How Bitcoin dies? - page 2. | Bitcointalksearch.org

imanikin

hero member

Activity: 702

Merit: 503

My prediction remains that if and when the banks and gov's go against B, they will buy out or "nationalize" >51% of the largest pools and miners.

That way they can change the fundamental rules and turn B into a p2p FedPal.

They may not want to completely destroy it for the same reason they let Tor go from the gov use into the wild, knowing what the masses could do with it. B will be useful to the gov's for clandestine ops the same way Tor is. Cool

John (John K.)

legendary

Activity: 1288

Merit: 1227

Away on an extended break

Bitcoin does not only exist in USA. A ban by the US government would at best hamper Bitcoin, or at least do nothing.

Deafboy

hero member

Activity: 482

Merit: 502

As matthewh3 said, we need to go dark. Because no matter what, some people will always take bitcoins (unless the fatal flaw in system is discovered) for exchange of something. IF the services and infrastructure is created and secured before SHTF, we have a huge advantage. If not, USD price of BTC will fall near zero for sure, but will recover after some time on black market.

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you can pay 1000 hackers for one year to make the bitcoin experience as painful as possible

Yeah... and not a single one of them is going to leak anything.

giszmo

legendary

Activity: 1862

Merit: 1114

WalletScrutiny.com

Quote from: flix on February 10, 2013, 11:34:35 AM

Quote from: giszmo on February 10, 2013, 11:03:43 AM

The fact that US government could crush bitcoin in no time and the fact that they did not do it despite the fact that it clearly made it onto just about every agency's agenda is proof enough for me that Bitcoin already has the blessing of the US government.

(If you doubt that Bitcoin can still be destroyed, please put into relation the $250,000 economy to the $50,000,000,000 printed every month and what a tiny fraction it would take to pay 1000 smart guys to hack every garage shop bitcoin business, buy 20PH/s ASICS, launch child porn portals operating with bitcoin, etc. The window to shut Bitcoin down will not close until the Bitcoin market value is some orders of magnitude higher.)

Right now that Bitcoin is a relative unkown, with < 1 Mn users, an attack would probably help (with publicity) more than hurt.

Once Bitcoin reaches critical mass (1-5 million users and 2Bn mkt cap) the defense mechanisms (legal, network size and redundancy, number of exchanges and worldwide presence, etc, etc) will be very strong and the only viable way to successfully attack will be hugely expensive and will carry a massive poison pill. (After all, the blockchain has hydra-like qualities)

Bitcoin does not have the USG blessing, it's just that they are always sooo slow to act. The genius behind Bitcoin is that it is not worth attacking when it is small and vulnerable, and it is extremely resilient once it becomes big enough.

I wish you were right but I highly doubt it. For 100 million dollars you can build more ASICS than it takes for a 50% attack. For another 100 million dollars you can create 500 fake bitcoin businesses that scam the hell out of its users. With another 100 million dollars you can pay 1000 hackers for one year to make the bitcoin experience as painful as possible to those that run legitimate bitcoin businesses. With another 100 million dollars you can run a dirt campaign about child porn, drugs and head hunters that are all fueled by bitcoin and if that is not enough, attach one or two 0s to above numbers. It doesn't hurt when you can print those dollars.

flix

legendary

Activity: 1227

Merit: 1000

Quote from: giszmo on February 10, 2013, 11:03:43 AM

The fact that US government could crush bitcoin in no time and the fact that they did not do it despite the fact that it clearly made it onto just about every agency's agenda is proof enough for me that Bitcoin already has the blessing of the US government.

(If you doubt that Bitcoin can still be destroyed, please put into relation the $250,000 economy to the $50,000,000,000 printed every month and what a tiny fraction it would take to pay 1000 smart guys to hack every garage shop bitcoin business, buy 20PH/s ASICS, launch child porn portals operating with bitcoin, etc. The window to shut Bitcoin down will not close until the Bitcoin market value is some orders of magnitude higher.)

Right now that Bitcoin is a relative unkown, with < 1 Mn users, an attack would probably help (with publicity) more than hurt.

Once Bitcoin reaches critical mass (1-5 million users and 2Bn mkt cap) the defense mechanisms (legal, network size and redundancy, number of exchanges and worldwide presence, etc, etc) will be very strong and the only viable way to successfully attack will be hugely expensive and will carry a massive poison pill. (After all, the blockchain has hydra-like qualities)

Bitcoin does not have the USG blessing, it's just that they are always sooo slow to act. The genius behind Bitcoin is that it is not worth attacking when it is small and vulnerable, and it is extremely resilient once it becomes big enough.

flix

legendary

Activity: 1227

Merit: 1000

Here is Jon Matonis' answer:

Government Ban On Bitcoin Would Fail Miserably
http://www.financialsense.com/contributors/jon-matonis/government-ban-on-bitcoin-would-fail-miserably

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I maintain that a government ban on bitcoin would be about as effective as alcohol prohibition was in the 1920s. Government prohibition doesn't even do a good job of keeping drugs out of prisons. The demand for an item, in this case digital cash with user-defined levels of privacy, does not simply evaporate in the face of a jurisdictional ban. One could even make the case that it becomes stronger because an official recognition that Bitcoin is not only a "renegade" currency but a "so-effective-it-had-to-be-banned" currency would imbue the cryptographic money with larger than life qualities.

I mean, just try stopping something like this:
https://localbitcoins.com/

matthewh3

legendary

Activity: 1372

Merit: 1003

We need to move more bitcoin services to eepsites (I2p) and Onion (Tor) sites plus services.

giszmo

legendary

Activity: 1862

Merit: 1114

WalletScrutiny.com

The fact that US government could crush bitcoin in no time and the fact that they did not do it despite the fact that it clearly made it onto just about every agency's agenda is proof enough for me that Bitcoin already has the blessing of the US government.

(If you doubt that Bitcoin can still be destroyed, please put into relation the $250,000 economy to the $50,000,000,000 printed every month and what a tiny fraction it would take to pay 1000 smart guys to hack every garage shop bitcoin business, buy 20PH/s ASICS, launch child porn portals operating with bitcoin, etc. The window to shut Bitcoin down will not close until the Bitcoin market value is some orders of magnitude higher.)

flix

legendary

Activity: 1227

Merit: 1000

This article is very wrong, but very interesting. It addresses an issue that has come up with almost all previous attempts at digital currencies: an all out government attack.

I want to bring it up because even 'though Bitcoin is designed to withstand precisely this sort of attack and survive, a bit of contingency planning on our part can help make that attack be even more ineffective and less traumatic, as well as spare a lot of hardship to some of those most exposed (especially in the US). In fact I'm pretty sure that one of the reasons for the creation of the Bitcoin Foundation is to make the legal defense of those most vulnerable easier.

http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com.es/2013/01/how-bitcoin-dies.html

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1: A DOJ indictment is unsealed which names everyone on Planet Three who operates, or has ever operated, or perhaps who has ever even breathed on, a BTC/USD exchange, as a criminal defendant.

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2: The BTC/USD price falls to 0 and remains there. BTC are permanently worthless. Everyone who was involved in the Bitcoin market and was holding BTC when the indictments were unsealed feels burned. Everyone who got out feels lucky. Many who escape prosecution, in fact, feel lucky. And BTC is remembered as an epic bubble.

We have precedents enough for both types of attack. See (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-gold) e-gold (and the many exchanges which existed around it) or the Liberty Dollar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_dollar) for a good example of how much harm the DOJ can do.

See the London Gold Pool (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Gold_Pool) for how the attack can be carried out for years on the price front.

The combination of both could be very harmful, even if there are workarounds. They would be incapable of destroying Bitcoin, but they could certainly drive it underground and delay mainstream adoption for a long, long time.

Topic: How Bitcoin dies? - page 2. (Read 3333 times)