Bitcoin: Censorship-Resistant Digital P2P Currency

[Anonymous Bosch]

Untraceable, huh? I can't imagine it would be too hard for investigators to create accounts, offer drugs or what have you for sale, and then send the police instead of a shipment when someone enters their address.

I feel like a lot of people are going to find that the oppressor state has some very practical tools available to it, though this will be interesting to observe.

Yeah, getting actual stuff shipped to you is hard to hide. BitCoin itself, however, is very, very anonymous.

That's not my experience - when I got my fraction of a bitcoin from the faucet, they put my email address (modified with the addition of a single letter that was easily recognizable as not being part of my address) AND my IP address. I found that rather annoying, actually.

As SpaceLord pointed out, that's a policy of the Bitcoin Faucet site; IP addresses that receive bitcoins are recorded, so that bitcoins are given only once to each address to prevent abuse of the system.

[SpaceLord]

An updated BTC ticker.

[Anonymous Bosch]

That's not BitCoin, that's the Faucet. BitCoin to BitCoin only require your public key, which changes with every transaction, and is effectively unbreakable due to the strict implementation of PGP.

Effectively unbreakable today maybe. Not sure I'd hold my breath that it will be unbreakable in a year or 5.

As this write-up explains, that seems rather unlikely, even if we're all using iSupercomputers 5 years hence:

The Security of the Cryptographic Methods Used by PGP
The Cipher IDEA

Can you really be sure that only the legitimate recipient of your message is able to read it in plain text?

For encryption of the text classic PGP uses IDEA, which is symmetric and works with a key of 128 bits of length, for instance
1010100101010010010010101010111101010101101100111101010000101110 1000011010110001001011110111001101111011010111111101011011000100
to encrypt a message. The same key has to be applied to the crypted text to convert it into the original message, and any other key would leave meaningless gibberish. The message is split into blocks of 8 bytes which are converted into another 64-bit-string. The result of the conversion, in which several sequences of logical addition, multiplication and XOR-operations are applied using the bits of the key, depends on every single bit of the encryption key, so decryption will be impossible without using exactly this key. By the length of the IDEA-key it is guaranteed that there is a really huge amount of different keys (exactly 2128 that is 340 282 366 920 938 463 463 374 607 431 768 211 456), making it practically impossible to "guess the key" by systematically testing every possible key, a method which is known as the "brute force attack".
EXCURSUS

Why should it remain unfeasible for a computer to test all possible IDEA-keys in the near future rather quickly?

It remains unfeasible because as a matter of principle a computer will not have the necessary efficiency.

According to today's state of physical research which in future could change the spreading of information in every imaginable computer system is limited by the speed of light.
Not even the results of current "experiments measuring velocities higher than the speed of light" do contradict this fact.

If you assume the size of a high-performance computer system performing keytests is 0.3 mm for electronic or optical transfer of information, it can only perform 1 000 000 000 000 operations (1012) per second, otherwise it has to be smaller. Over a period of 317 years or 10 003 759 200 seconds that will sum up to 10 003 759 200 000 000 000 000 operations. This ability to perform no more than 1022 operations within 317 years is truly not sufficient for testing 1022 different IDEA-keys because every keytest requires more than a single operation cycle. But even if it was possible to do a keytest that fast, the large number of 1038 IDEA-keys would have been searched for no more than 0.000 000 000 000 000 029 percent. Thus a specific IDEA-key will not be found even if "lots" of those high-performance computers will work parallel to test the keys.

This argument is based on empirical assumptions and therefore it can be refuted by experience. But without doubt it is definitely wrong to suppose "efficiency of any size" for future computer systems.

It is interesting to compare the ability of our proposed supercomputer to a real machine, "Deep Crack", which was invented in 1998 by EFF to show that a brute force attack on DES, the standard symmetric cipher used by banks and other commercial institutions for many years, was indeed possible. Deep Crack is a parallel computer using special hardware of 1500 Deep Crack chips and managed to test 90 billion DES-keys per second, so that any 56-bit DES-key can be found in about 5 days. This single machine today provides 9 percent of the ability we assigned to our proposed 0.3 mm supercomputer.

[LawBeefaroni]

An updated BTC ticker.

The whole bitcoin market seems like a giant pump and dump.

The trades are peer to peer. It's too inefficient and the coins have no real value (I can't buy a beer down the street with a bitcoin). I'd try a hundred or so if it didn't feel like buying pinksheets. *shiver*

[El Guapo]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

[SpaceLord]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

I don't disagree. Which is why I plan to dump mine early.

[LawBeefaroni]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

Yeah, they're great for money laundering or buying credit card numbers but I imagine most people in that business don't want to do peer to peer internet Paypal deals for their currency. Especially when the average trade appears to be around 10 bitcoins.

[El Guapo]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

I don't disagree. Which is why I plan to dump mine early.

Better a day too early than a day too late.

[Wargus]

That's not BitCoin, that's the Faucet. BitCoin to BitCoin only require your public key, which changes with every transaction, and is effectively unbreakable due to the strict implementation of PGP.

Effectively unbreakable today maybe. Not sure I'd hold my breath that it will be unbreakable in a year or 5.

As this write-up explains, that seems rather unlikely, even if we're all using iSupercomputers 5 years hence:

Spoiler:

The Security of the Cryptographic Methods Used by PGP
The Cipher IDEA

Can you really be sure that only the legitimate recipient of your message is able to read it in plain text?

For encryption of the text classic PGP uses IDEA, which is symmetric and works with a key of 128 bits of length, for instance
1010100101010010010010101010111101010101101100111101010000101110 1000011010110001001011110111001101111011010111111101011011000100
to encrypt a message. The same key has to be applied to the crypted text to convert it into the original message, and any other key would leave meaningless gibberish. The message is split into blocks of 8 bytes which are converted into another 64-bit-string. The result of the conversion, in which several sequences of logical addition, multiplication and XOR-operations are applied using the bits of the key, depends on every single bit of the encryption key, so decryption will be impossible without using exactly this key. By the length of the IDEA-key it is guaranteed that there is a really huge amount of different keys (exactly 2128 that is 340 282 366 920 938 463 463 374 607 431 768 211 456), making it practically impossible to "guess the key" by systematically testing every possible key, a method which is known as the "brute force attack".
EXCURSUS

Why should it remain unfeasible for a computer to test all possible IDEA-keys in the near future rather quickly?

It remains unfeasible because as a matter of principle a computer will not have the necessary efficiency.

According to today's state of physical research which in future could change the spreading of information in every imaginable computer system is limited by the speed of light.
Not even the results of current "experiments measuring velocities higher than the speed of light" do contradict this fact.

Spoiler:

If you assume the size of a high-performance computer system performing keytests is 0.3 mm for electronic or optical transfer of information, it can only perform 1 000 000 000 000 operations (1012) per second, otherwise it has to be smaller. Over a period of 317 years or 10 003 759 200 seconds that will sum up to 10 003 759 200 000 000 000 000 operations. This ability to perform no more than 1022 operations within 317 years is truly not sufficient for testing 1022 different IDEA-keys because every keytest requires more than a single operation cycle. But even if it was possible to do a keytest that fast, the large number of 1038 IDEA-keys would have been searched for no more than 0.000 000 000 000 000 029 percent. Thus a specific IDEA-key will not be found even if "lots" of those high-performance computers will work parallel to test the keys.

This argument is based on empirical assumptions and therefore it can be refuted by experience. But without doubt it is definitely wrong to suppose "efficiency of any size" for future computer systems.

It is interesting to compare the ability of our proposed supercomputer to a real machine, "Deep Crack", which was invented in 1998 by EFF to show that a brute force attack on DES, the standard symmetric cipher used by banks and other commercial institutions for many years, was indeed possible. Deep Crack is a parallel computer using special hardware of 1500 Deep Crack chips and managed to test 90 billion DES-keys per second, so that any 56-bit DES-key can be found in about 5 days. This single machine today provides 9 percent of the ability we assigned to our proposed 0.3 mm supercomputer.

[/quote][/spoiler]

1) They assume a brute force attack.
2) They assume computers will not evolve to have the necessary efficiency.
3) they assume standard speed of light computing.

For the first, maybe a brute force attack is the only way to hack this (I'm no expert), however I suspect that if the algorithm is known somebody will work out how to hack it.

As far as the second 2 items, computers may not be limited to speed of light processing, they are already working on quantum entanglement and are looking towards quantum computers for cracking encryption.

I don't know - I'm by no means an expert. I do believe history is on my side in denouncing the unbreakable, unbeatable anything.

[SpaceLord]

SmartMoney's article.

BitCoin will probably reach 12 bucks by Monday.

[Anonymous Bosch]

1) They assume a brute force attack.
2) They assume computers will not evolve to have the necessary efficiency.
3) they assume standard speed of light computing.

For the first, maybe a brute force attack is the only way to hack this (I'm no expert), however I suspect that if the algorithm is known somebody will work out how to hack it.

PGP releases the source code (complete for versions 2.6.2, 5.0, 5.5.3, 6.0.2, 6.5.1, 6.5.8, 8.x, 9.x, 10.x; and the PGPsdk 2.1.1 for the hotfixed PGP 7.1, which includes all the cryptographic functioning) of its PGP products so that others can freely examine it for backdoors or possible flaws (and anyone finding one would have instant fame in the cryptology community). That said, in terms of "breaking" a cryptographic cipher, a brute-force attack is the only relevant measure of demonstrating resistance to attack.

As far as the second 2 items, computers may not be limited to speed of light processing, they are already working on quantum entanglement and are looking towards quantum computers for cracking encryption.

I don't know - I'm by no means an expert. I do believe history is on my side in denouncing the unbreakable, unbeatable anything.

A quantum computer would certainly be a wonderful thing to have, yet the best efforts of even the cleverest boffins working for years has thus far yielded only a few laboratory novelties that are easily outperformed by any PC. It's debateable that a useful device, with sufficient qubits to use Shor's algorithm to break public-key cryptography schemes, will ever be built, much less in the next 5 years (e.g. the D-Wave "quantum computer" recently purchased by Lockheed Martin seems more snake oil, than true quantum computer).

Theoretical quantum computers aside, the speed of a computer is limited by the speed of light; it takes a finite amount of time for a signal to travel the subatomic distance from the nucleus of a hydrogen atom (the smallest) to its electron. Here's how Jon Callas, the CTO and co-founder of PGP corporation, once put it:

Modern cryptographic systems are essentially unbreakable, particularly if an adversary is restricted to intercepts. We have argued for, designed, and built systems with 128 bits of security precisely because they are essentially unbreakable. It is very easy to underestimate the power of exponentials. 2^128 is a very big number. Burt Kaliski first came up with this characterization, and if he had a nickel for every time I tell it, he could buy a latte or three.

Imagine a computer that is the size of a grain of sand that can test keys against some encrypted data. Also imagine that it can test a key in the amount of time it takes light to cross it. Then consider a cluster of these computers, so many that if you covered the earth with them, they would cover the whole planet to the height of 1 meter. The cluster of computers would crack a 128-bit key on average in 1,000 years.

If you want to brute-force a key, it literally takes a planet-ful of computers. And of course, there are always 256-bit keys, if you worry about the possibility that government has a spare planet that they want to devote to key-cracking.

The point being, Bitcoin's implementation of PGP is about as close to "unbreakable" as unbreakable gets, cryptographically speaking.

[SpaceLord]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

I don't disagree. Which is why I plan to dump mine early.

Better a day too early than a day too late.

The price jumped 3 bucks in less than a day.

Right now, the going price of BTC is ~14.25 bucks.

The total number of BTC available is 6,424,450.
That comes out to $ 91,548,412.50 worth of BitCoins out there.

We know how many BitCoins are sitting idle, by the nature of the program that makes them. Below is a chart of this:



This chart effectively measures market velocity. I'm trying to get a recent, perhaps realtime, chart. At the listed maximum percentage, the number of "idle" coins is around 22%. At the listed levels, this is ~1,400,000 BTC coins that aren't being moved around. There's nothing in the data that suggests anyone is hoarding more than a few 100k. There's only a few known people who have more than 50k.

[Gryndyl]

The jump seems to be caused by Gawker doing an article on a website that sells drugs using bitcoins for currency.

http://gawker.com/5808314/everyone-want ... -with-them" target="_blank

[SpaceLord]

The jump seems to be caused by Gawker doing an article on a website that sells drugs using bitcoins for currency.

http://gawker.com/5808314/everyone-want ... -with-them" target="_blank

Regardless of the source, BTC went as high as 24 each today. Those 0.02 BitCoins some of you got from The BitCoin Faucet are currently worth 0.45$!

Since this topic started, MoneyMatters.com has profiled BitCoins positively, John Stossel has blogged about them, and they've been profiled on several news programs.

What a ride!

[Exodor]

Two Democratic US Senators want to end the fun

wo U.S. senators have written an open letter to the United States attorney general, asking federal authorities to crack down on "Silk Road," the Internet black market drug trade, and the digital currency that funds it, Bitcoins.

After reading the report on Silk Road, written by Gawker's Adrian Chen, Democratic Senators Charles Schumer of New York and Joe Manchin of West Virginia wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, Reuters reports.

"The only method of payment for these illegal purchases is an untraceable peer-to-peer currency known as Bitcoins. After purchasing Bitcoins through an exchange, a user can create an account on Silk Road and start purchasing illegal drugs from individuals around the world and have them delivered to their homes within days. We urge you to take immediate action and shut down the Silk Road network."

Hopefully if the USAG takes any action at all it will be limited to Silk Road and not Bit Coins.


Still, sell 'em if you got 'em.

[SpaceLord]

They can't stop Silk Road, or BitCoins. Pandering and grandstanding at its finest. Schumer said BitCoin was a untraceable anonymous currency used to buy drugs. Kind of like cash, you ass? And he said Silk Road was flooding the streets with illegal drugs. Hardly, since SR has just a few thousand members.

I sold enough at 30$ to make my initial investment back, plus 30%. I still have over 50% of my coins. They're going to increase in value this next week, mark my words. But I think they're be another pull back soon, since adoption has been slow. If a major Poker site starts taking BitCoins, they're be another rush like we had two weeks ago, when the price went from 8 to 30.

[GreenGoo]

They can't stop Silk Road, or BitCoins. Pandering and grandstanding at its finest. Schumer said BitCoin was a untraceable anonymous currency used to buy drugs. Kind of like cash, you ass? And he said Silk Road was flooding the streets with illegal drugs. Hardly, since SR has just a few thousand members.

I sold enough at 30$ to make my initial investment back, plus 30%. I still have over 50% of my coins. They're going to increase in value this next week, mark my words. But I think they're be another pull back soon, since adoption has been slow. If a major Poker site starts taking BitCoins, they're be another rush like we had two weeks ago, when the price went from 8 to 30.

And Silk Road is using the Tor network. Very difficult to track. This should be an interesting waste of taxpayers funds.

Tor is a system intended to enable online anonymity. Tor client software routes Internet traffic through a worldwide volunteer network of servers in order to conceal a user's location or usage from someone conducting network surveillance or traffic analysis. Using Tor makes tracing Internet activity, including "visits to Web sites, online posts, instant messages and other communication forms", to the user more difficult.[7] It is intended to protect users' personal freedom, privacy, and ability to conduct confidential business, by keeping their internet activities from being monitored.[8] The software is open-source and the network is free of charge to use.

[Bakhtosh]

Sites like SurvivalBlog.com are using BitCoin to get donations from their readers - keeps "the man" from tracking what web sites you're donating to.

[SpaceLord]

Sites like SurvivalBlog.com are using BitCoin to get donations from their readers - keeps "the man" from tracking what web sites you're donating to.

Much like Wikileaks, which said BitCoin and NameCoin(a branch of BitCoin that produes anonymity for websites) would change the world.

[SpaceLord]

Sites like SurvivalBlog.com are using BitCoin to get donations from their readers - keeps "the man" from tracking what web sites you're donating to.

Much like Wikileaks, which said BitCoin and NameCoin(a branch of BitCoin that produes anonymity for websites) would change the world.

WikiLeaks now accepts BitCoins

[El Guapo]

Not that Schumer and his group have a nuanced or well-informed view of this, but I don't think it's so crazy to call for some sort of public investigation. BitCoin's whole raison d'etre as I understand it is to be an untraceable currency beyond the reach of national authorities. Given that, it's natural constituency would be three main groups:

(1) Tech nerds;
(2) Libertarians / survivalists (survivalblog as noted before) - though it's a little funny that people preparing for "uncertain times" would compile digital currency
(3) Criminals.

I'd wager heavily that right now there are few to no criminals using bit coins (beyond perhaps some tech nerds buying illegal narcotics), since criminals aren't always super tech savvy and since they have to be wary of relying on the anonymity of new technology. But if BitCoins' touted untraceability holds up, it's pretty much inevitable that it will be widely used for money laundering and illegal transactions.

So if you are charged with making and/or enforcing laws, don't you have every reason to be concerned about BitCoins and where it's headed?

[SpaceLord]

Not that Schumer and his group have a nuanced or well-informed view of this, but I don't think it's so crazy to call for some sort of public investigation. BitCoin's whole raison d'etre as I understand it is to be an untraceable currency beyond the reach of national authorities. Given that, it's natural constituency would be three main groups:

(1) Tech nerds;
(2) Libertarians / survivalists (survivalblog as noted before) - though it's a little funny that people preparing for "uncertain times" would compile digital currency
(3) Criminals.

I'd wager heavily that right now there are few to no criminals using bit coins (beyond perhaps some tech nerds buying illegal narcotics), since criminals aren't always super tech savvy and since they have to be wary of relying on the anonymity of new technology. But if BitCoins' touted untraceability holds up, it's pretty much inevitable that it will be widely used for money laundering and illegal transactions.

So if you are charged with making and/or enforcing laws, don't you have every reason to be concerned about BitCoins and where it's headed?

Criminals aren't tech-savvy? No, not all of them. But they definitely hire people who are.

Any public investigation, if fair, would come up with this:

1. BitCoin can't be stopped by any law enforcement.
2. BitCoin was designed to take a bit of the power out of the hands of the Fed. If it gains acceptance, it will do just that.
3. Being totally Open Source, BitCoin itself has no agenda.
4. With a little bit of R&D, and detective work, BitCoin is traceable, especially if you make transactions that involve moving large amounts of other currency into the system, or you buy goods that are physically shipped.

[El Guapo]

On the first point, I'm just saying that if you took a snap-shot of BitCoin usage *right now* I'd wager that there isn't a huge criminal use for it, since while criminals will absolutely take advantage of new technology, I wouldn't expect them to be an early adapter, due to (1) low overlap of tech nerd and criminal, for the most part; and (2) risk aversion - I don't think anyone wants to go first on using this for criminal purposes, for fear of it not being as good as advertised.

As for the rest, there ought to be some type of investigation focused at least on #4 - how federal authorities can work to trace BitCoin transactions, since there's a sensible federal law enforcement interest on that point.

[LawBeefaroni]

1. BitCoin can't be stopped by any law enforcement.

They could hinder (greatly) the inflows of "real" currency used to buy bitcoin. They could also hinder the outflows. The problem would then be that you'd need untracable currency to buy and sell bitcoin, which would kind of defeat the purpose.

[SpaceLord]

1. BitCoin can't be stopped by any law enforcement.

They could hinder (greatly) the inflows of "real" currency used to buy bitcoin. They could also hinder the outflows. The problem would then be that you'd need untracable currency to buy and sell bitcoin, which would kind of defeat the purpose.

Exchanges could easily be set up on TOR. Heck, NameCoin, an offshoot of BitCoin, could do it.

The Pirate Bay is still online, does anyone think that the government would be able to shut down BitCoin exchanges? Of course, the shutdown of any site by government would scare people, and drive traffic, as well as price, down.

[LawBeefaroni]

1. BitCoin can't be stopped by any law enforcement.

They could hinder (greatly) the inflows of "real" currency used to buy bitcoin. They could also hinder the outflows. The problem would then be that you'd need untracable currency to buy and sell bitcoin, which would kind of defeat the purpose.

Exchanges could easily be set up on TOR. Heck, NameCoin, an offshoot of BitCoin, could do it.

And they'd limit the scope, and thus the usefulness, of bitcoin. Goal achieved. Amazon or Paypal or Citi aren't going to open a presence on TOR or use NameCoin just to accept bitcoins.

So I can buy dope, some survival gear, and donate to certain websites anonymously buy turning cash into a highly volatile virtual currency. Doesn't really seem like something that would appeal to a consumer. A speculator, maybe.

[Holman]

I don't know much about economics, but I know nerd hilarity when I see it. Apparently the good folks at Something Awful have opened hostilities against Bitcoin, or perhaps vice-versa.

[Archinerd]

Yeah, they're great for money laundering or buying credit card numbers but I imagine most people in that business don't want to do peer to peer internet Paypal deals for their currency. Especially when the average trade appears to be around 10 bitcoins.

The latest podcast by NPR's Planet Money discusses this exact scenario.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/06/ ... ack-market" target="_blank

[Kasey Chang]

The problem with Bitcoin, from what I understand, is that it allegedly cannot be tracked. However, every transaction IS registered through the network, so it's not a matter it cannot be tracked, but the PERSON using the "account" will be difficult to track. But then, so current money laundering ain't that easy to track either, esp. if you have multiple layers of accounts bouncing money back and forth through multiple countries. A virtual account system like Bitcoin will simply make that EASIER.

What needs to happen is everybody needs to have at least one Bitcoin account (and ability to create new ones almost instantly). When you pay someone, you pay from your "instanced" BC account (created just for that payment). You transfer Bitcoin from your main account to instanced account with different levels of security based on transaction amt. If it's like $50, simple 4 digit PIN will do. If it's like $500, need additional verification. $5000, even more. $50000 and up? Biometric scan? Even more? You better show up in person with 3 forms of ID and a DNA test.

[Victoria Raverna]

On the first point, I'm just saying that if you took a snap-shot of BitCoin usage *right now* I'd wager that there isn't a huge criminal use for it, since while criminals will absolutely take advantage of new technology, I wouldn't expect them to be an early adapter, due to (1) low overlap of tech nerd and criminal, for the most part; and (2) risk aversion - I don't think anyone wants to go first on using this for criminal purposes, for fear of it not being as good as advertised.

As for the rest, there ought to be some type of investigation focused at least on #4 - how federal authorities can work to trace BitCoin transactions, since there's a sensible federal law enforcement interest on that point.

Criminals are stealing bitcoins.

[LawBeefaroni]

I know technicals probably aren't reliable at all for bitcoins, but the mtgox chart is looking pretty weak.

[Moliere]

Bitcoin prices plummet on hacked exchange

The Bitcoin community faced another crisis on Sunday afternoon as the price of the currency on the most popular exchange, Mt.Gox, fell from $17 to pennies in a matter of minutes.
...
The crash appears to be the fault of the Mt.Gox exchange rather than a collapse in the value of the currency itself, as the integrity of Bitcoin's underlying peer-to-peer transaction clearing process does not appear to have been compromised. Prices at a competing exchange showed Bitcoins trading down about 25 percent to $13 per Bitcoin earlier today, although it has edged up since.
...
It's been a wild couple of months for Bitcoin traders. Between April and June, the currency rose from a dollar to more than $30. This month, it fell back to $10 and rose again to $20. It was at $17 at the beginning of this weekend before a string of bad news pushed it down again.

[LawBeefaroni]

The extent of the compromise became clear when a copy of Mt.Gox's user database began circulating online. The file included username, email addres, and hashed password for thousands of Mt.Gox users. Karpeles's statement was updated to acknowledge the breach. He warned users who have re-used the Mt.Gox passwords on other sites to change them.

But Bitcoin users have few alternatives if they wish to convert their Bitcoins into more stable commodities. A recently-launched competitor, called TradeHill, has capitalized on Mt.Gox's troubles by encouraging members of the Bitcoin community to use their exchange instead. But the site is so new that no one knows if its administrators have the resources or technical expertise to avoid the security and reliability problems that have plagued Mt.Gox.

[GreenGoo]

And they'd limit the scope, and thus the usefulness, of bitcoin. Goal achieved. Amazon or Paypal or Citi aren't going to open a presence on TOR or use NameCoin just to accept bitcoins.

So I can buy dope, some survival gear, and donate to certain websites anonymously buy turning cash into a highly volatile virtual currency. Doesn't really seem like something that would appeal to a consumer. A speculator, maybe.

I make no comment on the viability of BitCoins. I will say that it's a little soon to think bitcoins aren't going to do what they are intended to do. Yes, the number of vendors is limited, but that's to be expected as the concept is new to most people and trust has not been built yet. Of course it's going to be volatile.

As for limiting cash used to buy or sell bitcoins, I think that's a bit wrong headed. Once (if) the currency is established, there may be no need to exchange it for other currency. It's not like you need to turn your American dollar into rupees just to buy things. If the currency takes off, once you own the currency, you can use it to buy and sell things. Why convert to "real" dollars when you're just going to need the coins to buy something else in the future?

No, it's unlikely that the drug lord is going to buy his million dollar home with bitcoins, so yes, there will be some exchange. But it would be no different than having both Canadian and American dollar accounts, which happens all the time here in Canada. Once the American dollar account has cash in it, it (usually) stays in it. There is no need to hop back and forth, as the whole reason you want the American dollar account is to buy and sell using American dollars. The exact same concept applies to BitCoins.

[LawBeefaroni]

I make no comment on the viability of BitCoins. I will say that it's a little soon to think bitcoins aren't going to do what they are intended to do. Yes, the number of vendors is limited, but that's to be expected as the concept is new to most people and trust has not been built yet. Of course it's going to be volatile.

It's going to be hard to build trust when it goes from $20 to $0.01 to $17 in a matter of days. And it's not just consumer trust. Amazon isn't going to want to get paid in a currency that can lose 99% of its value in a few hours. There is no incentive for Amazon to accept Bitcoin, except maybe to snare a few additional customers who also happen to be Bitcoin fans. I don't think it would be worth the extra risk and expense for Amazon.

As for limiting cash used to buy or sell bitcoins, I think that's a bit wrong headed. Once (if) the currency is established, there may be no need to exchange it for other currency. It's not like you need to turn your American dollar into rupees just to buy things. If the currency takes off, once you own the currency, you can use it to buy and sell things. Why convert to "real" dollars when you're just going to need the coins to buy something else in the future?

This is kind of cart-before-the-horse. How can it get established without stability or usefullness? It's not backed by anything and until it gets established, has no advantage over cash except for illegal online purchases. Buyers will continually buy them with cash and sellers will continue to trade them for cash. For example, I don't envision the online drug dealer paying for shipping or electricity with bitcoin. I don't envision Wikileaks paying server costs in bitcoins. And I don't see them doing it for the near future.

[GreenGoo]

It's going to be hard to build trust when it goes from $20 to $0.01 to $17 in a matter of days. And it's not just consumer trust. Amazon isn't going to want to get paid in a currency that can lose 99% of its value in a few hours. There is no incentive for Amazon to accept Bitcoin, except maybe to snare a few additional customers who also happen to be Bitcoin fans. I don't think it would be worth the extra risk and expense for Amazon.



This is kind of cart-before-the-horse. How can it get established without stability or usefullness?

Beats me, except people are already using it. In limited context sure, but this is the only way it will work. If it works.

And from what I read it didn't drop to 1 cent, one of the exchanges got hacked, not the currency itself.

My opinion is that this will die an interesting experiment and nothing more. But if it is going to work, then this is how it will work. Early adopters create a market, then others join slowly and cautiously. Stability will come over time. Or it won't, and the currency will die. But there is no way to create a stable currency of this nature out of the gate, and usefulness is in the eye of the owner.

I'm sure the creators would love to see Amazon start accepting them, but I doubt that would happen, at least any time soon. Will the BitCoin replace currencies backed by countries? I seriously doubt it. Could they be used for specific purposes online? Definitely.

[LawBeefaroni]

I'm sure the creators would love to see Amazon start accepting them, but I doubt that would happen, at least any time soon. Will the BitCoin replace currencies backed by countries? I seriously doubt it. Could they be used for specific purposes online? Definitely.

Unless/until it is pegged to a predictable value, it will just be forex for geeks with a profit opportunity for hackers and a handful of niche online retailers. I don't think it will go away exactly, but it will be a curiosity more than a currency.

[Enough]

Anyone still holding Bitcoins?

Bitcoin, the world's first peer-to-peer digital currency, fell below $3 on Monday. That represents a 90 percent fall since the currency hit its peak in early June.

[El Guapo]

Yeah, as I was saying it seems more of less inevitable that there will be a "bitcoin crash". I wouldn't say that the coins have a substantive value of zero, exactly, insofar as it seems like they have some value for use in illicit transactions. But a lot of what's driving it now has to be novelty, curiosity, and speculation. At some point in the future word's going to get out about someone dumping lots of these, and there's going to be a bitcoin run.

Why yes that was a good point, me-from-the-past.

[LawBeefaroni]

there's going to be a bitcoin run.

Why yes that was a good point, me-from-the-past.

Really?


But I know what you meant. Pretty much what's happening.


MTGox has handled over $6M in USD though, so someone has certainly made money. Abuse of amateurs. Can we get an Occupy Bitcoin thing going?