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All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

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321–330 of 398 posts

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#321
post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Except that they aren't taking anything from anyone. It's information. They might be copying it. It's true that information is infinitely abundant. However, unlike copyrighted works, private keys are not supposed to be shared. There should never be more than one copy of that number in the entire universe. If people can brute force keys by guessing, we've probably got bigger problems. Obtaining that number without a…

> Obtaining that number without authorization is already a crime. Accessing computers illegally to exfiltrate data is already a crime. Breaking into a physical safe in order to obtain a paper key is already a crime. Sure thing. Hence, the importance of analyzing each case individually. If unauthorized computer access is used, sure thing a crime was committed. If someone created a wallet using a stupid wallet generato…

Yeah, I agree with that.

You don't even need the website. Cryptographic keys are just numbers. All data is just numbers. You can write simple code to generate all numbers from zero to infinity and it will eventually generate all cryptograhpic keys, all computer files, all copyrighted works, all hate speech, all child abuse material, everything that can possibly be represented as data.

The thing is the search space is so unfathomably large that such a program will never produce useful results. This is central to cryptography. If a private key is copied, it must have been done so illegally or accidentally. Any other option means the cryptography is defective.

This is the complete opposite of copyrighted works whose entire purpose is copying. The data is already known and they're hopelessly trying to regulate access to it.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a rare care where "astronomically low" is actually underselling how unlikely something is.

By many orders of magnitude, I think. There are only estimated to be 10^24 or so stars, which is a lot less than 2^256, right. Astronomical is not in the same league.

This is a rare case where “many orders of magnitude” is underselling how unlikely something is.

It is estimated there are 10^80 atoms in the observable universe.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#324
post #316
post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if I do a bank transfer from your account to mine, I'm just "copying information".

No. You're accessing computer resources that you don't own and you aren't authorized to.

Same with private cryptocurrency keys. Otherwise, accessing non-public APIs with weak security by playing around with the URL would be legal.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#325
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, I found 10 used wallets not within 1000 pages of the first nor last page of his website in roughly 5 minutes. I’m fully aware behind the math of finding a wallet actually holding anything… but I was fairly weirded out to come across 10 wallets that quickly. Most had their last txn out roughly 2019.

Can you post the page?

A bit too busy to navigate that (just got an iPhone for the first time in my life, not good at navigating safari history in bulk yet)

But one of them was 1337, another some variant of 420-420xxx +-2 pages, another some variant of 1000000-1000000,xxx,xxx,xxx +-2 pages on those.

I can tell you there was nothing on 8008135 though

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#326
post #8

Reminds me of https://libraryofbabel.info/

IMHO everyone interested in computer science should try some Borges, at least Ficciones. Many of his stories are so mind-boggingly close to many topics of interest in CS. Beside The Library of Babel, I can come up with at least two other examples:

* Tlon Uqbar Orbis Tertius describes an extreme Idealistic philosophy where things exist only as long as someone (something?) perceives them, which IMHO is an apt description of the digital world.

* Funes describes the life of a man with perfect recall: so perfect, in fact, that he is unable to classify things (e.g., stones, or dogs) due to the infinite amount of details that set every single object apart from every other. And in a way, don't ML algorithms work by teaching a computer to forget about these details?

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh it's even crazier. He's trying to excavate the entire land fill now. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hard-drive-lost-bitcoin-landfil...

At this point, I hope he finds it.

Plot twist: it turns out to be the only key every found using this website. A user finds it 4 hours and 20 minutes before he excavates the hard drive.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#328
post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Obtaining that number without authorization is already a crime. Accessing computers illegally to exfiltrate data is already a crime. Breaking into a physical safe in order to obtain a paper key is already a crime. Sure thing. Hence, the importance of analyzing each case individually. If unauthorized computer access is used, sure thing a crime was committed. If someone created a wallet using a stupid wallet generato…

Yeah, I agree with that. You don't even need the website. Cryptographic keys are just numbers. All data is just numbers. You can write simple code to generate all numbers from zero to infinity and it will eventually generate all cryptograhpic keys, all computer files, all copyrighted works, all hate speech, all child abuse material, everything that can possibly be represented as data. The thing is the search space is…

> If a private key is copied, it must have been done so illegally or accidentally. Any other option means the cryptography is defective.

I agree if you're talking about an evidence such as a high-quality video or even photo with everything leading us to believe it's legit. However, we can not be as confident if we're talking about a BTC token. While extremely unlikely, there might be faulty algorithm implementations, problems with the algorithm, etc., that might lead to this situation.

Very unlikely? Sure, but we've to give the benefit of the doubt.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#329
post #324
post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. You're accessing computer resources that you don't own and you aren't authorized to.

Same with private cryptocurrency keys. Otherwise, accessing non-public APIs with weak security by playing around with the URL would be legal.

No. Invalid comparison. If you legitimately discover a cryptocurrency wallet private key by sheet lucky, and such cryptocurrency has no backing = is based in pure thin air, such as the case of Bitcoin, and there are public nodes which doesn't require you to abide by contracts that would forbid you to do so (which is supposedly all nodes), you're good to use that as you wish and it won't be a crime.

It's unethical to steal something tangible. Bitcoin has no tangibility whatsoever. You can't steal it.

Re: All Bitcoin private keys are on this website

#330
Somewhat related: Every once in a while someone sends BTC to the wallet you get when you generate a private key based on hashes of the word "bitcoin"[0] and the empty string[1].

0: https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/1E984zyYbNmeuumzEdqT8...

1: https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/1HZwkjkeaoZfTSaJxDw6a...

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