These guys are UNBELIEVABLE. The Brookings Institution weighs in.

[guywhogotgoxed]

"The potential Achilles heel of Bitcoin—that each server in the network contains a complete record
of all transactions—will almost certainly be addressed in future systems that distribute transaction
information so that no single server or small collection of servers contains a complete transaction
record."

i thought this was our strength?

It's law enforcement's Achilles Heel, that's why they say that, I think.
It's a good read. It's kind of boring though. Not much news really. But it does show Bitcoins impact and reaction from corporations and government.

Clearly Bitcoin is a problem for some people. This is a very good thing.  

yeah, i thought it was boring too.  but what made it boring is that its not really a research piece.  no statistics, figures, graphs.  just alot of fear and innuendo justifying gov't counteraction.  something you'd expect from a gov't pawn.

The syntax of that sentence does not imply that it is the law enforcements achilles heel. Seems like they got it all wrong, this is what keeps btc from being counterfeited and prevents double spends. Harder to counterfeit than actual cash! That is one hell of a trait considering cash has been around for so long. An applause to mr Nakamoto.

[cypherdoc]

Only had to go to page 4 for the best quote in the doc:

Almost no one would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace digital financial transactions associated with activities such as terrorism and human trafficking.

I would.

I would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace a damn thing, regardless what I'm suspected of. I've seen this argument in various forms so many times it's laughable and I'm honestly surprised that, for once, they didn't throw "child pornography" into that sentence. It IS the classic scapegoat of governmental agencies who want more power/control after all.

yeah, they used that phrase at least twice in the document as if they have a mandate to save all of us at the expense of our liberties and to their enrichment.  sickening really.

[Piper67]

"The potential Achilles heel of Bitcoin—that each server in the network contains a complete record
of all transactions—will almost certainly be addressed in future systems that distribute transaction
information so that no single server or small collection of servers contains a complete transaction
record."

i thought this was our strength?

It's law enforcement's Achilles Heel, that's why they say that, I think.
It's a good read. It's kind of boring though. Not much news really. But it does show Bitcoins impact and reaction from corporations and government.

Clearly Bitcoin is a problem for some people. This is a very good thing.  

yeah, i thought it was boring too.  but what made it boring is that its not really a research piece.  no statistics, figures, graphs.  just alot of fear and innuendo justifying gov't counteraction.  something you'd expect from a gov't pawn.

The syntax of that sentence does not imply that it is the law enforcements achilles heel. Seems like they got it all wrong, this is what keeps btc from being counterfeited and prevents double spends. Harder to counterfeit than actual cash! That is one hell of a trait considering cash has been around for so long. An applause to mr Nakamoto.

Or Ms. Nakamoto  

[bitrebel]

Only had to go to page 4 for the best quote in the doc:

Almost no one would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace digital financial transactions associated with activities such as terrorism and human trafficking.

I would.

I would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace a damn thing, regardless what I'm suspected of. I've seen this argument in various forms so many times it's laughable and I'm honestly surprised that, for once, they didn't throw "child pornography" into that sentence. It IS the classic scapegoat of governmental agencies who want more power/control after all.

100% Agreed!

[cypherdoc]

The syntax of that sentence does not imply that it is the law enforcements achilles heel. Seems like they got it all wrong, this is what keeps btc from being counterfeited and prevents double spends. Harder to counterfeit than actual cash! That is one hell of a trait considering cash has been around for so long. An applause to mr Nakamoto.

thats exactly right.  THIS is what gives me hope.  dealing with a bunch of dummies.  i'm bullish.

[Piper67]

"The potential Achilles heel of Bitcoin—that each server in the network contains a complete record
of all transactions—will almost certainly be addressed in future systems that distribute transaction
information so that no single server or small collection of servers contains a complete transaction
record."

i thought this was our strength?

It is the achilies heel because the complete transaction record can be combed through to pinpoint where the money went, thereby connecting identities to illegal transactions. Or something like that. To me trying to find a person by tracking down their money through the blockchain sounds almost impossible, but I guess really smart people could do it.

There seems to be a fair bit of disagreement on this point. The record is for the transactions themselves. Pairing those to any specific identity, while conceivable, may prove to be extremely difficult if someone has taken the steps to avoid detection.

Pretty much the same as cold hard cash, really.

[cypherdoc]

"The potential Achilles heel of Bitcoin—that each server in the network contains a complete record
of all transactions—will almost certainly be addressed in future systems that distribute transaction
information so that no single server or small collection of servers contains a complete transaction
record."

i thought this was our strength?

It is the achilies heel because the complete transaction record can be combed through to pinpoint where the money went, thereby connecting identities to illegal transactions. Or something like that. To me trying to find a person by tracking down their money through the blockchain sounds almost impossible, but I guess really smart people could do it.

i totally disagree.  the more widely the entire tx record is distributed the stronger the network is to an attack.  all it takes is for one node with a complete record to restore/redistribute Bitcoin to the rest of us in the off chance everyone else gets taken down.  all the gov't needs is one copy gotten from blockexplorer.com to comb through but it doesn't really matter; its pretty pseudonymous.

[hugolp]

"The potential Achilles heel of Bitcoin—that each server in the network contains a complete record
of all transactions—will almost certainly be addressed in future systems that distribute transaction
information so that no single server or small collection of servers contains a complete transaction
record."

i thought this was our strength?

It is the achilies heel because the complete transaction record can be combed through to pinpoint where the money went, thereby connecting identities to illegal transactions. Or something like that. To me trying to find a person by tracking down their money through the blockchain sounds almost impossible, but I guess really smart people could do it.

Exactly. They claim that since the history is there it might be posible to track the transactions. The problem as always is linking a Bitcoin address with a person. There is this researcher at some university that made some very cool graphs lnking addresses of the blockchain and he claims that he could find who stole some bitcoins, but he never did, so it remains unclear if he actually can or not. Nevertheless its important to understand that Bitcoin is psedo-anonymous, not anonymous, and that one has to be careful.

[BitLucky]

Only had to go to page 4 for the best quote in the doc:

Almost no one would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace digital financial transactions associated with activities such as terrorism and human trafficking.

I would.

I would argue that governments do not have a right to track and trace a damn thing, regardless what I'm suspected of. I've seen this argument in various forms so many times it's laughable and I'm honestly surprised that, for once, they didn't throw "child pornography" into that sentence. It IS the classic scapegoat of governmental agencies who want more power/control after all.

+1

so tired of seeing the same old scaremongering in order to push laws / legislation through

[Mjbmonetarymetals]

[JDBound]

Awesome.

How did you go about finding this? We need you in this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=40783.0

[herzmeister]

I'd like to



but things may be much more serious. "They" might go very far. Throughout history, many wars have been instigated for gaining control over nations' monetary systems.

Just to destroy Bitcoin and other P2P applications, they might enforce regulations on internet providers that essentially would shut down the free internet as we know it. They might centralize network access and make it into a proprietary thing that only runs the likes of MSN, FaceBook and appalling virtual shopping malls.

[ctoon6]

did you take that with your phone?

and the article was a pointless read, all it did was rehash everything a dedicated bitcoiner would already know.

[Shortline]

It will be a pleasure to watch them crawl and moan and suffer while Bitcoin slowly kills their system

The good part is that the general public will all know what Bitcoin is when the banks start their war on Bitcoin.
And the effect will be completely opposite to the banksters goals
[/quote]

Don't get hysterical with joy yet.

You'll notice they use bitcoin as a proof that these things are possible, not that anything is really happening worth noting. And if you'll read the rest of the paper it goes on to show that African financial services and WoW gold are actually much, much more important than bitcoin probably will ever be. After all, how many new bitcoin users were there in Kenya today? One? Zero? There were thousands of new M-PESA users. These guys don't give a shit about bitcoin.

And frankly, I'm surprised that any of you all are shocked or angry that some think tanks are proposing obnoxious policy solutions. That's what they do. If nobody paid any attention to their whitepapers, nobody would give them any funding, and the moderate thinktanks are thus squeezed out of the public discourse.

[cypherdoc]

Don't get hysterical with joy yet.

You'll notice they use bitcoin as a proof that these things are possible, not that anything is really happening worth noting. And if you'll read the rest of the paper it goes on to show that African financial services and WoW gold are actually much, much more important than bitcoin probably will ever be. After all, how many new bitcoin users were there in Kenya today? One? Zero? There were thousands of new M-PESA users. These guys don't give a shit about bitcoin.

And frankly, I'm surprised that any of you all are shocked or angry that some think tanks are proposing obnoxious policy solutions. That's what they do. If nobody paid any attention to their whitepapers, nobody would give them any funding, and the moderate thinktanks are thus squeezed out of the public discourse.

i wouldn't be so skeptical.  someone here said they talked to an M Pesa rep the other day who admitted Bitcoin would be much less expensive to implement for Safaricom.  there's only so long that one can ignore a cheaper alternative.  we're also getting a Kenyan Exchange soon i think so the hammer will eventually come down by Bitcoin.

[cypherdoc]

http://irdial.com/blogdial/?p=3181

excellent read.

[the founder]

Now the real fun will begin... The fuckers are feeling threated by Bitcoin. It's a huge day for Bitcoin, believe me.

Believe me.  They can't do anything about it.

yea they could.. go after dwoala , camp bx , flexcoin...  then push Japan to put pressure on Mt. Gox ...

Can they shut down bitcoin?  No.. but they can send it to 10 cents by the time they are done.

[cypherdoc]

http://www.libertariannews.org/2011/09/02/national-intelligence-university-academic-launches-attack-against-digital-currencies/

another excellent read about this paper by michaelsuede.

[cypherdoc]

Now the real fun will begin... The fuckers are feeling threated by Bitcoin. It's a huge day for Bitcoin, believe me.

Believe me.  They can't do anything about it.

yea they could.. go after dwoala , camp bx , flexcoin...  then push Japan to put pressure on Mt. Gox ...

Can they shut down bitcoin?  No.. but they can send it to 10 cents by the time they are done.

you mean like they're doing with gold?

[the founder]

Now the real fun will begin... The fuckers are feeling threated by Bitcoin. It's a huge day for Bitcoin, believe me.

Believe me.  They can't do anything about it.

yea they could.. go after dwoala , camp bx , flexcoin...  then push Japan to put pressure on Mt. Gox ...

Can they shut down bitcoin?  No.. but they can send it to 10 cents by the time they are done.

you mean like they're doing with gold?

no, because if they wanted to do that with Gold ...  APMEX would have been raided already... as every single local pawn shop and jeweler that has a "cash for gold" sign on the front door.

Honestly they could just treat bitcoins like music filesharing...  and it will have roughly the same legal problems...  

I know I am in the minority in this, but I would rather it be regulated than have it "shut down" or better said "legally shut down"... because I believe that in the long run those are the only 2 options.