Difference Between 51% and 52% Attack

[MysteryMiner]

Why you think that almost unlimited supply can take down Bitcoin? Why there is chronic shortage of High-End Radeon cards? Sure, banks can create money from thin air, but they cannot create GPU chips in the same way. Not counting all components needed to assemble functioning GPU card. To take down Bitcoin there is need for "Bombe" style machine that cracked german Enigma. Think about innovation and dedication required to do something similar today. Think about creating a building full of malicios Bitcoin ASICs.

[99Percent]

The point is, if you are going to invest in bitcoins, also invest hashing power.

[cypherdoc]

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Cypherdoc, get a clue or gtfo. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=52166.msg623111#msg623111

are you blind?  we are over 3yr into this and 1 Bitcoin is worth 5 USD.  there are alot of ppl who apparently disagree with you.  i'm waiting.

[CleverMiner]

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Cypherdoc, get a clue or gtfo. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=52166.msg623111#msg623111

are you blind?  we are over 3yr into this and 1 Bitcoin is worth 5 USD.  there are alot of ppl who apparently disagree with you.  i'm waiting.

Disagree with what ?  Face-palm is all I meant.

You had no clue about the USD value of Bitcoin security.
I think you also had no idea of the IT budget of banks, yet you seems to be willing to provide financial advices.

[stcupp]

um I did say why in the post. to take down the network. if bitcoin starts becoming a real threat to the established financial institution, it would be pocket change to them and by far in their best interest

pocket change?  how so?  the network is multiples in terms of hashing power of the largest supercomputer on earth.  how much does one of those supercomputers cost?

Your not thinking about ASIC's if they want to take down the network they could just pay like 5-10 million to have ASIC's made and easily have enough hashing power to take down the network.

and yes 5-10 million is pocket change to them

[istar]

The point is, if you are going to invest in bitcoins, also invest hashing power.

Its a good advice but when you buy you are also indirectly supporting the miners, so they can increase their hardware.

I think that if the main client got support for easy P2pool mining lots of people would mine somewhat just to support the network.

Atleast I would, but I do not have the time to put effort into buying a mining rig.

[cypherdoc]

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Cypherdoc, get a clue or gtfo. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=52166.msg623111#msg623111

are you blind?  we are over 3yr into this and 1 Bitcoin is worth 5 USD.  there are alot of ppl who apparently disagree with you.  i'm waiting.

Disagree with what ?  Face-palm is all I meant.

You had no clue about the USD value of Bitcoin security.

i fail to see how you could conclude this.  nothing i said would indicate that.  plus this topic has been discussed up and down the forums for years now and there is plenty of disagreement.  also that calculation is highly dubious and is based on a simple calculation of hardware based on today's prices which is unreasonable.  any big player entering a market for say asic components or whatever of this magnitude would shove prices thru the roof.

i gave you an small example of the Butterfly Rig.  that price has moved up 20% just from the limited demand of a few small Bitcoiners that you apparently think are making a mistake investing in such a high price machine as well.

I think you also had no idea of the IT budget of banks, yet you seems to be willing to provide financial advices.

this is just a plain and simple ad hominem attack.  you seem to just be repeating Etlase's.  do you have any creative concrete criticisms of your own?  

and what does my blog have to do with the discussion at hand?  you make an assumption and then create a diversion.  try to advance some ideas that pertain to this thread.

and as to regards to the number of my posts you referred to in the pm you just sent me, what if i say "b/c you have so few posts you can't possibly know anything about Bitcoin"?

is this the entity you guys are talking about smashing the network?:  http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/02/forgotten-password/

[Etlase2]

You had no clue about the USD value of Bitcoin security.

i fail to see how you could conclude this.  nothing i said would indicate that.

i disagree with this logic.  if the US gov't or some financial institution were to enter the market for gpu's the cost of those gpu's would skyrocket pushing the cost into the billions i'd estimate.

no point in any kind of logical discussion here, move along

[cypherdoc]

You had no clue about the USD value of Bitcoin security.

i fail to see how you could conclude this.  nothing i said would indicate that.

i disagree with this logic.  if the US gov't or some financial institution were to enter the market for gpu's the cost of those gpu's would skyrocket pushing the cost into the billions i'd estimate.

no point in any kind of logical discussion here, move along

actually, i agree with you on the move along part.  as i said, this topic has been discussed repeatedly in numerous threads and there is plenty of disagreement with well thought out arguments on both sides.  its useless hashing this out here yet again.

[triplehelix]

If an entity decided to spend $30M to attack or take control of Bitcoin, they would NOT got out to buy GPUs in retail stores.
They could design a 65nm ASIC for a couple of millions $ of NRE and then produce a ton of them probably for less than 100$ per GH/s (wild guess based on 45nm FPGA based systems going for close to $1 per MH/s  in single quantities today. A dedicated, mass produced ASIC design should be able to be 10 times more cost efficient than a retail FPGA design).
Heck, if anyone wants to give me $5M, I'm willing to give it a shot.  

i don't have the specific numbers or ability to work it out, but i know its a laughable idea that a powerful entity with the intent of dominating the compute power of the network would hit up newegg for gpu's.

the absolute closest this entity would come to buying off the shelf would be to get the most powerful 22nm FPGA chips on the market today, and fab their own boards.

most likely though, as mentioned they'd just build their own custom ASIC solution.

those pointing to the current hash rate of existing super computers are also missing the mark.  those configurations are not optimized for efficient hashing.  the same money (cost to originally acquire adjusted for inflation) a top level super computer cost, invested in a custom system designed specifically for hashing, would dominate beyond 51%.

[Boussac]

um I did say why in the post. to take down the network. if bitcoin starts becoming a real threat to the established financial institution, it would be pocket change to them and by far in their best interest

You are right in saying that it would be pocket change in terms of the financial power of the stakeholders.
However financial institutions tend to be extremely risk averse.
For a budget in the millions, the approval process is not a breeze: what banks's CEO will engage first? Who will be responsible for the risk analysis ? (litigations ?)
If it's a government agency, what is the mandate and charter ? Is it not like opening a can of worms ? Will it not backfire ?
Then again the best interest of a bank could very well be to adopt the technology instead of trying to make as if it was never invented.

[Etlase2]

If it's a government agency, what is the mandate and charter ? Is it not like opening a can of worms ? Will it not backfire ?

Remember, this never needs to go public. If bitcoin gets taken down, we will only know that it happened, not who did it or why. Even if it is later discovered who did it, the damage is still done. If people lose millions of dollars and the Big Problem of the bitcoin protocol is exposed, I don't really see how it will backfire. All of a sudden now the general public is going to run away from big banks and government aid? Not likely.

Then again the best interest of a bank could very well be to adopt the technology instead of trying to make as if it was never invented.

Highly unlikely. The Rothschild era of bitcoin has come and gone and the players are already decided with little chance of big banks making much headway. They are not going to relinquish control of money to the early adopters.

[cypherdoc]

If it's a government agency, what is the mandate and charter ? Is it not like opening a can of worms ? Will it not backfire ?

Remember, this never needs to go public. If bitcoin gets taken down, we will only know that it happened, not who did it or why. Even if it is later discovered who did it, the damage is still done. If people lose millions of dollars and the Big Problem of the bitcoin protocol is exposed, I don't really see how it will backfire. All of a sudden now the general public is going to run away from big banks and government aid? Not likely.

Then again the best interest of a bank could very well be to adopt the technology instead of trying to make as if it was never invented.

Highly unlikely. The Rothschild era of bitcoin has come and gone and the players are already decided with little chance of big banks making much headway. They are not going to relinquish control of money to the early adopters.

but yet you were willing to try and start an alt chain by the name of Encoin which apparently has failed since i don't see it in your sig anymore.

if it had been successful then YOU would have clearly been an early adopter and stood to gain the most from its success.  i guess in that scenario an alternative form of money would be OK, right?

but since you're clearly not a Bitcoin early adopter, it must be a bad thing and is highly likely to be destroyed by these big entities?  stop with the FUD.