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Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

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Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#11

Post by beaconstudios »

dane-pgp wrote: post #9
briantakita wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be valuable for a large entity to censor content that would make it look bad; by disrupting operations & breaking existing links to content.

This looks like a job for: Blockchain! Seriously, though, imagine a public, distributed, append-only log, containing the hashes of the content stored by archive.is, with the data effectively signed by a (e.g. wallet) private key of the archive maintainers. People could volunteer to locally store copies of all the data that was archived, but only serve the data that goes "missing" from archive.is. With such a dead man…

or archive.is could just post regular signed backups. No need for blockchain, as there is no need to form a consensus in this case.

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#12

Post by dane-pgp »

beaconstudios wrote: post #11
dane-pgp wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This looks like a job for: Blockchain! Seriously, though, imagine a public, distributed, append-only log, containing the hashes of the content stored by archive.is, with the data effectively signed by a (e.g. wallet) private key of the archive maintainers. People could volunteer to locally store copies of all the data that was archived, but only serve the data that goes "missing" from archive.is. With such a dead man…

or archive.is could just post regular signed backups. No need for blockchain, as there is no need to form a consensus in this case.

Yes, regular signed backups would be almost as good. What a blockchain adds is the inability to fraudulently backdate material (in case a key was compromised) and a financial incentive for making sure that at least the existence of the hash remains a public record (unless the value of the entire blockchain becomes zero, which is more likely for some blockchains than others).

I suppose I'm inspired by this idea:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6aiysw/the_whole_i...

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#13

Post by [deleted] »

keketi wrote: post #4
celticninja wrote: post #2

I don't see the value in a high profile stolen domain for a trader. Anyone have any ideas on why this would be financially worthwhile? I am assuming financial motives.

Maybe it's an attempt at blackmailing to get something deleted? 31 Jan 2018, "I will make a donation every month. Please delete what we ask": https://twitter.com/archiveis/status/958760127359840257

[deleted]

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#14

Post by beaconstudios »

dane-pgp wrote: post #12
beaconstudios wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or archive.is could just post regular signed backups. No need for blockchain, as there is no need to form a consensus in this case.

Yes, regular signed backups would be almost as good. What a blockchain adds is the inability to fraudulently backdate material (in case a key was compromised) and a financial incentive for making sure that at least the existence of the hash remains a public record (unless the value of the entire blockchain becomes zero, which is more likely for some blockchains than others). I suppose I'm inspired by this idea: https…

a blockchain doesn't uniquely add that - there are cryptographic constructs that prevent that sort of attack, such as (I believe, I'm not a cryptographer) merkle trees that enforce a causal ordering. Really, the cost of a blockchain massively outweighs the value it brings to the table. The only instance where a blockchain is needed is where you need a tamper-proof distributed consensus between untrusted parties.

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#15

Post by dane-pgp »

beaconstudios wrote: post #14
dane-pgp wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, regular signed backups would be almost as good. What a blockchain adds is the inability to fraudulently backdate material (in case a key was compromised) and a financial incentive for making sure that at least the existence of the hash remains a public record (unless the value of the entire blockchain becomes zero, which is more likely for some blockchains than others). I suppose I'm inspired by this idea: https…

a blockchain doesn't uniquely add that - there are cryptographic constructs that prevent that sort of attack, such as (I believe, I'm not a cryptographer) merkle trees that enforce a causal ordering. Really, the cost of a blockchain massively outweighs the value it brings to the table. The only instance where a blockchain is needed is where you need a tamper-proof distributed consensus between untrusted parties.

Yes, you can create a merkle tree which enforces a causal ordering, but anyone with the (potentially compromised) key can generate such a tree with whatever ordering they want (or missing items). I concede, though, that the existence of multiple signed orderings would at least prove that the key had been compromised.

You're also right that there is a huge cost to creating a secure blockchain from scratch, but the incremental cost of using an already secure public blockchain (such as Ethereum's) can be lower than the amount of value it brings to the table.

Proving the existence of data, at specific timestamps in the past, when keys may have later been compromised, does seem like a use case that requires tamper-proof distributed consensus between untrusted parties. Whether that use case is particularly valuable or not is harder to judge, though, I admit.

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#16

Post by [deleted] »

keketi wrote: post #4
celticninja wrote: post #2

I don't see the value in a high profile stolen domain for a trader. Anyone have any ideas on why this would be financially worthwhile? I am assuming financial motives.

Maybe it's an attempt at blackmailing to get something deleted? 31 Jan 2018, "I will make a donation every month. Please delete what we ask": https://twitter.com/archiveis/status/958760127359840257

[deleted]

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#17

Post by skywhopper »

dane-pgp wrote: post #9
briantakita wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be valuable for a large entity to censor content that would make it look bad; by disrupting operations & breaking existing links to content.

This looks like a job for: Blockchain! Seriously, though, imagine a public, distributed, append-only log, containing the hashes of the content stored by archive.is, with the data effectively signed by a (e.g. wallet) private key of the archive maintainers. People could volunteer to locally store copies of all the data that was archived, but only serve the data that goes "missing" from archive.is. With such a dead man…

This misses the point of censorship. A party determined to sow misinformation can hijack a domain to do so. All the blockchain in the world won't solve that problem.

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#18

Post by samstave »

keketi wrote: post #4
celticninja wrote: post #2

I don't see the value in a high profile stolen domain for a trader. Anyone have any ideas on why this would be financially worthwhile? I am assuming financial motives.

Maybe it's an attempt at blackmailing to get something deleted? 31 Jan 2018, "I will make a donation every month. Please delete what we ask": https://twitter.com/archiveis/status/958760127359840257

Serious question, in that thread some guy is attempting to have an old blog with his face pic deleted... id suport that. But then if some other news or political or corporate arm was seeking to get something deleted to prevent them from looking bad, then im against it...

So what is the middle ground here, or how should one view this dilema?

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#19

Post by reaperducer »

samstave wrote: post #18
keketi wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's an attempt at blackmailing to get something deleted? 31 Jan 2018, "I will make a donation every month. Please delete what we ask": https://twitter.com/archiveis/status/958760127359840257

Serious question, in that thread some guy is attempting to have an old blog with his face pic deleted... id suport that. But then if some other news or political or corporate arm was seeking to get something deleted to prevent them from looking bad, then im against it... So what is the middle ground here, or how should one view this dilema?

You can't un-ring a bell.

Re: Someone is trying to steal archive.is's domain

#20

Post by centering »

samstave wrote: post #18
keketi wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's an attempt at blackmailing to get something deleted? 31 Jan 2018, "I will make a donation every month. Please delete what we ask": https://twitter.com/archiveis/status/958760127359840257

Serious question, in that thread some guy is attempting to have an old blog with his face pic deleted... id suport that. But then if some other news or political or corporate arm was seeking to get something deleted to prevent them from looking bad, then im against it... So what is the middle ground here, or how should one view this dilema?

Archive.is is notorious for not deleting anything. Not even a dox with SSN and more.
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