Dark Wallet Will Make Bitcoin Accessible for All, Except the Feds

http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/dark-wallet-will-make-bitcoin-accessible-for-allexcept-the-feds

by kseistrup • 13 years ago

65 42 13 years ago

motherboard.vice.com

kseistrup• 13 years ago

The Dark Wallet web site:

https://darkwallet.unsystem.net/

And some technical info about the implementation:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=322483.0

droopyEyelids• 13 years ago

Does anyone have an idea how this would practically work?

I understand if the money stays in the black market economy, but once the government is serious about Bitcoin and has a few data centers following all transactions in the block chain, we'll have to be accountable for all transactions into and out of our wallet.

It'll be the perfect system for taxation, and I can't imagine how some of these anonymous funds will ever interact with your real identity without sending up a million red flags.

mtgx• 13 years ago

Maybe then we'll start using Zerocoin:

http://blog.cryptographyengineering.com/2013/04/zerocoin-mak...

http://zerocoin.org/

IanCal2• 13 years ago

Would zerocoin count as a mixer? It sounds very similar, and I believe those are/can easily be illegal^.

The wiki page on mixers [0] suggests that doing this with a large amount of money could be seen as structuring [1].

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mixing_service http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structuring

^ In the US

RRRA• 13 years ago

I agree, we need to make bitcoin even better before releasing it and see it fail because anonymity is currently not part of it, though people still claim it is. Zerocoin and whatnot!

throwaway98604• 13 years ago

I agree with most things Cody Wilson stands for, but I just can't stand those videos he makes. It makes it sound like this wallet (and a few months ago, the 3D printed gun) is going to destroy the U.S. government in one fell swoop. This wallet isn't really bringing anything new to the table. Zerocoin / Blockchain.info already exist.

I'll pass.

k_os• 13 years ago

I cringe aswell when I see such videos but they're for media attention not to people very well informed like yourself. They do no harm to you except for cringing for a few seconds. On the other hand these kind of videos appeal to sheeple on an emotional level.

ar4s• 13 years ago

Well, they look to have failed out of the gate. Why would Joe Nobody want to use "Dark Wallet". . Rename it, and you'll have a better chance.

saraid216• 13 years ago

We could rename it the Bat Wallet. It goes in your Bat Backpocket underneath the Bat Utility Belt.

eru• 13 years ago

It's only called Dark Wallet to allude to the Dark Knight.

wmf2• 13 years ago

I hear Joe Nobody likes drugs.

ethana• 13 years ago

I guess the Dark Mail guys need to pack up their shop too...

mrb3• 13 years ago

A state-less browser-based Bitcoin wallet that connects to the p2p network using WebSocket? Using a deterministic wallet seeded with a password you type once when opening the page? Is this the technical core of what Dark Wallet is about?

Wow, I have been in Bitcoin for 3 years, and I can't believe I never put thin web client + deterministic seeded wallet together... Even without implementing anything else[1] this would be HUGE, INSANELY useful.

- There would be zero efforts in getting started using Bitcoin.

- No software/app to install.

- Open a Dark Wallet page (hosted anywhere), type in a password, that's it you can see your Bitcoin addresses and receive coins.

- If you received coins in the past, you see your balance, and are ready to send coins. Dark Wallet can use SPV[2] to automatically discover the balance of your addresses. It could use HTML5 local storage just to cache a few things to speed up auto-discovery.

- You could even save the Dark Wallet html/js on your local harddrive and just open this up next time.

- If Bitcoin nodes have native support for acting as WebSocket servers, this would make Dark Wallet completely server-less.

- Dark Wallet would dynamically find p2p Bitcoin nodes via DNS, just like Bitcoin-QT does it today.

- No need to back up or save anything. Coins cannot be accidentally lost as long as you remember your password and as long as the password is strong. The password you type is the seed generating your wallet's private keys.

[1] https://darkwallet.unsystem.net lists: auto-anonymizer, broadcasters, encrypted messaging, encrypted shop-front, contracts, escrows, etc. [2] Simple Payment Verification.

EDIT: Looking more into Dark Wallet, it seems they want to implement it as a browser extension, which would involve a non-zero effort to install. Argh! There is a huge value to have NOTHING to install. Another way to understand what I suggest is a server-less blockchain.info wallet.

sktrdie• 13 years ago

Even if the Bitcoin protocol adopted WebSockets, the browser wouldn't be able to initiate the connections between peers. They would only be able to receive them from regular Bitcoin clients that can initiate connections [1].

1. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4118272/do-websockets-all...

johnpmayer• 13 years ago

But the browser could simply do verified transaction signing using known code. It severely lowers the trust barrier.

kolinko3• 13 years ago

Well, there are solutions that you described, for example: http://carbonwallet.com

No required plugins, no mess related to p2p network connection, and just as secure/safe from government as anything.

Darkwallet - meh. A case of overcomplicating a simple thing.

pixelcort• 13 years ago

There's also http://brainwallet.org/ for a similar concept.

neals• 13 years ago

So if 2 people have the same password, they have the same wallet?

phaer3• 13 years ago

You could use a username too, right? Because <unique username> + <any password> should be unique.

kolinko3• 13 years ago

Not just that, but if you have a slightly obvious password, your money will be gone in seconds.

That's why you never should use any quotations or popular phrases as a brainwallet password. There are people who watch those phrases.

mrb3• 13 years ago

Yes. That's a feature. You can log on any computer, and access your coins, with no server and no state.

But note that "if 2 people have the same password" means you can guess someone's password. And not being able to guess passwords is an assumption that any and all password-based systems have to make.

Avoiding guessable passwords is easy: implement verification of the password strength.

conformal3• 13 years ago

- If Bitcoin nodes have native support for acting as WebSocket servers, this would make Dark Wallet completely server-less.

we are working on this with btcd - the wallet and gui are decoupled from the blockchain maintenance. all blockchain-related operations can be done via json/websockets.

kyledrake• 13 years ago

Is there a json API for your blockchain daemon? I would love to take a look at it for Coinpunk.

olalonde• 13 years ago

Basically they will develop a thin Bitcoin client that implements the Coinjoin proposal?

gaius• 13 years ago

The problem I have with this, and the newly announced Dark Mail Alliance is that "dark" sounds sexy these days that bookshops are full of "paranormal romance" books (yes this really is an entire section now) but you can't go mainstream with it precisely because of the name. The mail guys should have called themselves the "Privacy Guard Alliance" or something.

conformal3• 13 years ago

i guess everyone wants to go sexy vs conventional lately.

is miley cyrus setting trends in computing now?

XorNot• 13 years ago

I think it speaks more to the motivations of the people involved. They want to imagine themselves untouchable by the law, while simultaneously claiming they have no desire to break it.

"if you've nothing to hide you've nothing to fear" has been used as a scare-phrase about surveillance for far too long without anyone comprehending what it actually is supposed to mean.

HoochTHX• 13 years ago

Anyone else notice that that is the same guy who was behind Defense Distributed? I haven't heard anything about him since he was served with a notice that he was violating the ITAR laws.

conformal3• 13 years ago

this sounds similar to torwallet, except that you don't need to trust ppl running a service. it's a fine idea and will be possible without a browser plugin in the next month or two... ;)

Dark Wallet Will Make Bitcoin Accessible for All, Except the Feds

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