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Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

coindesk.com

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Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#91

Post by zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC »

o_nate wrote: post #53
JohnTHaller wrote: post #2

Didn't coindesk just report yesterday that the 'transaction malleability problem' that MtGox was worried about was already known and a non-issue?

It turns out that "non-issue" might have been a slight exaggeration. I can understand where the Bitcoin developers are coming from. I mean no one likes to admit there's a bug in their code. Just read through Microsoft support archives. How many times will you find that some bizarre, head-scratching, counter-intuitive behavior of some API or other is "by design"? Does that mean they won't eventually (quietly) patch it…

The bitcoin developers "admitted" long ago that that behaviour is not quite optimal, and they are actually working on fixing it, albeit not quietly, because that would risk breaking bitcoin, as would doing so fast.

It's a non-issue in so far as it does not prevent bitcoin from working as it should if you do implement things as the original client does it, it's only an issue because it's something you might easily get wrong when implementing a new client (which apparently happened to some other developers), and it would have been avoidable - but changing the behaviour now has to be done very carefully, coordinating with all implementors of bitcoin clients, in order to make sure the fix does not cause a blockchain split, so that is what is happening.

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#92

Post by branchan »

anigbrowl wrote: post #80
kordless wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't secure cash under your mattress with a password, for one thing. That makes cash (and paper wallets) venerable to physical attack, even by vermin: http://metro.co.uk/2007/03/27/mouse-eats-cash-machine-makes-... There is no problem with value changing tomorrow as this is a potential problem with any new payment methodologies. Adoption does not appear magically overnight. The US Dollar is velocity stable due t…

There are these things called safes...

Are you going to put the safe under your mattress? Or do you think a secure encrypted and password protected wallet stored on a tiny USB drive or SD card might be more secure?

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#94

Post by lockes5hadow »

RRRA wrote: post #73
smtddr wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as I don't condone this kind of abuse, that's exactly what I'm preparing for. If BTC drops below $500, I'm buying more.

If BTC drops, below 500 or less, why exactly 500? Why not wait for 400? I'm new to this but maybe we need to make it easier to move money from wallet to wallet, from wallet to "hard" currencies and back, etc. Right now it's practically impossible to get verified on an exchange, get money out, paying anywhere with it, etc. You are lucky if you have a bitcoin ATM where the rate is probably not that good but at least yo…

You can still instantly verify a transaction as valid, which works for the retail store. You don't have to wait for 6 verifications, the money will arrive in your wallet once you have a copy of the verified transaction and you send that to the network. It might have a different transaction id or more 0000's prepended to the number, but you will get the money.

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#96

Post by branchan »

watty wrote: post #81
kordless wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't secure cash under your mattress with a password, for one thing. That makes cash (and paper wallets) venerable to physical attack, even by vermin: http://metro.co.uk/2007/03/27/mouse-eats-cash-machine-makes-... There is no problem with value changing tomorrow as this is a potential problem with any new payment methodologies. Adoption does not appear magically overnight. The US Dollar is velocity stable due t…

If someone is going to physically break into your house and access your money what's to stop them from physically assaulting you until you give them the password? Or just taking the computer that stores the "offline" wallet?

Unless someone has some kind of insider information, no burglar is going to assume that you have a stash of bitcoins.

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#98

Post by flatline »

kordless wrote: post #74
mrkickling wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way is that different from fiat money? You can keep fiat money in your mattress and spend it anywhere that accepts them. If you have $100 in a mattress (offline) then you would still have it tomorrow. The problem is that the moneys value may change tomorrow, especially if we are talking about bitcoin.

You can't secure cash under your mattress with a password, for one thing. That makes cash (and paper wallets) venerable to physical attack, even by vermin: http://metro.co.uk/2007/03/27/mouse-eats-cash-machine-makes-... There is no problem with value changing tomorrow as this is a potential problem with any new payment methodologies. Adoption does not appear magically overnight. The US Dollar is velocity stable due t…

I've seen more people get jacked of all their cryptocurrency holdings than any significant amount of fiat on their person, due to targeted viruses and backdoored systems. I've also seen numerous occasions where someone sent money to the wrong address and that was it, the money was forever sent into the void.

There was a guy on reddit who had all of his DOGE and BTC lifted right off his computer. He was using strong, auto-generated passwords stored in a password manager, so he was not even typing in passwords that a keylogger could intercept. Presumably the attacker had a backdoor into his system, watched him work, and just transferred out the funds when he wasn't at his desk. Poof - all gone, with more or less proper security measures in place and no clear sign of an intruder other than the missing money. Several other people reported similar events in that thread.

These are still major problems for mass adoption of crypto, completely setting aside the massive cases of fraudulent pools, online wallets, exchanges, etc., etc. There are many subtle problems that are difficult to diagnose and cure that come with a technological solution like bitcoin, that paper money simply does not have.

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#99

Post by panarky »

eterm wrote: post #40
ayanb wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also worth noting is the fact that the Bitcoin Price Index has been massively resilient to all the bad "news" thats been pouring in this month. It has been consistently hovering around the 670-700 mark.

I can't find the article now, but there have been several good articles explaining the lack of gravity on bitcoin in general. Basically, the price goes up quickly when new people are attracted to bitcoin and rush to buy. When the price dips however, because so much is bought for long term speculation, the price doesn't really dip much, as no one is incentivised to sell and hold out for when it gets better. At some po…

The psychology part of this argument seems the same as with any commodity, not just Bitcoin.

Maybe Bitcoin would be different if you could put money in but not take it out. But it's actually the reverse now -- it's harder to get Bitcoin out. So wouldn't that tend to increase the selling pressure?

And if you don't want to sell to a sketchy exchange, you can sell to SecondMarket[0] and get a wire transfer to your bank account the same day.

https://www.secondmarket.com/education/sell-bitcoin-secondma...

Re: Bitcoin Exchanges Under ‘Massive and Concerted Attack’

#100

Post by ph0rque »

pjc50 wrote: post #62
eterm wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't find the article now, but there have been several good articles explaining the lack of gravity on bitcoin in general. Basically, the price goes up quickly when new people are attracted to bitcoin and rush to buy. When the price dips however, because so much is bought for long term speculation, the price doesn't really dip much, as no one is incentivised to sell and hold out for when it gets better. At some po…

Also worth noting: you can't buy bitcoins on margin. So no margin calls to suddenly detonate the market.

You can margin buy/sell on bitfinex.com
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