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IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

casey.github.io

61–70 of 111 posts

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#61
post #47
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those Singer quotes almost killed me: "limitless ignorance of swaths of the human race". He's absolutely correct, but, deep down, secretly a little upset he did not purchase Ripple at 2 cents

There is perhaps a bit more to cryptocurrencies that Singer gives them credit for. I've recently been reading some of the original stuff from Szabo / Satoshi eg http://unenumerated.blogspot.com/2005/12/bit-gold.html and https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf that partly explain why they have worked and not collapsed 9 years later. A lot of it is much clearer than the hype which has followed.

There are several thousand of those articles with the same points scrambled, filled with millions of comments with the same points scrambled.

It's bait for people to jump in a pool with sharks. People like Singer and Buffett are driving by in a boat and looking in with binoculars. Hopefully enough people do not jump in that there ends up being a tidal wave.

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#62
post #48
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The writer of the article essentially admitted it was bullshit and wrote it just to manipulate the market: https://twitter.com/ShitcoinDotCom/status/965910847645212672

Where is the part where he admitted it was bullshit?

https://twitter.com/ShitcoinDotCom/status/965370339999014913

Are you honestly going to try and tell me that this guy is not full of shit?

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#63
post #45

I want to critique one particular point made in this article, becuase it’s incorrect: > IOTA uses cryptography that cannot be broken by quantum computers. The use of such cryptography, specifically Winternitz signatures, leaves IOTA users vulnerable to loss of funds if they ever reuse an address. This attack that has already been seen in practice, with one user reportedly losing $30,000 USD worth of IOTA. As quantum…

I am somewhat of a layman in regards to the math of cryptography but could you solve this by using Winternitz signatures first then something like chacha?

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#64
post #50
post #45

I want to critique one particular point made in this article, becuase it’s incorrect: > IOTA uses cryptography that cannot be broken by quantum computers. The use of such cryptography, specifically Winternitz signatures, leaves IOTA users vulnerable to loss of funds if they ever reuse an address. This attack that has already been seen in practice, with one user reportedly losing $30,000 USD worth of IOTA. As quantum…

Don't you think IOTA is trying to do too much at the same time? Maybe I'm underestimating the risk but it seems like practical quantum computer attacks are still a few decades away, maybe it would make more sense to focus on getting the rest of IOTA to work and plan to switch to different cryptographic algorithms later once things have settled a bit. If I get this right IOTA is trying to: * Move away from PoW * Have…

Right, so there’s the problem. I consider post-quantum cryotography to be more important than everything else on that list aside from transaction frequency. It should be, at the least, a serious consideration for any new cryptocurrency, even if they don’t ultimately move forward with it after a cost-benefit analysis.

The threat model is more nuanced than “decades away.” The attacks may be decades away, but their targets will not necessarily be. Assets and communications secured today will be fully seizable and transparent in the future, you just don’t know exactly when. In other words, old ciphertexts have to be disposed of or re-encrypted, and addresses need to upgrade to pq-secure signature schemes.

This all takes for granted the idea that quantum computers will ever feasibly break classical cryptosystems (I’m weakly pessimistic it will happen in the next 100 years). But if you do accept that premise, you either implement post-quantum cryptography now if you can afford it, or you implement it on top of legacy software in the indeterminate future. The latter option is a legitimate decision, to be clear. But I can also virtually guarantee that some cryptocurrencies will footgun themselves in the process of upgrading when they’re more established.

I agree with you that IOTA is taking on a lot, but I really don’t think Winternitz signatures are exactly the deciding factor in that, based on how packed that list is already :)

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#65
post #45

I want to critique one particular point made in this article, becuase it’s incorrect: > IOTA uses cryptography that cannot be broken by quantum computers. The use of such cryptography, specifically Winternitz signatures, leaves IOTA users vulnerable to loss of funds if they ever reuse an address. This attack that has already been seen in practice, with one user reportedly losing $30,000 USD worth of IOTA. As quantum…

I intend for the phrase "no tangible benefit" to mean "at the current time", since large quantum computers do not yet exist. Now, it's possible that this benefit will be made tangible eventually, should large quantum computers become practical, but they just aren't here yet.

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#66

as interesting iota is so they claim, my bet is on lightning network for high scalability transaction and machine to machine payment

A mesh network that requires YOU to be online to receive funds. Also you must have funds to open a channel. So in order to receive funds you must have funds already. It seems like a really big step backwards in big big scheme of things bitcoin. All of the above problems can be solved by increasing the block size. I'm not saying it's the definitive solution... but right now it is a better solution. A good talk about r…

No, you dont need funds to receive them. An unfunded node can receive and transact over a peer funded channel.

There are services like strike that offer custodial lightning channels, and will aggregate and send onchain tx's: https://medium.com/@ACINQ/introducing-strike-a-stripe-like-a...

While the network has such low fees as today, there is no need to increase the blocksize. Increasing the blocksize (or time) effects scalability in epic ways -- ie: Ethereum requires at least 500GB SSD to run -- so the minimum cost of entry is at least $300. Meanwhile 10m/1MB blocks still runs on $20 RPis.

I am not against mods to consensus to increase the block size, but there are more critical problems like solving tx malleability and new tx format (segwit) that provide more value today.

Dont be an ignorant big blocker. Look at the smartest people in this space. The real technical folk. What are they saying?

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#67
post #50
post #45

I want to critique one particular point made in this article, becuase it’s incorrect: > IOTA uses cryptography that cannot be broken by quantum computers. The use of such cryptography, specifically Winternitz signatures, leaves IOTA users vulnerable to loss of funds if they ever reuse an address. This attack that has already been seen in practice, with one user reportedly losing $30,000 USD worth of IOTA. As quantum…

Don't you think IOTA is trying to do too much at the same time? Maybe I'm underestimating the risk but it seems like practical quantum computer attacks are still a few decades away, maybe it would make more sense to focus on getting the rest of IOTA to work and plan to switch to different cryptographic algorithms later once things have settled a bit. If I get this right IOTA is trying to: * Move away from PoW * Have…

This seems to be the case with a lot of cryptocurrencies. They spread themselves too thin before they've even begun solving the core problems they need to solve. It would be enough to get a DAG-based distributed ledger/coin running and running well, but throw in all the extra nonsense and it's just a mess of poor prioritization.

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#68
post #64
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you think IOTA is trying to do too much at the same time? Maybe I'm underestimating the risk but it seems like practical quantum computer attacks are still a few decades away, maybe it would make more sense to focus on getting the rest of IOTA to work and plan to switch to different cryptographic algorithms later once things have settled a bit. If I get this right IOTA is trying to: * Move away from PoW * Have…

Right, so there’s the problem. I consider post-quantum cryotography to be more important than everything else on that list aside from transaction frequency. It should be, at the least, a serious consideration for any new cryptocurrency, even if they don’t ultimately move forward with it after a cost-benefit analysis. The threat model is more nuanced than “decades away.” The attacks may be decades away, but their targ…

I think that switch commitments are an interesting way to go: https://lists.launchpad.net/mimblewimble/msg00195.html

They let you fork in post-quantum cryptography at a later date, assume that there isn't a sudden and unexpected breakthrough in the capabilities of quantum computers.

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#69
post #58

The main thing here is that IOTA is not a _decentralized_ cryptocurrency. Given that there are centralized cryptocurrencies in circulation, it makes more sense to compare IOTA to something like Ripple or Stellar than to compare it to Bitcoin. In that light, most of the other objections go away -- censorship resistance is not an advertised feature; double-spends are only detectable when the coordinator milestone; fung…

https://iota.org/ > Scalable, Decentralized, Modular, No Fees

Hmm... I did not mean for my reply to be an apology for IOTA, though reading it now I can easily see how it looks like it.

I'm not trying to rewrite history and say that "IOTA was never intended to be decentralized". I'm saying, as the article points out, that IOTA is effectively centralized, and the plan for moving to being decentralized is fatally and irretrievably flawed.

I also think the rhetoric about being a currency for the "Internet of Things" is a nonsensical claim at best. The fact that the coins does not deliver on anything it promises does not mean that it is worthless, because it still delivers on other things that people find useful.

I'm not sold on IOTA (I have no holdings myself) just as I am not sold on the other big centralized competitors (Ripple or Stellar), but I don't think it's significantly worse than either of those in terms of what it delivers.

Re: IOTA: The Brave Little Toaster That Couldn’t

#70
post #60
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it was on his domain at http://come-from-beyond.com , unfortunately since last month he's not renewed it and wayback just loads a blank page. Shame, I'm going to see if it's available anywhere as it was a riot. Technology NASA is making him keep secret until this countdown he had going.

FYI: This is a fake webpage. The creators have nothing to do with it. You're an imbecile for believing such a thing.

Not even an iota of an idiot compared to those who bought into this scam of a coin :)
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