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Statement on Mt. Gox

antonopoulos.com

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Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#11

Post by crystaln »

davidw wrote: post #6
crystaln wrote: post #5

"Some exchanges were in fact completely unaffected, revealing as false Gox’s claims that this was a bug in bitcoin." This reveals a lack of objectivity here. There IS a bug in bitcoin. There are workarounds, and some exchanges implemented those properly. Of course, MtGox should have followed best practices and implemented a workaround, but the above sentence is - on its face - flawed and biased. The fact that some ex…

I'm inclined to agree with cperciva, who is no slouch with security stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7289273

The statement is inherently flawed, regardless of its source. Because some exchanges were unaffected does not mean that MtGox was not affected, and the statement itself implies that other exchanges were affected which would be evidence in MtGox' favor.

I'm not saying MtGox was not incredibly incompetent, however nobody is helped by this false defensiveness over a very serious and clear bug in bitcoin that seems to have affected at least a few exchanges.

Regardless of MtGox' incompetence, this IS a serious bug in bitcoin for which a workaround is required, and without which a bitcoin theft is possible.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#12

Post by diegocg »

It puts all the blame on Mt. Gox, assuming that their lack of good management is to blame. But I still see the lack of reversibility of transactions (one of bitcoin's strengths) as the major problem here. We live in civilized in a world where there are laws and polices and judges and banks and governments, but bitcoin tries to workaround them for no good reason.

I'm still hoping that banks will take what to me is the bitcoin's biggest feature (multiple wallet addresses and the ability to easily make cash transfers to other wallet address) but without pretending that centuries of legal and financial traditions somehow don't matter.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#13

Post by wmf »

xdarnold wrote: post #10

Under the presumption that it is true that ~750k BTC has been stolen, has anyone considered the possibility of orchestrating a 51% attack on the attacker(s)? Gox probably has logs of withdrawal requests. It might be daunting but feasible to sift the tx-MAL withdrawals from legitimate ones, then work with major pools and exchanges to double-spend stolen coins back to Gox. Gox could then be forced (by the same 51% majo…

Vigilante rewriting of the blockchain has been discussed before and it tends to get hung up on the issue of agreeing who's the thief and who's the victim.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#14

Post by JHSheridan »

mindstab wrote: post #3

A little regulation and over sight might have prevented all this. And with out it going forward all anyone can do is advise best practices, and then watch as some ignore them and also have their money stolen. Very wild west. Totally something I'll be staying well back from

Just like a little regulation and oversight stopped the housing bubble, tech bubble, etc.

I'm not saying this is comparable directly to those situations, but we shouldn't forget that regulated markets have crooks and cheats too.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#15

Post by hoggle »

mindstab wrote: post #3

A little regulation and over sight might have prevented all this. And with out it going forward all anyone can do is advise best practices, and then watch as some ignore them and also have their money stolen. Very wild west. Totally something I'll be staying well back from

Unfortunately things usually don't change on their own, it's actually good that this happened. The client-side key-management solutions that Andreas mentioned in the last paragraph of his statement are a testament to that.

Evolution in nature is brutal, I can understand that you don't want to be part of that process.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#16

Post by argumentum »

mindstab wrote: post #3

A little regulation and over sight might have prevented all this. And with out it going forward all anyone can do is advise best practices, and then watch as some ignore them and also have their money stolen. Very wild west. Totally something I'll be staying well back from

It's unfortunate that many people lost money (and some might have lost a lot), but if the ecosystem can recover from this without governmental regulation (as I expect it will), we have the first evidence (ever) that there is no need for a central authority to conduct oversight and ensure a robust currency.

It looks likely that the free market, which includes the self-regulating actions by Coinbase, Blockchain and others (as well as customer reactions), will punish the bad actors and reward "good" (well managed) companies. It will also create better consumers, who will now be more diligent in evaluating relevant services before they sign up.

You write that you'll be staying away for now, that is your right as a potential participant in the market. We are already seeing the major players (like Coinbase) react to your sentiment by increasing transparency to bolster confidence in their services.

1. This is what we want. 2. When have you seen the existing financial system react so rapidly and thoroughly to the many flaws and disasters incumbent within?

Yes, "a little regulation and oversight might have prevented all this", but it also might have prevented crypto currency from being able to prove its value (or fail to) in the free market.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#17

Post by mpyne »

kaonashi wrote: post #9
mpyne wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A little regulation and over sight might have prevented all this. Yes, but that is completely contrary to the whole reason Bitcoin exists in the first place. If you wanted a regulated currency you'd get fiat. It's wild west by definition, which is good for popcorn-muncher like me... but bad for friends of mine who have lost a significant amount of money by "experimenting" with Bitcoin. :(

>Yes, but that is completely contrary to the whole reason Bitcoin exists in the first place. Not really. Satoichi has shied away from the political motivations of a lot of the community.

What Satoshi does after releasing the creation has no bearing on the purpose behind creating something before they released it though.

Realizing that you need to shy away from something after you do something doesn't invalidate the reasons behind why you did it.

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#18

Post by eliasmacpherson »

crystaln wrote: post #11
davidw wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm inclined to agree with cperciva, who is no slouch with security stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7289273

The statement is inherently flawed, regardless of its source. Because some exchanges were unaffected does not mean that MtGox was not affected, and the statement itself implies that other exchanges were affected which would be evidence in MtGox' favor. I'm not saying MtGox was not incredibly incompetent, however nobody is helped by this false defensiveness over a very serious and clear bug in bitcoin that seems to ha…

If this implementation is bugged:

http://blog.magicaltux.net/2010/06/27/php-can-do-anything-wh...

then is ssh broken?

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#19

Post by xdarnold »

wmf wrote: post #13
xdarnold wrote: post #10

Under the presumption that it is true that ~750k BTC has been stolen, has anyone considered the possibility of orchestrating a 51% attack on the attacker(s)? Gox probably has logs of withdrawal requests. It might be daunting but feasible to sift the tx-MAL withdrawals from legitimate ones, then work with major pools and exchanges to double-spend stolen coins back to Gox. Gox could then be forced (by the same 51% majo…

Vigilante rewriting of the blockchain has been discussed before and it tends to get hung up on the issue of agreeing who's the thief and who's the victim.

It seems like there is a straightforward enough principle in this case to do so without much argument. Not that the method would be perfect. But isn't it preferable to the alternative?

Re: Statement on Mt. Gox

#20

Post by aggronn »

argumentum wrote: post #16
mindstab wrote: post #3

A little regulation and over sight might have prevented all this. And with out it going forward all anyone can do is advise best practices, and then watch as some ignore them and also have their money stolen. Very wild west. Totally something I'll be staying well back from

It's unfortunate that many people lost money (and some might have lost a lot), but if the ecosystem can recover from this without governmental regulation (as I expect it will), we have the first evidence (ever) that there is no need for a central authority to conduct oversight and ensure a robust currency. It looks likely that the free market, which includes the self-regulating actions by Coinbase, Blockchain and oth…

> we have the first evidence (ever) that there is no need for a central authority to conduct oversight and ensure a robust currency.

No one has ever doubted that this was possible. 'Robust' currency has existed without a central monetary authority in the past (for millenia!). The reason the Fed exists is because its believe that it takes an existing 'robust' currency and makes it better.

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