Blowing the lid off the CryptoNote/Bytecoin scam (with the exception of Monero)

[rethink-your-strategy]

Anonfile links in OP r broken. Cannot evidence the screenshots. Any other links?

Anonfile is being a piece of shit lately. Thankfully archive.org has saved copies.

whitepaper_v1.pdf, SHA hash 509da5d77428a8d26e75601fe9ac22d1f958d29a, https://web.archive.org/web/20140706225233/https://cryptonote.org/whitepaper_v1.pdf

whitepaper.pdf, SHA hash 5bafdd891c1459ddfd22d71412d5365de723fb23, https://web.archive.org/web/20140529235502/https://cryptonote.org/whitepaper.pdf

I've updated the links in the main post.

so a bunch of cypherpunks/academics/NSA dudes create a tech which is widely recognized to be bullet-proof…
market cap a few million bucks… whatever

No Charlie, it's not bullet-proof.

the tech has spawned a plethora of copies (all bad except XMR according to thread-starter) worth many millions more. And yet I am supposed to chew out the geniuses benhind CN?? I don't think so… what will XMR offer for future dev? BCN showing the way atm it seems.

Monero is fixing the huge failings found in the CN protocol. https://lab.getmonero.org/pubs/MRL-0004.pdf

But that's not really the point of the research. The point is that CN/BCN is a scam that is desperately trying to pretend it's legit, and thats some bullshit right there.

[1715221927]

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[Oscilson]

Monero is fixing the huge failings found in the CN protocol. https://lab.getmonero.org/pubs/MRL-0004.pdf

But that's not really the point of the research. The point is that CN/BCN is a scam that is desperately trying to pretend it's legit, and thats some bullshit right there.

Some times I think if the developers own a lot of the coin, they will have more incentive to make it successful.

[rethink-your-strategy]

Some times I think if the developers own a lot of the coin, they will have more incentive to make it successful.

It's only a short-term incentive. The real talent is always going to flow towards projects that aren't giant scams (Bitcoin for example) which means you can only ride the wave and pump the price for a few years before the house of cards collapses around you. Good scammers recognise this and move on to the next scam quickly enough.

[Wanderlust]

Some times I think if the developers own a lot of the coin, they will have more incentive to make it successful.

It's only a short-term incentive. The real talent is always going to flow towards projects that aren't giant scams (Bitcoin for example) which means you can only ride the wave and pump the price for a few years before the house of cards collapses around you. Good scammers recognise this and move on to the next scam quickly enough.

For the record, how long was BTC mined before bitcointalk was set up? How much BTC was mined in private circles before a wider audience joined in the mining effort?

Anonfile links in OP r broken. Cannot evidence the screenshots. Any other links?

Anonfile is being a piece of shit lately. Thankfully archive.org has saved copies.

whitepaper_v1.pdf, SHA hash 509da5d77428a8d26e75601fe9ac22d1f958d29a, https://web.archive.org/web/20140706225233/https://cryptonote.org/whitepaper_v1.pdf

whitepaper.pdf, SHA hash 5bafdd891c1459ddfd22d71412d5365de723fb23, https://web.archive.org/web/20140529235502/https://cryptonote.org/whitepaper.pdf

I've updated the links in the main post.

so a bunch of cypherpunks/academics/NSA dudes create a tech which is widely recognized to be bullet-proof…
market cap a few million bucks… whatever

No Charlie, it's not bullet-proof.

the tech has spawned a plethora of copies (all bad except XMR according to thread-starter) worth many millions more. And yet I am supposed to chew out the geniuses benhind CN?? I don't think so… what will XMR offer for future dev? BCN showing the way atm it seems.

Monero is fixing the huge failings found in the CN protocol. https://lab.getmonero.org/pubs/MRL-0004.pdf

But that's not really the point of the research. The point is that CN/BCN is a scam that is desperately trying to pretend it's legit, and thats some bullshit right there.

could u elaborate on No Charlie, it's not bullet-proof. and "Monero is fixing the huge failings found in the CN protocol."

thanks, and thanks for the updated links.

[smooth]

For the record, how long was BTC mined before bitcointalk was set up?

Good questions! I'm glad you are researching these issues with an inquisitive and open mind!

Bitcoin was announced on the public cryptography mailing list about a month before launch, a list that had been around for a decade or longer and reached, directly or indirectly, nearly all the people who (at that time). would have the slightest interest or understanding in an experimental cryptographic currency using digital signatures and hashcash PoW. I've read there were thousands of subscribers. but I don't really know the number, nor do I know if that number is/was public. You can see the original message and subsequent discussion here: https://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg09959.html

After the cryptography mailing list, the original venue for discussing the project was the bitcoin mailing list on sourceforge, which started the same month as the launch: http://sourceforge.net/p/bitcoin/mailman/bitcoin-list/?viewmonth=200901

As far as forum posts, satoshi posted about bitcoin on a p2p forum about two months after it launched: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/forum/topics/bitcoin-open-source

The bitcointalk forum (called the bitcoin.org forum at the time) was created in November, about 9 months later. However, the very first post to that forum references an earlier forum, also on sourceforge (the forum is no longer accessible though). You can read that post here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5.msg28#msg28

How much BTC was mined in private circles before a wider audience joined in the mining effort?

None. The project was announced on a public mailing list and code made available to the public before it was launched. All of these announcements and messages are archived and those archives can be read today. According to Greg Maxwell there were quite a few people mining it, at least intermittently, from the very beginning, and a much larger number over the first 6 months to a year (a quote to that effect is on this forum but I don't have a link to it this very moment).

[Wanderlust]

thanks for the above info smooth - will read it up

copying the below from XMR thread for sake of opening it up. unfortunately it provides the would-be scammers with a good motive for a premine. (i supose i should now look and see how much BCN has been sold in the last year… hmm)

regarding my Q about minimum CN coin supply required for de-anon - i asked that to establish if the amount allegedly pre-mined was exactly equal to the amount required to de-anon the tech.

There is no specific set amount, but 80% is very high. It is a question of probabilities. Someone who controls e.g. 80% has a high probability to control all of the mixin of any new transaction and therefore know which is the real one (since it is the only one that isn't theirs). With a mix of 5+1 that 80% owner will be able to trace about 33% of new transactions. In that same situation someone who owns 20% (still a lot in any remotely reasonably distributed coin) would only be able to trace 0.032% of new transactions, so obviously that is a huge difference.

understood.

and (sorry to repeat) do you agree with the following statement?:

The only way to prevent gov(s)/attacker(s)/whoever(s) buying-in and/or mining in order to de-anon the CN system would be to premine a huge amount and vow to not sell it.

(LOL. I know that sounds like trolling but the logic is sound, yes? In this scenario the creators, aware of the fatal flaw, take the only measure possible to securie its anonymity forever*, assuming they keep their vow to never sell)

thanks
*shouldnt use that word. sorry.

[cAPSLOCK]

That is such a ridiculous reach it hurts my brain.

You are really looking more and more like a BCN apologist.  And that's fine... I would rather know who I am talking to than not.

[Wanderlust]

That is such a ridiculous reach it hurts my brain.

You are really looking more and more like a BCN apologist.  And that's fine... I would rather know who I am talking to than not.

Apologies for sounding the apologist, but there is a Catch 22 here. Either u trust a coin will be disto'd fairly (which never happens) and risks being bought out,by a bad player or u trust a group of anon guys not to sell or de-anon themselves.

Either way with ALL CN coins we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's

The only way to prevent gov(s)/attacker(s)/whoever(s) buying-in and/or mining in order to de-anon the CN system would be to premine a huge amount and vow to not sell it.

That is a central bank.

(LOL. I know that sounds like trolling but the logic is sound, yes? In this scenario the creators, aware of the fatal flaw, take the only measure possible to securie its anonymity forever*, assuming they keep their vow to never sell)

FWIW I have been giving you the benefit of the doubt as we get to know you.

You just added enough to the "doubt" pile that I am second guessing that benefit.

preposterous as it sounds the statement it seems to me is true. bytecoin scam or no bytecoin scam. as I say Ill now look to see the last 12 months+ trading history to see if it has already been disproved by large% sales.

why stop giving me the benefit of the doubt after my most curious insight thus far that arguably a CN coin's anon cannot be safeguarded unless a large % is never sold on exchanges or mined by bad actors or both, and (very tentatively, perhaps regrettably) provides BCN with a justification for a premine.

understand this is purely a thought-experment. i am not vouching for anything here.

Since you are repeating this nonsense, you obviously missed the correct answer I already gave earlier.

No, because such a vow could never be verified or enforced, and furthermore you don't need to sell it, just share information about it. There is certainly no possibility of confidence as long as someone is in a position to do that in an invisible and undetectable manner.

Furthermore I'd add that it won't work, because given such a premine and intelligent users (or wallet developers) they will simply avoid mixing with the premine outputs. This in turn makes the task of an attacker easier, because now that attacker need only control a large portion of the remaining outputs, a far smaller number.

So you can choose your poison. Either certain traceability by the original fraudulent developers, or easier traceability by a subsequent attacker.

Or you can just leave the scammers to the dustbin of history and use a true open source coin with a open, community-driven development process and a fair ongoing distribution process that makes it extraordinarily unlikely for anyone to control anywhere near 80%, particularly if the coin actually sees widespread use.

Isn't life a bit too short to be wasting your mental effort trying to come up with increasingly contrived excuses for Bytecoin's fraud and greed?

You're breaking the rules of the thought experiment. the IF they dont sell must be observed. if it is i believe the statement true. whilst one cannot be sure the devs are not de-anoning their own tech it is arguably better not to give a bad player a chance at doing so.

"So you can choose your poison. Either certain traceability by the original fraudulent developers, or easier traceability by a subsequent attacker"

assuming the devs dont work for 3-letter orgs it's a close call. they have less motive to de-anonymize than most. the latter provides no greater reassurances than the former.

Clearly CN coins have a prob. On the BTC network there is no diff between users save the amounts in their addys. On CN coin networks there is no diff except for the balances AND the ability of large stakeholders to have a chance at de-anoning tx's. it follows the CN/BCN devs might take the only theoretical measure to prevent bad actors (or bad actors other than themselves) from doing just that.
 
Either way with ALL CN coins we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's

[cAPSLOCK]

That is such a ridiculous reach it hurts my brain.

You are really looking more and more like a BCN apologist.  And that's fine... I would rather know who I am talking to than not.

Apologies for sounding the apologist, but there is a Catch 22 here. Either u trust a coin will be disto'd fairly (which never happens) and risks being bought out,by a bad player or u trust a group of anon guys not to sell or de-anon themselves.

Either way with ALL CN coins we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's

You don't even need a fair distribution (which I assume is an egalitarian distribution in your example).  You just cannot have one that has 80% in one cartel. 

In Monero say you hold 30% of the coins.  It would cost at least $3,000,000 to get to 80%.

Monero does not have an anonymity problem.

That is FUD.

[Wanderlust]

That is such a ridiculous reach it hurts my brain.

You are really looking more and more like a BCN apologist.  And that's fine... I would rather know who I am talking to than not.

Apologies for sounding the apologist, but there is a Catch 22 here. Either u trust a coin will be disto'd fairly (which never happens) and risks being bought out,by a bad player or u trust a group of anon guys not to sell or de-anon themselves.

Either way with ALL CN coins we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's

You don't even need a fair distribution (which I assume is an egalitarian distribution in your example).  You just cannot have one that has 80% in one cartel.  

In Monero say you hold 30% of the coins.  It would cost at least $3,000,000 to get to 80%.

Monero does not have an anonymity problem.

That is FUD.

FUD? Methinks not.

Here follows a FACT I HOLD TO BE TRUE:

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

One method of preventing a malicious entity from BUYING into a CN coin to de-anon tx's would be to ensure a large amount of coins are never put up for sale or are made available for mining to the public. Of course this requires we trust in the preminers/early miners (BCN) as opposed to trusting malicious entities dont get a hold of their coins (XMR). With both BCN and XMR a theoretical attack of this nature is a persistent threat to the coin's anon functionality.

[shitaifan2013]

That is such a ridiculous reach it hurts my brain.

You are really looking more and more like a BCN apologist.  And that's fine... I would rather know who I am talking to than not.

Apologies for sounding the apologist, but there is a Catch 22 here. Either u trust a coin will be disto'd fairly (which never happens) and risks being bought out,by a bad player or u trust a group of anon guys not to sell or de-anon themselves.

Either way with ALL CN coins we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's

You don't even need a fair distribution (which I assume is an egalitarian distribution in your example).  You just cannot have one that has 80% in one cartel.  

In Monero say you hold 30% of the coins.  It would cost at least $3,000,000 to get to 80%.

Monero does not have an anonymity problem.

That is FUD.

FUD? Methinks not.

Here follows a FACT I HOLD TO BE TRUE:

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

One method of preventing a malicious entity from BUYING into a CN coin to de-anon tx's would be to ensure a large amount of coins are never put up for sale or are made available for mining to the public. Of course this requires we trust in the preminers/early miners (BCN) as opposed to trusting malicious entities dont get a hold of their coins (XMR). With both BCN and XMR a theoretical attack of this nature is a persistent threat to the coin's anon functionality.

most people already realized you're a troll, so no need for further proof. you can stop posting now. thanks and goodbye.

[smooth]

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

A successful tracing of a ring signature (1+5) could occur with a grand total of 5 outputs. It just would have an infinitesimal probability of happening, thus can't be used for a successful attack. Yes it is a question of probabilities, so let's answer it.

I already posted numbers on the Monero thread where you were pushing this same flawed logic. In the case of 80%, tracing is possible about 32.7% of the time. In the case of 30% control, tracing is possible 0.02% of the time. For 5% control, tracing is possible 0.00003125% of the time. In all of these cases, the attacker has no control over which 32.7%, 0.02%, or 0.00003125% of transactions (all of which use opaque one-time addresses) are traced. 32.7% of transactions being traced provides a potential vector for large scale analysis of the blockchain, that could at least begin to attempt to attach some meaningful identities to these addresses. 0.00003125% does not.

As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack. Once you obtain that large a portion of the coins, you own it forever. By contrast, in a coin with a reasonable years-long-distribution process, even owning 80% of the current supply (40% of the base total in the case of Monero today) would simply dilute down unless you continued to spend money to maintain your share of the newly mined coins.

Thus it should be obvious that plausible control concentrations in an actively used currency that was honestly and openly distributed and has a vibrant community present no real concern, while an 80% premine/ninjamine/scam is catastrophic.

[Wanderlust]

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

A successful tracing of a ring signature (1+5) could occur with a grand total of 5 outputs. It just would have an infinitesimal probability of happening, thus can't be used for a successful attack. Yes it is a question of probabilities, so let's answer it.

I already posted numbers on the Monero thread where you were pushing this same flawed logic. In the case of 80%, tracing is possible about 32.7% of the time. In the case of 30% control, tracing is possible 0.02% of the time. For 5% control, tracing is possible 0.00003125% of the time. In all of these cases, the attacker has no control over which 32.7%, 0.02%, or 0.00003125% of transactions (all of which use opaque one-time addresses) are traced. 32.7% of transactions being traced provides a potential vector for large scale analysis of the blockchain, that could at least begin to attempt to attach some meaningful identities to these addresses. 0.00003125% does not.

As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack. Once you obtain that large a portion of the coins, you own it forever. By contrast, in a coin with a reasonable years-long-distribution process, even owning 80% of the current supply (40% of the base total in the case of Monero today) would simply dilute down unless you continued to spend money to maintain your share of the newly mined coins.

Thus it should be obvious that plausible control concentrations in an actively used currency that was honestly and openly distributed and has a vibrant community present no real concern, while an 80% premine/ninjamine/scam is catastrophic.

"As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack."
To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

[generalizethis]

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

A successful tracing of a ring signature (1+5) could occur with a grand total of 5 outputs. It just would have an infinitesimal probability of happening, thus can't be used for a successful attack. Yes it is a question of probabilities, so let's answer it.

I already posted numbers on the Monero thread where you were pushing this same flawed logic. In the case of 80%, tracing is possible about 32.7% of the time. In the case of 30% control, tracing is possible 0.02% of the time. For 5% control, tracing is possible 0.00003125% of the time. In all of these cases, the attacker has no control over which 32.7%, 0.02%, or 0.00003125% of transactions (all of which use opaque one-time addresses) are traced. 32.7% of transactions being traced provides a potential vector for large scale analysis of the blockchain, that could at least begin to attempt to attach some meaningful identities to these addresses. 0.00003125% does not.

As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack. Once you obtain that large a portion of the coins, you own it forever. By contrast, in a coin with a reasonable years-long-distribution process, even owning 80% of the current supply (40% of the base total in the case of Monero today) would simply dilute down unless you continued to spend money to maintain your share of the newly mined coins.

Thus it should be obvious that plausible control concentrations in an actively used currency that was honestly and openly distributed and has a vibrant community present no real concern, while an 80% premine/ninjamine/scam is catastrophic.

Math, why you so mean?

You're ruining his false comparison. How is he going to unload his "1 BTC" of BCN on the greater fool if you don't play along?

[smooth]

WITH ALL CRYPTONOTE COINS we have to trust that large holders do not conspire to de-anon our tx's.

80% is not the min required. It's a question of probabilities. A successful de-anon could be achieved with much less.

A successful tracing of a ring signature (1+5) could occur with a grand total of 5 outputs. It just would have an infinitesimal probability of happening, thus can't be used for a successful attack. Yes it is a question of probabilities, so let's answer it.

I already posted numbers on the Monero thread where you were pushing this same flawed logic. In the case of 80%, tracing is possible about 32.7% of the time. In the case of 30% control, tracing is possible 0.02% of the time. For 5% control, tracing is possible 0.00003125% of the time. In all of these cases, the attacker has no control over which 32.7%, 0.02%, or 0.00003125% of transactions (all of which use opaque one-time addresses) are traced. 32.7% of transactions being traced provides a potential vector for large scale analysis of the blockchain, that could at least begin to attempt to attach some meaningful identities to these addresses. 0.00003125% does not.

As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack. Once you obtain that large a portion of the coins, you own it forever. By contrast, in a coin with a reasonable years-long-distribution process, even owning 80% of the current supply (40% of the base total in the case of Monero today) would simply dilute down unless you continued to spend money to maintain your share of the newly mined coins.

Thus it should be obvious that plausible control concentrations in an actively used currency that was honestly and openly distributed and has a vibrant community present no real concern, while an 80% premine/ninjamine/scam is catastrophic.

"As I also explained, an 80% premine is a permanent, passive attack."
To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

When you have premined 82% of the total supply, continued mining does not dilute your share below 82%. In point of fact the current share represented by the 82% BCN premine is greater than 82% of the current supply because not all of BCN has been mined (though it is close).

Or to say it another way, at the time of the public launch, 100% of the then-current supply was controlled by the premine/ninjamine, meaning 100% of transactions would be traceable by those controlling the premine.

Until, of course, people were to wise up and would stop mixing with any outputs that were part of the premine or derived from outputs that were part of the premine. At that point, only a possible 18% of the supply remains, which means for an attacker to try to control a large portion of that supply would be 5x easier (in fact even easier than that since not all of the 18% is so far mined).

Now none of this matters because for all practical purposes no one is using or paying attention to BCN aside from a few shills on the BCN thread and bots trading on hitbtc. The second largest circle jerk in crypto would be another way to put it.

[Wanderlust]

PLEASE answer my specific question:

To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

Thanks

[smooth]

why you so mean?

You know that's a fair point. There are a few people I suspect who are just naive and gullible, and indeed are in crypto mostly for fun and to the cheer their favorite team, which happens the be BCN and its quirky Mars fundraiser, fake Cicada 3301 connection, deep web fantasies, etc. To them my facts come across as There is No Santa Claus. I feel bad for that, but I'm also tired of sock puppets, trolls, shills, and bots that trade with themselves keeping this zombie alive, so I'm done sugar coating it.

[illodin]

PLEASE answer my specific question:

To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

Thanks

Premine holders, or any entity that can buy, hack, steal, expropriate (individual holders, exchanges), and borrow enough coins.

Btw, if there is a fair distribution without deanonymization risk right now and you make a transaction you want to stay private, the coin's value might go to (near) zero in the future for some reason (zero cash or Monero2 takes over, all devs decide to leave, a fatal bug is found, a totally new kind of way to transfer and store value is invented, etc) and an entity wishing to unravel the blockchain could place a buy wall at $0.01 and people would flock to dump their now worthless coin.

[smooth]

PLEASE answer my specific question:

To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

Thanks

Anyone with 80% of the supply can do the same thing. It is impossible to accumulate that amount of a coin as a passive holding when the coin continues to be actively mined (and in some cases hasn't even had 80% of its supply mined yet).

If you work out the numbers, even 50% is far less serious of a concern than 80%, and more realistic numbers like 5% (or less) are no real concern at all.

I find it implausible and/or impossible for anyone to accumulate for example 80% of an openly launched, actively developed, continually traded coin with a years-long mining schedule. In practice, those extreme concentrations only come about from premines, instamines, ninjamines, etc.

[ArticMine]

PLEASE answer my specific question:

To be clear this is an attack only the premine holders can perform/help perform?

Thanks

The premine turns a decentralized virtual currency into a centralized virtual currency and the preminers become MSBs. The premine creates a massive regulatory risk. This is what happened in the case of Ripple. In the Ripple case the word premine was used in the settlement agreement between Ripple labs and the US government. So to answer your question the regulators will force the preminers to perform the attack.