you end up producing, DAT. |
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Good lord. That's, what, almost 250,000BTCs lost from hacks.
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Haven't been following this. Is it clear yet, you know, that anyone will get any coins back or not?
Roughly 20% of the Bitcoins they held were lost but USD are apparently fine. One of the VCs with a silent interest in Bitcionica has said that the losses will be covered and I'd be inclined to believe him as they just received half a million dollars in seed funding for their Bitcoin projects and need to be seen to be reputable in order to grow their CoinLab business. They do have accounting records, even though they don't have an image of the database as it stood at the time it was deleted. While that's not a perfect record, it's nowhere near as catastrophic as having no records would be - it might just take a bit longer to piece the information needed to return funds and Bitcoins to users together. Hmmm, ok. I guess I'm just going to let this cook for a while and move on. Maybe in a few weeks I'll get a surprise email that their ready to return my coins. In the meantime, I still want to try this new BitInstant thing and buy a few more coins. I've only got a few hundred coins in any exchange now. Everything else has been moved to paper and brain wallets. I'm keeping one hot wallet with small amounts for day to day stuff, but otherwise everything else is is staying locked up tight. |
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No backups. I guess this explains why the whole process of officially acknowledging the hack (via the bitcoinica web site) and the claims process has been so slow.
Missed this earlier. So it's settled then? Nobody is getting anything back. Next. |
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Haven't been following this. Is it clear yet, you know, that anyone will get any coins back or not?
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And let me add this...
There are probably certain functions that are going to performed best for the bitcoin economy through various centralized online services, and that's fine. But, I don't think one of those functions ought to be storing private bitcoin savings. Too many people are still using online services (MtGox, Bitcoinica [RIP], MyBitcoin [RIP]) to store their bitcoins. I think the reason people are doing this is because it's easy and clearly not everyone into bitcoins is technically conversant enough to setup up an offline Linux machine. Those services are fine for making trades, or for holding small amounts of bitcoins like you would cash in a physical wallet. But people are using them to save their entire bitcoin savings. That's got to stop!. I think one way to move people beyond that is by providing something simple to use that does what we can already do with Armory and an offline computer, for example.
The geek's solution is always going to be there and, honestly, it would be wonderful for people to better educate themselves. But as the diversity of users increases, that's just not a realistic expectation. Something is going to have to fill the gap between what is necessary for the best possible security, and what less tech savvy people are willing and able to use. I say "something is going to have to fill the gap", and I mean that as strongly as I can. It's necessary for bitcoin to expand that people can, basically, securely and easily be their own bank. After all, that's a large part of what this is all about, right?
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i think its a great idea. no one i know is doing this with Armory.
you would want to contact eto obviously, i would think? maybe not.
he claims you can buy used laptops for $50 on the net. haven't verified that though.
my guess is your main target would be brick and mortar businesses as described in my piece.
I haven't been able to find used laptops for $50 that aren't really, really old clunky tech or, worse, broken. That's fine. I mean, you can certainly do what you need to do with a $50 10 year old laptop. I guess I'm just imagining a more elegant solution. I'd be aiming for something much lower power than a laptop. Also, I'd want the there to be essentially no setup. Turn it on, maybe create an encryption key for the thing's storage, and then start creating wallets (paper wallets, brain wallets, etc) and making transactions. I think the competition in this sector is going to be heating up in the next few years. |
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I need the moon from the sky. Somebody do it for me, now!
That isn't the point of this thread. I'm interested in feedback on the idea. If it's a bad idea, I wouldn't want to pursue it. |
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this is already how i have Armory set up.
i have a small used, inexpensive laptop that i erased 3 separate times.
i then installed Ubuntu 10.04 from a USB stick.
etotheipi then provided me with a link to download a full Armory installer which was just point and click.
laptop was never exposed to the Interent.
you're done.
Totally. That's what I do too. I guess I'm proposing a sort of all-in-one solution. No wifi, no ethernet, very small, extremely low power, everything is already installed and ready to go, encrypted, etc. Maybe, say, $50 or $60. I don't know. I have friends who are interested in bitcoin, but they're not very tech savvy. It'd be nice if there were a solution for that sort of person that allowed them to do what you and I are doing without requiring of them learning about Ubuntu, or Linux, ect. They buy it, plug it in, and follow the snazzy on screen instructions. I just think that if we really want bitcoin to expand out of the circle it's settled in, we're going to have to start thinking in this direction. Ordinary people will need something as secure and functional as offline Armory, without any of the setup. |
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The thing never touches a network and doesn't even have wifi or ethernet. How do you think it is going to manage transactions? If it's something along the lines of "connect to pc using usb, install drivers, etc.", that's not nowhere near "simple for the average joe". And besides, the idea isn't to create an offline hardware device for everyday bitcoin use. Rather, it's to provide an easy and very secure way to store bitcoins. However, if it used Armory, or something like it, it could be easy enough to manage transactions. |
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Paper is pretty secure. Print it out and put it in a locked safe?
Ok. Sure. But the idea is to offer a totally offline solution that's (1) inexpensive and (2) user friendly for the average joe. What I'm suggesting is a hardware device that you buy. Take it home and plug it in and you're presented with a few simple options like, "Create an offline bitcoin wallet", or "Create a wallet with a passphrase", "Import a bitcoin wallet", etc. The thing never touches a network and doesn't even have wifi or ethernet. Right now the solution is something like buy a netbook and use some clunky software or client side web app. I'm saying combine what we can already do into a very low power, very small, and less expensive device. |
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I think it'd be awesome to combine something as inexpensive and versatile as a Raspberry Pi with Armory. Make the UI very easy to use, and put it in a nice looking case, and you'd have a user friendly way for the average joe to secure their bitcoins. Anyone working on this? Stupid idea? Discuss...
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If that business isn't here in 300 years can we sue? and what about laminating the paper and locking it in a (large) safe? wouldn't that last longer then digital data that is susceptible to EMI? what about sending it out to space as radio-waves and once we can travel faster than light, go ahead of it and record. lol |
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Zhou, I don't remember if I had a balance on Bitcoinica or not. If I did, it was a rather old balance. I submitted a claim when the claims form was revealed, and put 0 btc in everything since I had no clue if I had anything in there or not. Should I take any additional steps? Resubmit a claim with different balances?
It was a small amount if any (I think 1 BTC or 5 BTC), so not a huge deal, just wondering what I should do to be sure I get back anything I did have in there.
You should be asking that to Mr. Hacker. He's the only one who knows your Bitcoinica balance now lol When is the hacker's claims page gonna be up? |
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you are right that there is good internal bitcoin market strength.
But stability will soon be gone...
There is not going to be a return of volatility like there was a year ago. There is too much capital in the BitCoin economy now to allow for volatility like a year ago, it is beginning to function like a real currency, the arbitrage bots have helped stabilize price discovery and there are plenty of other places for speculators to go instead of the price of coins. That said, for a currency it is pretty volatile with 1-3% movement in a 24 hour period being fairly common. I agree. I think if the price is going to go up, it's going to be slow and over a period of many, many years. |
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'cause you cleaned up your workplace?
Quick! Everyone clean their workplace! |
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