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Comment by bigdubs | Hacker News Reader

The point is to have verifiable identity that is tied to something more secure than a (not random) 9 digit [0-9] string and an address.

Your name is on the chain, the assertion you're you is done with your private key.

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And are we expecting normal people to do key management?

Works fine in estonia.

I'm a normal person. My first attempt at key management was an utter failure, accidentally broadcasting a private key instead of the public one.

I'm a computer security researcher. At some point I posted a public key for people to send me encrypted email. Nobody ever did and at some point I lost that private key.

Point is, key management is hard problem for big corporations with dedicated IT staff. Relying on normal people to be able to do that is just insane.

I'll give another example. My medical practice tried to do GPG encryption in a shared DropBox folder. Within the first week, someone decrypted half the files into the same shared folder...

It was all just a test with non-critical data, but the test was a total failure. And that didn't even get into key-related issues.

How else do you expect them to start the cars and open the doors to the houses they bought on credit?

Perhaps Equifax could transition to a key escrow service for those who trust giant corporations more than themselves.

Sure, because of their stellar record protecting PII?

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