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Keybase chooses Zcash

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Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#81

Post by pero »

jerguismi wrote: post #79
pero wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you understand how Monero works _at all_ - let me fix one of your arguments to illustrate: >When you spend money, you basically say "I am one of 2^256 people", where 2^256 is usually fairly small. Disappointing/embarrassing level of insight from a crypto project leader - here's a good layman-friendly video https://youtu.be/GEVm1dMn5Ks?t=14m to bring you up to speed (the simplified example is continued a…

Hmm. I don't think this is clear issue at all. I have been looking at monero block explorer, and there seems to be "mixing level" etc parameters. What do these parameters imply if not the level of how many people you mix the inputs with? I mean, your argument "you're stupid, look at this youtube video" is not very convincing either.

The Monero blockchain is comprised of inputs and outputs - public keys/one-time addresses to power of 10 denominated amounts into which each transaction is split and mixed with past public keys of identical power of 10 amounts. There are no 'orthodox' addresses on the blockchain which can be linked to transactions or to an identity.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#82

Post by TD-Linux »

anondon wrote: post #40

Is there any way to mimic Zcash's z-addresses in Bitcoin? I like the ideas behind Zcash and it solves important privacy issues, but I don't like the idea of a for profit company being the heavyweight behind Zcash. From what I gather, Bitcoin is more of a community effort than most other altcoins, which inspires trust. I looked up Zcash's price chart, it fell from ~$1300 at launch to ~$90 now. Ouch.

There are ways to do zero-knowledge proofs in Bitcoin too, for example: https://bitcoincore.org/en/2016/02/26/zero-knowledge-conting...

It is pending a Bitcoin softfork (segregated witness) (edit: actually I don't think it depends on this), and I don't think anyone has implemented something approximating z-addresses on this yet, but the opportunity is there.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#83

Post by antonios »

Taek wrote: post #68
kyledrake wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Can someone chime in here and give me an argument for why Zcash is better than Monero? Because everybody I've talked to thinks Monero is better. I'm not saying it is, but Monero came out far earlier than Zcash, and unless there is a substantial argument for using it over Monero, I'm not convinced of the argument to standardize on it. The only striking difference I can see between Monero and Zcash is that Zcash…

I do not understand all of the details behind Monero, but basically the privacy is incomplete. When you spend money, you basically say "I am one of X people", where X is usually fairly small. It's a lot better than Bitcoin where X=1, but it's still something that advanced algorithms can get though, and it still collapses if enough people have their identities and transactions revealed. In Zcash on the other hand, you…

It's not that simple. In your example, the X-1 "people" apart from you have already mixed their own coins with other people before...and so on. Monero is like a constant tumbler getting better with usage.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#84

Post by CiPHPerCoder »

petertodd wrote: post #77
CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2.1 million total for the Founder's Reward out of 21 million total that will ever be minted = 10%

That's why I said "for the next few years"

I know, but you're both talking about different things.

It may be 20% for the next few years, but it's also 10% overall. You're both right, why even try to nitpick over these details or correct anyone?

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#85

Post by plasticmachine »

Taek wrote: post #68
kyledrake wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Can someone chime in here and give me an argument for why Zcash is better than Monero? Because everybody I've talked to thinks Monero is better. I'm not saying it is, but Monero came out far earlier than Zcash, and unless there is a substantial argument for using it over Monero, I'm not convinced of the argument to standardize on it. The only striking difference I can see between Monero and Zcash is that Zcash…

I do not understand all of the details behind Monero, but basically the privacy is incomplete. When you spend money, you basically say "I am one of X people", where X is usually fairly small. It's a lot better than Bitcoin where X=1, but it's still something that advanced algorithms can get though, and it still collapses if enough people have their identities and transactions revealed. In Zcash on the other hand, you…

You're almost there, but not quite.

Since Monero outputs go to dual-key stealth addresses, outputs are effectively paid to a random 256-bit "address". So if you use a mixin of 50, in a transaction with 1 input, an external observer can say "this illicit transaction spends funds from 1 of 50 possible transactions", but then you need to go to those 50 and work your way back till eventually you find a needle, in a very large haystack, that you can actually identify.

Because of this, the anonymityset grows exponentially the further up the tx chain from an identifiable transaction (eg. a withdrawal from a KYC / AML exchange) you are.

The major advantage here is that every Monero transaction adds to this anonymityset, since privacy is compulsory.

On the other hand, ZCash's privacy is nearly unusable. Using it requires 8gb+ of RAM, and takes over a minute on a Xeon processor. Because of its unusability you end up being "1 of X people", where X is very tiny - it's limited to the people moving from traceable addresses to z-addresses who haven't identifiably moved ~the same amount out.

ZCash is useless at best, dangerous privacy theatre at worst.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#86

Post by plasticmachine »

kobeya wrote: post #55
malgorithms wrote: post #32

Author here. Seeing some of the discussion go down on Twitter, I feel maybe I should explain further the "white supremacist" example in the post. (one tweet at me: "So now you can hide the fact that white supremacists are sending you money? F!@#ing weird example.") When I shared a draft post with some friends, a lot of them had an ah-ha moment, so I was hoping for the same from others. I was trying to illustrate 2 pr…

Have you considered supporting a stealth address scheme for Bitcoin? The problem is reuse of addresses, period. Bitcoin has solutions for this.

How will they pump the ZCash scam if they do?

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#87

Post by jszymborski »

Slightly OT, but I realllyy wish Keybase would prioritise email validation so that it could fulfill the much needed role of general PGP key server, with the added "sum of your social identities" assurance.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#88

Post by petertodd »

elif wrote: post #16
CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #2

I like Zcash. I think it's a good solution to a problem that Bitcoin did not solve, and creates a cryptocurrency more in line with the vision spelled out in A Cyperpunk's Manifesto than the previous attempts. (Yes, I've looked at the other attempts to build a private alternative to Bitcoin, including Monero: https://github.com/monero-project/monero/issues/1271 )

Yeah, but proof that (Beyond the 10% pre-mine) more ZEC are not being secretly generated for the creators relies upon trust in a cabal of six individuals based upon a "public" exhibition of genesis involving theatrical destruction of computers (whose video was supposed to be published but I can't find?) Even if they are 100% legitimate actors, the lack of absolute proof undermines the provenance. From my perspective,…

> whose video was supposed to be published but I can't find?

Keep in mind that while videos of the destruction are entertaining - and and possibly useful for education and peer review - they prove nothing. You shouldn't trust Zcash significantly less because they haven't been released yet - if that'd make you trust Zcash more, you're probably not thinking carefully about how fundamentally based on trust the whole process was. I'm one of those six individuals, and the simple fact is it would have been trivial for me collude with the other five to backdoor the process undetectably; if we did that you would never know. End of story. (and sorry, but the video footage of the ceremony that some stations apparently kept doesn't change that either)

Also remember that everyone ran the exact same software - a bootage DVD image - and that software was produced by one guy the day prior to the ceremony. I hear Andrew Miller successfully reproduced the build of that DVD image, but there's a lot more independent auditing work that needs to be done on that software. Until that work is done by multiple independent people, the entire multi-party aspect of the ceremony is just a bunch of crypto hocus pocus that means nothing.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#89

Post by Apofis »

malgorithms wrote: post #32

Author here. Seeing some of the discussion go down on Twitter, I feel maybe I should explain further the "white supremacist" example in the post. (one tweet at me: "So now you can hide the fact that white supremacists are sending you money? F!@#ing weird example.") When I shared a draft post with some friends, a lot of them had an ah-ha moment, so I was hoping for the same from others. I was trying to illustrate 2 pr…

You should probably amend the post with this info as it looks be going over some people's heads.

Re: Keybase chooses Zcash

#90

Post by hackinthebochs »

Taek wrote: post #54
anondon wrote: post #40

Is there any way to mimic Zcash's z-addresses in Bitcoin? I like the ideas behind Zcash and it solves important privacy issues, but I don't like the idea of a for profit company being the heavyweight behind Zcash. From what I gather, Bitcoin is more of a community effort than most other altcoins, which inspires trust. I looked up Zcash's price chart, it fell from ~$1300 at launch to ~$90 now. Ouch.

If I recall correctly, more than 500btc was traded when the price was over 100 btc per Zcash - $350,000 in trade volume at a price exceeding $70,000 per token, when the price today has fallen to about $100 per token. Max price was almost $2,000,000 per token, someone actually literally spent that much. Perhaps the greatest example I've ever seen of tulip mania. And I'm fairly confident those were real trades, as they…

>Max price was almost $2,000,000 per token, someone actually literally spent that much.

No. When zcash was trading at such a price, it was less than a single zcash coin in total. So a few people were paying significant sums for very small fractions of a zcash coin, but no one payed 2,000,000 for a single coin. The price has crashed because supply has grown exponentially. What you were seeing was supply vs demand in action in an unusually obvious way.

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