jron

OpenBSD disables Intel's hyperthreading due to security concerns: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17350278

Touch to auth is also the part that Google ignores for some strange reason. Their high security Gmail program defaults to remembering the device! There isn't a way to disable it either.

This. I assume a few of these provocative landing pages attempt to identify 0day exploits as well.

Ethereum's security model is totally different: https://eprint.iacr.org/2016/555.pdf If you look at bitcoin based POW intervals, 10 minutes is very close to optimal: https://eprint.iacr.org/2015/1019.pdf

Sorry. What don't you agree with? I think we're saying the same thing here.

Bitcoin is now valued a little higher than a major shoe company.

The cognitive dissonance around Bitcoin was understandable during the first move to $1000 but anyone yelling bubble now really needs to consider how tiny 86 billion actually is.

I can think of a great reason to disable SELinux; you actually use linux for a workstation and don't want fight with it every time you install a new application.

Cyrus Farivar is one of the worst.

Is there a reason for the masses to hold it?

Please tell us about your Satoshi hunt without revealing personal details ;)

Amateur Radio sure loves Windows. The relationship has always baffled me.

A password for key derivation prevents this attack and all other physical attacks. Trezor has supported this since day one.

It doesn't look like they have an option to validate account creation from a bitcoin payment instead of an SMS/email. I suspect it would be a popular feature.

Here is an interesting exchange on twitter between two insiders: https://twitter.com/TheBlueMatt/status/896931182369099777

Anyone can create infinite forks similar to BCC/BCH. Should Coinbase support them all?

Never a dull moment in Bitcoin.

Interview: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/features/athlete...

Pictures: http://elcapreport.com/content/elcap-report-6317-special-edi...

That assumes the person actually needs fast block confirmation times. The security properties of block times gets pretty complex and bitcoin's model is no slouch: https://eprint.iacr.org/2015/1019.pdf

The GHOST protocol only made the security properties of a group of short block times similar to longer block times. Before GHOST, short block times had worse security properties. POW over time still determines how secure a transaction really is.

https://eprint.iacr.org/2013/881.pdf

https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Design-Rationale

https://blog.ethereum.org/2015/09/14/on-slow-and-fast-block-...

I see comments like this echoed whenever bitcoin is mentioned outside of the usual circles. I always assume that the individual is personally invested in ethereum's success and/or they don't understand the technology.

Currently, ethereum has inherited all of the problems that bitcoin has and and magnified them by a substantial amount. We'll either witness the development team pull off a miracle - or more likely, in my opinion, watch the house of cards come crashing down.

Agreed! It is crazy that this code even exists. They have since rolled it into their decred/altcoin project.

Does anyone have a better summary of the Xen vs KVM security debate? The best I know of is the brief Qubes architecture document from 2010: https://www.qubes-os.org/attachment/wiki/QubesArchitecture/a... (Section 3).

KVM using Google's hardened device emulation may eliminate some of Qube's QEMU concerns.

Qubes author critique on the state of Xen security: https://lists.xen.org/archives/html/xen-devel/2015-11/msg006...

Last I checked, ProtonMail required SMS verification for account creation.

Edit: When using Tor

By that rational, any publicly traded commodity is a ponzi\pyramid scheme. Anything with a finite supply and demand will command a price. The market doesn't care if you dislike the speculative nature of bitcoin; it is simple supply and demand at work.

You could make the exact same arguments against gold but that doesn't stop central banks of the world from hording it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_reserve The only differences are 3,500 years of history and... teleportation.

A penny stock that skyrockets and holds value is no longer a penny stock. Bitcoin is 8 years old and has hit $1000 USD twice now over multiple years.

The "market cap" is currently over 16 billion dollars. It would place 68th when compared with 192 countries M1 money supply (2015) data: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/...

The hash rate securing the network is currently at 2.5 quintillion operations per second which is really 5 quintillion SHA256 operations every second: http://bitcoin.sipa.be/ Speaking of pennies... if every operation was a penny laid flat on earth, you could cover the surface of the earth, land and sea, twice over every second.

Bitcoin surpassed the penny stock phase a long time ago.

*Bitcoin companies were supposed to change the world.

What happened? Nearly all of those companies failed to understand that Bitcoin, at its core, is a bearer instrument with two goals: censorship resistance and bootstrapping to fulfill as many properties of ideal money as possible. Bitcoin has already changed the world and you don't really need to look any farther than Wikileaks and darknet markets. Bitcoin doesn't care if you agree them either.

"Nonetheless, I feel that I have no reasonable choice left within the bounds of ethics, but to announce the discontinuation of all Tor-related services hosted on every system under my control."

One can only assume this statement was made due to the somewhat recent Appelbaum debacle, but why pussyfoot around the subject? Lucky either believes numerous members of the Tor project are lying or there is something more nefarious going on here. Has he expanded on what ethical standards he is in disagreement with?

This was a pretty amazing presentation on the above project if you're interested in stylometry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMa04HovKfs

Brilliant code != beautiful code. Dan Kaminsky called Satoshi's programming alien technology with regard to security.

I haven't looked for similarities but I'm guessing someone has already compared the two using Aylin's CodeStylometry work: https://github.com/calaylin/CodeStylometry

There are some interesting circumstantial connections to Satoshi:

Considered to be a "brilliant" programmer with a strong C++ background - Most people would call you crazy if you attempted to put a 6 billion dollar prize behind an internet facing application without memory safety

Author of crypto/privacy software - E4M and possibly TrueCrypt written in C++

Experience hiding identity both online and off

Millionaire - Satoshi never converted any of his btc fortune

Anti-authoritarian

Understands the benefits of digital currency - Has millions of dollars stacked in boxes

Understands the payment problem - Illegal prescription drug marketplaces

Has an interest in internet gambling software - The first version of btc actually had some code for a marketplace and poker: http://imgur.com/a/NPiIs

Multifocal - Satoshi vanished around April 23 2011 to "move on to other things"

South African spelling/phrasing - analyse, colour, defence, bloody hard