Topic: POW vs POS? - page 2. (Read 4164 times)

So far you have presented me zero proof of your claim, so I would just have to take it as a rumor then. Your argument is therefore invalid, because you have created yet another imagined scenario that doesn't exist in reality. I know you have a vivid imagination from prior discussion.

How do you sell 51% stake in an eco-system, and then attack it? I don't see how that is even possible. The selling alone would take months, and would alert the community already. Your theory is a imagined scenario, that can not be done in reality, that's why it has never happened in reality.

No, they would sell the stake and THEN attack it.  that's the issue.  the attacker acts as if they still had that stake and it was the point in time just prior to selling.  and there's very little cost to do it unlike pow hashing.  that's the infamous NaS problem.

This is probably not true (LOL) however it is a good point that the large stakeholders could potentially all be the same person (or group of people working together) who can potentially attack the network for free.

If it does not cost anything to mine then it does not cost anything to attack the network

Why do you need the evidence, DPoS is immune to attacks, right? I'm surprised you are unaware, aren't you a delegate? It is happening soon as well, as early as 1Q 2015!
I would rather have you reflect and think critically about security rather than handing you the details on a silver plate. Some self reflection about security is just what you need
and if I hand over the links I fear you will just rationalize them.

I am not spreading FUD either and if you are willing to wager a friendly BTC I can provide the evidence for you to back up my statements.

Again you have to give me more detail, links maybe? I'm not aware of any plans to devalue stakes.

Are you unaware that many large BTSX/PTS stakeholders, and Invictus developers are currently right now negotiating a marketing affiliate plan with banks which will be likely funded either with another direct or indirect method of devaluation of everyone's stake ?

Not sure what you mean, you'll need to talk in more detail how is this an attack on their own currency, how do you know with certainty that something is a false benefit, while stakeholders believe otherwise?

What if the stakeholders attacked their own currency unintentionally by falsely believing their actions would benefit their currency? Is this not a real possibility that is unfolding itself right now with Bitshares which may happen as soon as 1Q 2015 with a very real marketing plan that is being negotiated with certain banks?

Or are you going to insist that PoS/DPoS is immune?

PoS bag holders sound like communist party politicians. They say that working is at an end if you will join their party. They then proceed to violently assault the business leadership  (PoW miners) in the community and use intimidation to scam their property. I prefer an honest days work for an honest days pay.Thanks, but no thanks Mr. Chairman.

There's nothing to stop a well funded and determined attacker to attack Bitcoin's PoW network in the same fashion, it's still only cost 10% of Bitcoin marketcap to attack. That's extremely cheap compared to buying 51% stake in a PoS eco-system.

This naturally makes sense, PoW alts can't properly secure themselves anymore because of either Scrypt Asics, botnets, or simply not having the hashing power of Bitcoin. I expect many PoW alts to start failing and continue decreasing in market share because of this. Look how litecoin just recently lost number 2 in market cap -- http://coinmarketcap.com/

The exception to this are coins that depend upon the security of bitcoin blockchain like coloredcoins , counter-party, mastercoin, and namecoin.

You will never read about that scenario happening, because no one is dumb enough to buy 51% stake in an eco-system, then proceed to destroy their own stake and wealth. It's like burning your own money. Well if you do, then the rest of stakeholders would thank you for it, you just made their stake 100% more valuable by destroying your own stake, because the attacking stake will soon be blocked by community consensus and rendered unusable forever.

On the other hand, with the PoW mining farms, nearly nothing can be done to stop them from attacking any PoW network that they can overwelm with their hardware, as you already seen in the death of many PoW altcoins.

PoW coins are slowing going out of fashion it seems.

All the new coins are PoS based and some are doing quite well.

There is too much focus on comparing the cost to 51% attack PoW coins vs the cost 51% attack to a PoS coin. There are many attack vectors to consider from bugs in code (heartbleed), DDoS, Sybil attack, NAS attack, Timewarp attack, Addition Attack, Modification Attack, Race attack, Vector76 attack, Brute force attack, ect....

There may not be any examples of 51% attacks directly on a PoS currency as those are relatively new examples with large initial stakeholders who have strong vested interests in not attacking their own assets but there are plenty of examples of other attacks and weaknesses that any user and investor should be concerned with.

An example - NXT was attacked before it was even launched. The creators of Nxt botched what could have been viewed as a fair initial launch by changing the dates and not waiting till there was a greater distribution list before closing the IPO. This will forever taint the public and investors perception of nxt and is a social attack on the integrity of the currency.

As far as BTSX is concerned, there are many weaknesses within DPoS , one of them I have yet to mention, but is being carried out as we speak right now by Invictus and many of the early investors against their own currency. BTSX shareholders like to promote certain qualities of BTSX/BitUSD but behind closed doors there are negotiations happening as we speak between Invictus and some large banks.

I am not suggesting that Bitcoin is impervious either, in fact I'm suggesting that all crypto-currencies are extremely fragile from internal and external attacks. I am merely suggesting that the way in which PoS/ DPoS promoters talk about security is very naive when they insinuate that they are so much more secure than Bitcoin.

Read the statements carefully again. It changing to pow - cpu mine. That would provide some advantage to an average joe. With current scenario, cpu don't even stand the slightest chance at all. Not even single bit. Everybody knows about that.

I have heard this said before and a lot of people talk about it in theory, but I wondering has the theory ever been put to the test. 

I know for a fact many PoW coins have been taken over and destroyed by a malicious actor, but I have still yet to hear about a single PoS coin being harmed in the way described.  And this is in a world where sooooooo many fake PoS coins are released just for pumps.  Can anybody confirm a real world example of a PoS that was actually "51%" attacked by a person that bought a bunch of coins and then used them to attack the network?  If so, I would definitely like to read more about it. 

The problem with PoS is that if you buy a lot of coins then you could attack the network without anyone knowing, sell the coins plus your ill gotten gains and the scam coin will be damaged once it is realized that an attack took place. With PoW you need to invest in machines that mine so if you attack the network you can sell your ill gotten gains but the future earnings potential from your machine will be greatly reduced so you would have an incentive to not attack the network

PoW = Spend a lot of money on computers and electricity to get coins through at a 98% predictable rate as you join a good and big pool.

PoS = Spend money directly on coins and buy them at a 100% predictable rate and not waste money on computers and electricity.

Both have block chains. 

PoW usually just have a blockchain and little esle.  Sometimes 2nd party platforms can piggyback on PoW
 
PoS has a ton of options and services in addition to the traditional blockchain

I have 6 old computers.  I can use them all to mine bitcoin and not ever get a bitcoin.  It basically is a complete waste of money and electricity to try to mine with anything that is not specialized hardware (asics). 

Now with PoS, anybody's old computer can support the network.  Even a Ras Pi an be a node.