Bitcoin really is in trouble.

[darkmule]

fundamental flaw? 

The fundamental flaw with bitcoin is that it is not a UNIT.  Currency is 3 things. 1. a store of value
                                                                                                           2. a medium of exchange
                                                                                                           3. a UNIT of account

Bitcoin is not currency because it is not a UNIT. Units are definable in objective terms and are a constant
Bitcoin is not definable and is not a constant. Bitcoin has the same problem as the dollar since 1971. It cant be defined.

This is crackpot gibberish you basically just pulled out of your ass.

Umm, yeah.  Right.  Bitcoin isn't currency because, according to you, it "has the same problem as the dollar," since apparently the dollar isn't currency either according to your utterly idiotic made-up bullshit.

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[manfred]

Much bigger trouble on the horizon, affects not just bitcoin:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=325642.0

[Eri]

They can blacklist Bitcoins, reverse transactions and penalise people choosing to use a client other than their own. Sound like a central authority to me.

Your really under the wrong impression on how it all works.

lets say the govt tells the devs to make a client that blacklists coins, they publish it and say "this is the official client you must use it".

1. Nobody is required to use it, and anyone with half a brain wont.
2. Everyone will be yelling about how crazy it is and to not use it.
3. Someone will be forking the official client(probably the devs themselves over TOR) to include the latest updates without that bit of code in it.


That example applies to the other two examples you mention. And let me just cut you off before you try to make your next point. "But the devs DID reverse many transactions!" No they didnt. If memory serves... there was an issue where the blockchain forked from an update, unintentionally.  you either let it run its course and fix itself (screwing people in the process) or ... get the pool operators together to go back to the previous version of the client to fix it faster. The fallout was minimal and it was the right choice to make. The problem that caused it was in the original database the clients used, a bug.

If people wernt in agreement with what was done they would have left the pools rather then migrating to them.

If you want the rest of the details im sure there is a thread about it somewhere, including a chat log.

[crazy_rabbit]

Typically, Bitcoin cultists have dismissed the latest which demonstrates that Bitcoin has a fundamental vulnerability. Some salient facts pertinent to this issue largely ignored by this community of rampant speculators.

1. Despite what Bitcoin cultists claim, Bitcoin does have a central authority. Specifically, the group responsible for the most popular Bitcoin client wields as much power over Bitcoin as any central bank does over state fiat.

No, that's flat out wrong. Not only is the group that works on the standard client very large, and very broad, and very active (not to mention under lots of scrutiny) the miners also have a strong say in what bitcoin looks like. Even if the group that makes the popular client were tyrannical in some sense, the miners (the REAL backbone of Bitcoin) can decide themselves if they support new features, new clients, etc... If the miners and developers somehow 'collude' on features, then what you get is a BETTER BITCOIN. Because what your saying is that the people who actively build bitcoin agree with the people who actively run bitcoin, which is exactly what all this is anyway. It's a consensus system. Which means it runs perfectly fine.

2. A fork of the most popular client with what we shall call a war miner module (extra credit for spotting the gaming reference) would quickly become popular with all those people who invested in ASIC hardware, but ended up  out of pocket as mining difficulty moved ahead of them.

Nope. There are tens of thousands, if not now, soon, hundreds of thousands of miners out there. The only thing that coordinates them now is the pools that they mine one. Miners have no interest in a fork, it's bad for bitcoin, bad for business. A Forked bitcoin with the 'loser asic miners' has no value. You might as well jump on my bandwagon to Monetize and Mine Bitcoin Testnet. Because there already IS a 'bitcoin2' and it's right inside the standard bitcoin client. If you're pissed the difficulty has surpassed your device and still want to mine bitcoin, just hop on the test net. Forks run by the already out-hashes ASICS would be instantly orphaned.

3. There seems to be a foolish assumption that nobody would bother exploiting this systemic flaw in Bitcoin because to do so would destroy the very thing they would be investing in exploiting. Alas gentlemen, you shall be hoist be your own petard. For all the talk of a brave new world of cryptocurrency, free from the ruinous short-termism of state fiat, what you have is a community whose engagement with Bitcoin is entirely speculative in nature. It's all about riding the bubble and cashing out before it explodes, very few people seem truly committed to Bitcoin as a currency, rather a means to acquire more of the sate fiat they claim to detest. You've collectively recreated the very worst excesses of the Wall St. Mafia, and as a consequence there are plenty in the Bitcoin community who will seek to exploit this core vulnerability for profit.

It's not a flaw, and it's not currently exploitable. You are probably not watching the development email list, but not only are they talking about ways to get around this, but the issue is academic at best. The mining ecosystem is rather well understood to the miners There aren't a bunch of "dark horses" out there. The same people with the hash power to pull something like this off are also the same people working to find solutions to it. There's no money to be made in destroying your own money.

[gaston909]

I agree it is a sham. Bitcoin is not currency it is a speculative bubble.

Bitcoin is a sham. Unlike the dollar.

[muddafudda]

I agree it is a sham. Bitcoin is not currency it is a speculative bubble.

Bitcoin is a sham. Unlike the dollar.

Quote of the day, awesome

[HeliKopterBen]

Its funny how such an obvious and easy money-making exploit has been described in detail and broadcast to the world, yet no one has taken advantage of it.

[LostDutchman]

Typically, Bitcoin cultists have dismissed the latest which demonstrates that Bitcoin has a fundamental vulnerability. Some salient facts pertinent to this issue largely ignored by this community of rampant speculators.


1. Despite what Bitcoin cultists claim, Bitcoin does have a central authority. Specifically, the group responsible for the most popular Bitcoin client wields as much power over Bitcoin as any central bank does over state fiat.

2. A fork of the most popular client with what we shall call a war miner module (extra credit for spotting the gaming reference) would quickly become popular with all those people who invested in ASIC hardware, but ended up  out of pocket as mining difficulty moved ahead of them.

3. There seems to be a foolish assumption that nobody would bother exploiting this systemic flaw in Bitcoin because to do so would destroy the very thing they would be investing in exploiting. Alas gentlemen, you shall be hoist be your own petard. For all the talk of a brave new world of cryptocurrency, free from the ruinous short-termism of state fiat, what you have is a community whose engagement with Bitcoin is entirely speculative in nature. It's all about riding the bubble and cashing out before it explodes, very few people seem truly committed to Bitcoin as a currency, rather a means to acquire more of the sate fiat they claim to detest. You've collectively recreated the very worst excesses of the Wall St. Mafia, and as a consequence there are plenty in the Bitcoin community who will seek to exploit this core vulnerability for profit.

The greed that created the bubble in Bitcoin will burn it to the ground just as quickly.

"No!" to what you wrote.



My $.02.

[revans]

Its funny how such an obvious and easy money-making exploit has been described in detail and broadcast to the world, yet no one has taken advantage of it.

It was only a few days ago. Give it time.

[cypherdoc]

Its funny how such an obvious and easy money-making exploit has been described in detail and broadcast to the world, yet no one has taken advantage of it.

It was only a few days ago. Give it time.

you really think that highly of yourself, eh?

[revans]

Its funny how such an obvious and easy money-making exploit has been described in detail and broadcast to the world, yet no one has taken advantage of it.

It was only a few days ago. Give it time.

you really think that highly of yourself, eh?

The esteem in which I hold myself is irrelevant. I was merely pointing out that there has not been sufficient time for someone to create and debug an attack based on the selfish mining principle explained in the paper.

[kjj]

1. Despite what Bitcoin cultists claim, Bitcoin does have a central authority. Specifically, the group responsible for the most popular Bitcoin client wields as much power over Bitcoin as any central bank does over state fiat.

This is true.  Under orders from the secret committee that runs the foundation, I added a secret file to the bitcoin source master repository.  Don't bother looking for it on your copy of the source , it is hidden secret file.  This file allows the cabal to push updates to all nodes, changing the block validation rules.  The end result is that the central bank foundation can print unlimited bitcoins.

(Note:  I'm mocking the idiot here.  Not only is this not true, it couldn't possibly become true, no matter how many sock puppet accounts Atlas creates to spread these lies.)

[BlackBison]

[sublime5447]

fundamental flaw? 

The fundamental flaw with bitcoin is that it is not a UNIT.  Currency is 3 things. 1. a store of value
                                                                                                           2. a medium of exchange
                                                                                                           3. a UNIT of account

Bitcoin is not currency because it is not a UNIT. Units are definable in objective terms and are a constant
Bitcoin is not definable and is not a constant. Bitcoin has the same problem as the dollar since 1971. It cant be defined.

This is crackpot gibberish you basically just pulled out of your ass.

Umm, yeah.  Right.  Bitcoin isn't currency because, according to you, it "has the same problem as the dollar," since apparently the dollar isn't currency either according to your utterly idiotic made-up bullshit.

Dick face, Open up your pee brain a little.   

Is currency a system of measurement? .... (yes)

Are all systems of measurement dependent on a unit of measurement? .... (yes)

Is bitcoin a UNIT? No none of the worlds "currencies" are.

The gold that the central banks still hold is a UNIT. 

[gwedo]

Much bigger trouble on the horizon, affects not just bitcoin:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=325642.0

if internet fractures along national borders how it could influence btc?
 I thought its kind of P2P network which is able to operate independently and if necessary, some easy adjustments can be done to keep p2P net alive...
apologize, I am not developer, I have only common IT skills.

[kjj]

hello all
I dont understand all technical details but how it is possible that FBI bureau has located and seized a collection of 144,000 bitcoins???

I thought that BTC cannot be seized or taken away by officials or police. especially when someone encrypt the wallet.
How they could easily seized firstly btc of users of silkroad (in october) and now at second also seized ulbrichts money? ?

You answer your own question.  Either his wallets were not encrypted, not encrypted well, or he was convinced to cough up the key.

[RodeoX]

I thought that BTC cannot be seized or taken away by officials or police. ...

That is incorrect. It may be hard for them to do, but they can be seized if they are involved in a crime. Or a corrupt government somewhere could take them for whatever reason they want.

[theonewhowaskazu]

I don't even know what the OP is saying. He's concerned that the core devs will add in some sort of backdoor into the main Bitcoin client and "make" everybody change their client to this new client? Why would they switch to the new client, exactly?

You're essentially saying that the devs will create a flawed altcoin and all Bitcoiners will randomly decide to switch to the flawed altcoin. Only this has been tried in the past, and has failed, for really obvious reasons: Nobody wants to change their good Bitcoins into crap Bitcoins which is what they're doing by switching their client.

[gwedo]

Thank you all for quick deletion of my post which was not rude or offtopic!
this is reallly polite democratic discussion
and also thank you who managed to answer my curious question about bitcoin before someone disliked it and deleted it...

[AndrewWilliams]

hello all
I dont understand all technical details but how it is possible that FBI bureau has located and seized a collection of 144,000 bitcoins???

I thought that BTC cannot be seized or taken away by officials or police. especially when someone encrypt the wallet.
How they could easily seized firstly btc of users of silkroad (in october) and now at second also seized ulbrichts money? ?

You answer your own question.  Either his wallets were not encrypted, not encrypted well, or he was convinced to cough up the key.

It's called give us the password to your Bitcoins (in this case, ill gotten funds), or face another 20 years in prison.