What if Bitcoin Mining is a Cover?

[pedrog]

While the idea of some gov/agency involvement in BitCoin is not entirely far-fetched, the code/algorithm itself is fairly simple and doing what it claims. The likelihood of backdoors or non-understood effects is small.

A greater possibility is that the entire bitcoin concept/operation has been created and supported for some generally unknown further purpose.

Actually that is way more far-fetched than believing Hotmail and Gmail were built with the intention of spying on our communications, as those are closed platforms, in open technology there's always someone watching and verifying every line of the code...

And thinking that some shady organization will have a plan like "Hey, lets build a great technology with the power to substitute the entire economic system and unleash it into the wild and lose complete control over it and maybe it will gain enough popularity and maybe some day, some how we will be capable of harnessing its power to do something", that's tin foil hat mentality big time.

There are way more popular and widely used open source software and I don't see the nutjobs making outrageous claims about them, like linux, apache, android, open office, and so on, well we see then making claims, but not as much as with bitcoin technology.

[cWq34#9tH-3]

.... in open technology there's always someone watching and verifying every line of the code..

You guys keep saying this but my point is that while being open makes verifying the code possible. Who has actually done this? And I'm not talking about your average user who wouldn't know what the code actually does. I mean what qualified person or organization has actually verified the code? JC, if you guys think that being able to verify the code is what makes this safe. Then I wanna know who has actually done this? Why is that too hard of a question?

It cracks me up how vitally important many of you say that it is that code can be verified but none of you seem to believe that it's important that it actually be verified. Wow, just wow. There's no tinfoil hat needed to see the failure and the absolute stupidity in this thinking.

[YukonCoinelius]

While the idea of some gov/agency involvement in BitCoin is not entirely far-fetched, the code/algorithm itself is fairly simple and doing what it claims. The likelihood of backdoors or non-understood effects is small.

A greater possibility is that the entire bitcoin concept/operation has been created and supported for some generally unknown further purpose.

And thinking that some shady organization will have a plan like "Hey, lets build a great technology with the power to substitute the entire economic system and unleash it into the wild and lose complete control over it and maybe it will gain enough popularity and maybe some day, some how we will be capable of harnessing its power to do something", that's tin foil hat mentality big time.

There are way more popular and widely used open source software and I don't see the nutjobs making outrageous claims about them, like linux, apache, android, open office, and so on, well we see then making claims, but not as much as with bitcoin technology.

The difference between the open-source projects you mention and Bitcoin, is that they have known developers and founders, while "Satoshi Nakamoto" is not a known individual.  To invent an algorithmic design of this caliber out of the blue, document it in a published  paper, develop it in software, engineer and test into a working system scalable across millions of machines, release and sustain the seed operation over a period of years, all the while maintaining total anonymity, and ultimately perfectly disappearing from the scene without a trace...  speaks to a very wide skillset, dedication, and resources -- arguably beyond any 1 person's capacity.

By the way, I wonder if you realize, your quoted example of a crazy plan: "Hey let's build... unleash to the wild... harnessing it's power" is a not too inaccurate description of the internet itself (originally a Darpa project).

Bitcoin mining is not "a cover".  It does what it says it does, which is pretty clear, and very useful. No reason not to move forward with this great technology.  (although energy inefficient). For those asking "who has verified it?",  many people.  There is an extended development team and many other academics, researchers, engineers and developers who understand it to varying degrees (including many on this forum).  It's not some arcane black box.

However, there are certainly interesting questions about the origin, why, who, is there an overall "schedule/program" of some kind, is it a testbed for something future, what does Mark II look like, etc.  And as for many cryptographic technologies, there could be advanced exploits/holes that are beyond current state-of-art.   (of course, if they break Bitcoin, they probably break a considerable number of other things too).

[cWq34#9tH-3]

thank you for a reasonable answer @YukonCoinelius. I was waiting for another ignorant jerk to again insinuate that my reasonable question made me crazy and then you answered it. that was a refreshing change around here. And there I was all ready to reply to someone, saying "Oh yeah, you don't think that having a reputable person or organization to actually verify the code is important? And you think that I'm nuts for insisting on it? Wow, I guess you think that all the certifying organizations and individuals, such as those hundreds of organizations (and tens of thousands of individuals) that certify things like firefox plugins, and other software, AND Microsoft type software and compatability etc. I guess you think that doing that is nuts, huh? Well if I am a nut, I certainly have a lot of company. A lot of well respected company. The FACT is that I am not only "NOT" a nut, but I am very clear headed AND anyone that thinks that actually verifying code is a stupid idea - well, if that's you, then YOU are an idiot"

And hey btw YukonCoinelius, can you give me some names and links to these numerous people and orgs that you say have verified the bitcoin client code? Please no names or links to the producers of the code. Thanks!

[Xuesheng]

Awesome!

Yes it is open source and I'm sure many have poured through the code. But it would be cool if the computing power was actually used for something useful (like gene bending) Maybe it is. I don't know.

[cWq34#9tH-3]

Awesome!

Yes it is open source and I'm sure many have poured through the code. But it would be cool if the computing power was actually used for something useful (like gene bending) Maybe it is. I don't know.

If so "many have" done this then why can't anybody tell me who?

I'm beginning to think that everyone is so sure that since it's open code that surely someone must have verified it? well... that's an assumption.

You're so sure this code has been verified? then back it up. Who? Tell me Who has done this?

[pedrog]

While the idea of some gov/agency involvement in BitCoin is not entirely far-fetched, the code/algorithm itself is fairly simple and doing what it claims. The likelihood of backdoors or non-understood effects is small.

A greater possibility is that the entire bitcoin concept/operation has been created and supported for some generally unknown further purpose.

And thinking that some shady organization will have a plan like "Hey, lets build a great technology with the power to substitute the entire economic system and unleash it into the wild and lose complete control over it and maybe it will gain enough popularity and maybe some day, some how we will be capable of harnessing its power to do something", that's tin foil hat mentality big time.

There are way more popular and widely used open source software and I don't see the nutjobs making outrageous claims about them, like linux, apache, android, open office, and so on, well we see then making claims, but not as much as with bitcoin technology.

The difference between the open-source projects you mention and Bitcoin, is that they have known developers and founders, while "Satoshi Nakamoto" is not a known individual.  To invent an algorithmic design of this caliber out of the blue, document it in a published  paper, develop it in software, engineer and test into a working system scalable across millions of machines, release and sustain the seed operation over a period of years, all the while maintaining total anonymity, and ultimately perfectly disappearing from the scene without a trace...  speaks to a very wide skillset, dedication, and resources -- arguably beyond any 1 person's capacity.

By the way, I wonder if you realize, your quoted example of a crazy plan: "Hey let's build... unleash to the wild... harnessing it's power" is a not too inaccurate description of the internet itself (originally a Darpa project).

Bitcoin mining is not "a cover".  It does what it says it does, which is pretty clear, and very useful. No reason not to move forward with this great technology.  (although energy inefficient). For those asking "who has verified it?",  many people.  There is an extended development team and many other academics, researchers, engineers and developers who understand it to varying degrees (including many on this forum).  It's not some arcane black box.

However, there are certainly interesting questions about the origin, why, who, is there an overall "schedule/program" of some kind, is it a testbed for something future, what does Mark II look like, etc.  And as for many cryptographic technologies, there could be advanced exploits/holes that are beyond current state-of-art.   (of course, if they break Bitcoin, they probably break a considerable number of other things too).

I can see where you are coming from, but with open technologies there's no need for authority in the creator or inventor, the technology proves to be useful or not, and I find the mystery around the Satoshi Nakamoto character fascinating because of the reasons you mentioned.

What I meant with the "tin foil hat mentality" is the need for an incredible foresight in the plan, it's easy to look back and see the potential right away, but 5 years ago...

And there are lots of technologies that came from war efforts or military backgrounds that are used every day in the civilian world, Internet is just another one, you have to agree that it would be very hard for someone  50 years ago have the foresight for something like PRISM, has in PRISM beeing the objective of the Internet, and there was competition for the Internet like the french Minitel, and I'm sure there were others.

Yes, breaking Bitcoin would break many other things, Bitcoin would be the least of our concerns, hehe.

[Deroba]

A massive password cracker is interesting, but it simply isn't.

[pedrog]

Awesome!

Yes it is open source and I'm sure many have poured through the code. But it would be cool if the computing power was actually used for something useful (like gene bending) Maybe it is. I don't know.

If so "many have" done this then why can't anybody tell me who?

I'm beginning to think that everyone is so sure that since it's open code that surely someone must have verified it? well... that's an assumption.

You're so sure this code has been verified? then back it up. Who? Tell me Who has done this?

Here you go:

Dan Kaminsky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Kaminsky

Article: http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/05/lets-cut-through-the-bitcoin-hype/


Ben Laurie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Laurie

His critique: http://www.links.org/files/decentralised-currencies.pdf

His proposal: http://www.links.org/files/distributed-currency.pdf


Here's another paper from some reputable people: http://crypto.stanford.edu/~xb/fc12/bitcoin.pdf


And more: http://eprint.iacr.org/2012/584.pdf


More: http://spar.isi.jhu.edu/~mgreen/ZerocoinOakland.pdf


And you are right in being skeptical, never change about that, always doubt, and I mean it...

[cWq34#9tH-3]

Those appear to be articles about bitcoin itself. And I have read numerous articles but I have yet to read where anyone has said that they actually inspected the code for backdoors or any other malicious code. Although as in one of your first links, the expert author does state that he tried to break the code. Obviously he must have reviewed it it he was trying to find flaws in it. Thanks for that one.

[siliclone]

I'm a firm believer of every conspiracy theory, ever.

[cWq34#9tH-3]

Want to know how to know when the person that you're debating is full of shit? It's when they start making up shit that you didn't say and then use that (i.e what they just made up) to insult and discredit you.

I never said a damn thing about any conspiracy. I merely asked the questions: has anybody actually examined the code? And if so, who? About as simple and straightforward as any questions anyone could have; And yet it's met with so much hostility and fear.  My, my, how low someone's self-esteem must be to behave in such a manner.

[a1phanumrc]

I merely asked the questions: has anybody actually examined the code?

Yes. Many people have examined the code. Many.

Why don't you stop asking about it and go examine it yourself? Even if you can't read code you should be able to see a gaping security hole like phoning home to the NSA. It would stick out like a sore thumb and bitcoin would not be where it is today.

It wouldn't have made it past the first week.

[SirMintALot]

Why do you worry that Bitcoin might be used by the NSA, when the NSA has access to your windows computer anyway?
http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/5/5263/1.html

They already could have loaded a hashcat like tool to your PC and using it.  Bitcoin mining is something mainly done by nerds and nothing that the common guy does. Because of that the hashing power would be much lower than if the would be hasing only with the cpu on every windows computer 

[sana8410]

No way, NSA has even more powerful machines that we can imagine.

[cWq34#9tH-3]

I merely asked the questions: has anybody actually examined the code?

Yes. Many people have examined the code. Many.

Why don't you stop asking about it and go examine it yourself? Even if you can't read code you should be able to see a gaping security hole like phoning home to the NSA. It would stick out like a sore thumb and bitcoin would not be where it is today.

It wouldn't have made it past the first week.

Well then you should have no trouble answering my question.

[cWq34#9tH-3]

Why do you worry that Bitcoin might be used by the NSA, when the NSA has access to your windows computer anyway?
http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/5/5263/1.html

They already could have loaded a hashcat like tool to your PC and using it.  Bitcoin mining is something mainly done by nerds and nothing that the common guy does. Because of that the hashing power would be much lower than if the would be hasing only with the cpu on every windows computer 

Oh I see so for windows users then there is no advantage in using "open source" programs. Thanks for clearing that up.

[rafi365]

Believe me that a lot of non nerd guys started to open big btc mining farms as an investment.

[wearepoor]

But in the blockchain, there are hidden secret messages

From the illuminati, isn't it?

its the secret illuminati communication network

And the hashing power is used to power the alien brainwashing machines.

No, your quite wrong. Sending specific amount from certain address can be encoded message.

[a1phanumrc]

I merely asked the questions: has anybody actually examined the code?

Yes. Many people have examined the code. Many.

Why don't you stop asking about it and go examine it yourself? Even if you can't read code you should be able to see a gaping security hole like phoning home to the NSA. It would stick out like a sore thumb and bitcoin would not be where it is today.

It wouldn't have made it past the first week.

Well then you should have no trouble answering my question.

I already did. Go do your own research and quit relying on others to do it for you.