Comment by throwaway92394 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by throwaway92394 | Hacker News Reader

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> We will have a security overview doc up soon, we ran out of time to have it ready today.

I mean this respectfully - why would you release a cryptographic method of transferring money - without going into detail of how it actually works? That's kinda the entire point of cryptocurrency, that we have a way to be mathematically confident the money is safe - but you didn't tell us the math. Especially on HN were a lot of the audience is technical enough to want to and be able to verify it to some degree.

I see you have patent US10896412B2, which honestly I have to ask how this is any different from any other hardware wallet?

> A physical cryptocurrency may comprise a physical medium and an attached processor.

I read some of the details (admittedly not all) and I'm still unsure how this is different from any other hardware wallet. AFAIK this is just a hardware wallet that exposes it's public key, then exposes it's private key when you cut the wire? Then we still need your signature to transfer the crypto, which is so double spend is prevented?

Also, if your servers go down or you're hacked or rm -rf dir/ * happens, will all the notes become unusable? Are we relying on you to maintain servers indefinitely?

> I mean this respectfully - why would you release a cryptographic method of transferring money - without going into detail of how it actually works? That's kinda the entire point of cryptocurrency, that we have a way to be mathematically confident the money is safe - but you didn't tell us the math. Especially on HN were a lot of the audience is technical enough to want to and be able to verify it to some degree.

As noted, the app will be open source as will the (brief) Bitcoin script for audit. For the sake of simplicity 2-of-2 multisig that downgrades to 1-of-2 multisig over time should capture the essence of how these notes work.

> Also, if your servers go down or you're hacked or rm -rf dir/ * happens, will all the notes become unusable? Are we relying on you to maintain servers indefinitely?

Nope. Users can always claim funds after the expiration date of January 3rd 2029 using the user key stored on the note.

> For the sake of simplicity 2-of-2 multisig that downgrades to 1-of-2 multisig over time should capture the essence of how these notes work. > Users can always claim funds after the expiration date of January 3rd 2029 using the user key stored on the note.

Interesting, thank you. That does seem more reasonable to me. Best of luck with your project.

>Nope. Users can always claim funds after the expiration date of January 3rd 2029 using the user key stored on the note.

Wait what? If your service gets hacked or goes away, the funds will be usable seven years from now? How is this statement different from “You’ll find out whether or tech stack works years from now “?

This kind of "smart-contracts" can be made and tested today on the Bitcoin network. Instead of picking a block-height of 7-9 years in the future, you could pick one on the next 20 minutes....

The code (if not put in a Taproot transaction) is "naked" visible on the blockchain, so no "trust" is needed.

> 2-of-2 multisig that downgrades to 1-of-2 multisig over time

Did you mean "downgrades to 1-of-1"? "1-of-2" implies either key would work.

> The multisig reverts to only your key after a printed expiration date on the note

Yes, that makes more sense, I was mischaracterizing it. 1-of-1 is more appropriate (although the notion of a 1-of-1 multisig is a little odd at face value until one digs in).

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