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Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

blog.coinbase.com

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Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#301

Post by woah »

egd wrote: post #200
woah wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a protocol, it's not great. There's a lot more flexibility in a lot of the new consensus protocols coming out that can run Turing-complete contracts etc. Look at all the hoops that need to be jumped through to do stuff like colored coins, payment channels, etc. in Bitcoin vs protocols with smart contracts. Anyway, that's irrelevant. If Bitcoin is for some reason the best protocol to be used, why would someone want…

Can you point me to some of the consensus protocol work? That's always seemed to be the more interesting aspect of BTC to me, but the other requirements of the currency have made that harder than just the smart contracts alone.

Yes, so the one I am most familiar with is Tendermint (disclaimer, I'm friends with some of the people involved). This is a genuinely novel consensus protocol that is inspired by DLS and PBFT (classic Byzantine consensus stuff), and also runs smart contracts using the same languages as Ethereum. Ethereum themselves are trying to do something similar (Casper), but to the best of my knowledge it is not ready yet.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#302

Post by Sir_Cmpwn »

conradev wrote: post #279
jandrese wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, you give them your private key? Doesn't that defeat the entire security model of Bitcoin? Once Coinbase is hacked all of your money will be gone. It seems crazy to me that you would give them the private key.

> Coinbase is insured against employee theft and hacking in an amount that exceeds the average value of online bitcoin it holds at any given time. Key word there is "online", but it's better than nothing (see: Mt. Gox). https://support.coinbase.com/customer/portal/articles/166237...

They did a writeup a while ago about how they do cold storage. It seems pretty solid to me.

https://www.coinbase.com/security

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#303

Post by [deleted] »

yasth wrote: post #265
joshmn wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP, but I think it's time we have some open-source, single-click install for some web-based app for managing a wallet. If you're using bitcoin, I'm assuming you can click something to install to Heroku.

Something like that just screams "eventual compromise and massive tears" though. Especially since most click to deploy solutions go on to pull from a lot of different remote servers, widening the attack surface.

[deleted]

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#304

Post by tjohns »

personjerry wrote: post #291
adrianmacneil wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might be a silly question, but did you use your Coinbase account to conduct any illegal transactions? The team there really cares about customer experience, so generally if they are ignoring you it's because your account has some connection to illegal/banned activity, which they can't disclose due to ridiculous financial laws.

I thought Bitcoin transactions were supposed to be private or something? How would Coinbase know if your transaction was illegal?

Bitcoin is decentralized, but it's definitely not private. Every transaction is recorded publicly in the blockchain. Some folks are very good at backtracking to figure out how funds are flowing through the network. And sometimes it's not even hard, especially if you reuse a wallet's address for receiving funds across multiple transactions.

In particular, there was an article alleging that Coinbase keeps a list of suspicious wallet addresses, and transacting with them will get your account banned. @gwern (who posts to HN sometimes) is reportedly one of the folks whose address is flagged as suspicious: http://truthvoice.com/2015/05/coinbase-accused-of-tracking-b...

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#305

Post by dang »

such_a_casual wrote: post #256
tw04 wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can buy drugs with legitimate income. The fact he didn't directly say no the first or second time says the answer is probably yes.

>The fact he didn't directly say no the first or second time says the answer is probably yes. Your statement is perhaps true from the perspective of a 110 IQ individual. However, for the rest of us, it makes no sense to make such a silly assumption.

> Your statement is perhaps true from the perspective of a 110 IQ individual. However, for the rest of us

This breaks the HN guidelines. Please don't comment like this here.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#307

Post by egd »

woah wrote: post #301
egd wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you point me to some of the consensus protocol work? That's always seemed to be the more interesting aspect of BTC to me, but the other requirements of the currency have made that harder than just the smart contracts alone.

Yes, so the one I am most familiar with is Tendermint (disclaimer, I'm friends with some of the people involved). This is a genuinely novel consensus protocol that is inspired by DLS and PBFT (classic Byzantine consensus stuff), and also runs smart contracts using the same languages as Ethereum. Ethereum themselves are trying to do something similar (Casper), but to the best of my knowledge it is not ready yet.

Great, thanks for the info - I'll check into those.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#308

Post by personjerry »

tjohns wrote: post #304
personjerry wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Bitcoin transactions were supposed to be private or something? How would Coinbase know if your transaction was illegal?

Bitcoin is decentralized, but it's definitely not private. Every transaction is recorded publicly in the blockchain. Some folks are very good at backtracking to figure out how funds are flowing through the network. And sometimes it's not even hard, especially if you reuse a wallet's address for receiving funds across multiple transactions. In particular, there was an article alleging that Coinbase keeps a list of sus…

But if the anonymity can be deciphered as such, then why does the Silk Road rely on Bitcoin?

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#309

Post by runnamike »

IkmoIkmo wrote: post #198
drcode wrote: post #39

Just a reminder to Bitcoin newbies: This card looks like an OK product (still open questions about how much coinbase is gaming the ask/bid spread) but just realize that this card does NOT use Bitcoin, it uses "Coinbase Bitcoin"[1] which is Bitcoin for which the coinbase company is managing your private key: You only truly own Bitcoins if you own the private key for the account (users of MtGox learn this the hard way…

Well no you're not really using bitcoin, not even Coinbase bitcoin. At the end of the day the creditcard simply uses a normal credit card transaction, which is denominated in dollars and paid for by Coinbase, in dollars, to the merchant. All Coinbase does is 1) make sure you enough bitcoin to cover the transaction 2) sell your bitcoin to recoup the dollars they're paying on your behalf to the merchant None of this ha…

Doesn't the funding source (BTC) make it at least a bit interesting? For example a card user in the US could have this credit card, and international relatives could fund it with BTC and not have to pay international transfer fees.

It seems like a small step in the direction of using BTC as an actual primary account on the backend and making transactions in the real world.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#310

Post by idibidiart »

I've never used Bitcoin, although was mentioned by its original inventor on a research list once ;).

I have met the founders at Coinbase, and their vibe was more like that of an SF startup that will do anything to "win" and "exit big" than a world change agent. Bitcoin needs the latter, not the former.

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