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To repeat an earlier comment, this scheme encourages a centralization of trust into a private key managed by processor manufacturers. You might say that by inte

To repeat an earlier comment, this scheme encourages a centralization of trust into a private key managed by processor manufacturers. You might say that by integrating SGX mechanisms into your security model, you create a set of 'feudal lords' [1] who can wield their power over you. A manufacturer may 'legitimately' establish an enclave in your most trusted hardware which you may not audit or even measure. And if that security model becomes commonplace, for example when only allowing Widevine DRM inside SGX, you eventually cannot use your self-chosen hardware, but will have to pick a feudal lord from a limited set of 'ecosystem choices'. [1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feudal.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feuda...

senand 9y ago
Complete reference link: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feudal.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feuda...
darawk 9y ago
That was my first impression as well. That being said, I have a lot of respect for Moxie and his work, so i'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt and am curious to see his response to this point.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
nebulous1 9y ago
Yes, the features of the SGX means that we can no longer even see what are computer is doing. > This means that the ledger is "public" and distributed to all MobileCoin nodes, but will also simultaneously never be accessible or viewable by humans (even the operators of the MobileCoin nodes) so long as SGX and the MobileCoin software remains secure. It seems unlikely to me that these two things things will remain the case. > A client can perform remote attestation to its MobileCoin node before transmitting its keys into the remote enclave along with a short recovery PIN. And it seems if SGX gets popped the whole thing comes crumbling down. Quotes from https://www.mobilecoin.com/whitepaper-en.pdf https://www.mobilecoin.com/whitepaper-en.pdf
Asdfbla 9y ago
I still think it's an interesting approach. If you want to be more efficient and less wasteful than Bitcoin, at some point trust has to come into play. And reducing your trust to the manufacturers of secure enclaves (whose products can also be audited to a degree) is surely an improvement still, even if it doesn't have the radical threat model of conventional cryptocurrencies (which inevitably run into scaling problems because it mostly requires proof-of-work). Also, the article mentions the de facto centralization of trust in the current cryptocurrency ecosystem - so pragmatically, it's not much better there. From centralized exchanges, to centralized mining cartels, what does something like Bitcoin have left to offer?
- nebulous1 9y ago
  Bitcoin uses proof-of-work for its consensus system, but not all cryptocurrencies do. Bitcoin is a technological wonder, but it's ultimately not as advanced as its younger brethren. The Stellar Consensus Protocol, which MobileCoin say they're using, uses something more akin to a web of trust rather than proof-of-work. You do not need the SGX to get rid of proof-of-work.
  - eternalban 9y ago
    > Bitcoin is a technological wonder Oh, dear lord. > ultimately not as advanced as its younger brethren. These must then be simply out of this world. Superwonder technologies. Double digit transactions per second!! /$ The hype around this piece of software is getting out of hand.
    - hossbeast 9y ago
      Perhaps you do not understand it's revolutionary aspects.
      - pishpash 9y ago
        Nothing revolutionary about distributed consensus. It was the 2008 financial crisis that brought the anti-banking crowd into frenzy, seeing all sorts of claimed benefits in using this sort of thing for money. They would have been goldbugs or tulip collectors under other circumstances. Or do you mean the revolutionary scamming techniques never seen before? /s
subway 9y ago
Moxie has made it pretty clear through the way Signal operates than Moxie's worldview is one where our feudal lords know better than mere serfs can ever hope to. I'm not at all surprised that yet again trust roots are taken out of the hands of end users.
- Fnoord 9y ago
  What I don't understand is why such a person resorts to a nickname, but does use a picture. The US government knows the real name of people like ioerror and moxie marlinspike. It seems pointless to consistently hide the real name to the public.
  - 317070 9y ago
    If your pseudonym carries more klout, and you have even more people in your social life knowing you by the pseudonym, it kind of becomes your 'real' name. Not any different from other persona names like Marilyn Manson, or Marilyn Monroe.
  - vertex-four 9y ago
    I used to use my online name enough that people were confused when they heard my legal name. Eventually, I decided to change my legal name to save the hassle of having a legal name that nobody actually knew me by, but that's easy in my country (doesn't involve courts or lawyers) and a pain in the ass in most other places.
    - trafficlight 9y ago
      Nice to meet you, Mr. Vertex Four.
- Asdfbla 9y ago
  Seems unnecessarily adversarial of you. I think Moxie has justified his standpoint relatively convincingly, even if you may not agree with it. And to some degree, the success of Signal, or Signal's protocol as implemented widely used services in WhatsApp, supports his approach. If cypherpunk-purists had their way, encryption would still only be a thing exclusively used by a slim minority of nerds who are capable of managing PGP and all the complications that come with its fragile nature.
golangnews 9y ago
Your argument would be stronger if you didn’t resort to epithets. Bitcoin was designed to be as decentralised as possible. It turns out this has serious downsides and it’s difficult to pursue the sort of financial revolution it aspires to without social revolution. This currency chooses different trade-offs which the creators believe will make it more popular because most people don’t need or want trustless transactions. People delegate power for finance, politics and computing not because they are stupid or serfs but because they are willing to sacrifice some autonomy for the speed, ease of use and enforceable contracts which come with a central authority.
- Confiks 9y ago
  If you (re)read the blog post I'm referring to, you'll find that your concerns are very much addressed. I actually chose to refer to 'feudal security' as coined by Schneier (at least in the context of computer security), because it is such a compelling and balanced approach to the exact same trade-offs you're describing.
- explainplease 9y ago
  > Your argument would be stronger if you didn’t resort to epithets. No, an argument is strong or weak regardless of whether you like the words used to express it.
  - zaphar 9y ago
    The argument would be stronger in the sense that it would be more persuasive. Which if your goal is to convince people is a highly relevant metric of strength to use. As disappointing as it might be pure logic is rarely enough in the real world.
    - explainplease 9y ago
      You state the obvious. The point is to encourage rational thinking and discourage emotional reaction. One person at a time.

senand 9y ago

Complete reference link: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feudal.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/more_on_feuda...

darawk 9y ago

That was my first impression as well. That being said, I have a lot of respect for Moxie and his work, so i'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt and am curious to see his response to this point.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

nebulous1 9y ago

Yes, the features of the SGX means that we can no longer even see what are computer is doing. > This means that the ledger is "public" and distributed to all MobileCoin nodes, but will also simultaneously never be accessible or viewable by humans (even the operators of the MobileCoin nodes) so long as SGX and the MobileCoin software remains secure. It seems unlikely to me that these two things things will remain the case. > A client can perform remote attestation to its MobileCoin node before transmitting its keys into the remote enclave along with a short recovery PIN. And it seems if SGX gets popped the whole thing comes crumbling down. Quotes from https://www.mobilecoin.com/whitepaper-en.pdf https://www.mobilecoin.com/whitepaper-en.pdf

Asdfbla 9y ago

I still think it's an interesting approach. If you want to be more efficient and less wasteful than Bitcoin, at some point trust has to come into play. And reducing your trust to the manufacturers of secure enclaves (whose products can also be audited to a degree) is surely an improvement still, even if it doesn't have the radical threat model of conventional cryptocurrencies (which inevitably run into scaling problems because it mostly requires proof-of-work). Also, the article mentions the de facto centralization of trust in the current cryptocurrency ecosystem - so pragmatically, it's not much better there. From centralized exchanges, to centralized mining cartels, what does something like Bitcoin have left to offer?

nebulous1 9y ago
Bitcoin uses proof-of-work for its consensus system, but not all cryptocurrencies do. Bitcoin is a technological wonder, but it's ultimately not as advanced as its younger brethren. The Stellar Consensus Protocol, which MobileCoin say they're using, uses something more akin to a web of trust rather than proof-of-work. You do not need the SGX to get rid of proof-of-work.
- eternalban 9y ago
  > Bitcoin is a technological wonder Oh, dear lord. > ultimately not as advanced as its younger brethren. These must then be simply out of this world. Superwonder technologies. Double digit transactions per second!! /$ The hype around this piece of software is getting out of hand.
  - hossbeast 9y ago
    Perhaps you do not understand it's revolutionary aspects.
    - pishpash 9y ago
      Nothing revolutionary about distributed consensus. It was the 2008 financial crisis that brought the anti-banking crowd into frenzy, seeing all sorts of claimed benefits in using this sort of thing for money. They would have been goldbugs or tulip collectors under other circumstances. Or do you mean the revolutionary scamming techniques never seen before? /s

subway 9y ago

Moxie has made it pretty clear through the way Signal operates than Moxie's worldview is one where our feudal lords know better than mere serfs can ever hope to. I'm not at all surprised that yet again trust roots are taken out of the hands of end users.

Fnoord 9y ago
What I don't understand is why such a person resorts to a nickname, but does use a picture. The US government knows the real name of people like ioerror and moxie marlinspike. It seems pointless to consistently hide the real name to the public.
- 317070 9y ago
  If your pseudonym carries more klout, and you have even more people in your social life knowing you by the pseudonym, it kind of becomes your 'real' name. Not any different from other persona names like Marilyn Manson, or Marilyn Monroe.
- vertex-four 9y ago
  I used to use my online name enough that people were confused when they heard my legal name. Eventually, I decided to change my legal name to save the hassle of having a legal name that nobody actually knew me by, but that's easy in my country (doesn't involve courts or lawyers) and a pain in the ass in most other places.
  - trafficlight 9y ago
    Nice to meet you, Mr. Vertex Four.
Asdfbla 9y ago
Seems unnecessarily adversarial of you. I think Moxie has justified his standpoint relatively convincingly, even if you may not agree with it. And to some degree, the success of Signal, or Signal's protocol as implemented widely used services in WhatsApp, supports his approach. If cypherpunk-purists had their way, encryption would still only be a thing exclusively used by a slim minority of nerds who are capable of managing PGP and all the complications that come with its fragile nature.

golangnews 9y ago

Your argument would be stronger if you didn’t resort to epithets. Bitcoin was designed to be as decentralised as possible. It turns out this has serious downsides and it’s difficult to pursue the sort of financial revolution it aspires to without social revolution. This currency chooses different trade-offs which the creators believe will make it more popular because most people don’t need or want trustless transactions. People delegate power for finance, politics and computing not because they are stupid or serfs but because they are willing to sacrifice some autonomy for the speed, ease of use and enforceable contracts which come with a central authority.

Confiks 9y ago
If you (re)read the blog post I'm referring to, you'll find that your concerns are very much addressed. I actually chose to refer to 'feudal security' as coined by Schneier (at least in the context of computer security), because it is such a compelling and balanced approach to the exact same trade-offs you're describing.
explainplease 9y ago
> Your argument would be stronger if you didn’t resort to epithets. No, an argument is strong or weak regardless of whether you like the words used to express it.
- zaphar 9y ago
  The argument would be stronger in the sense that it would be more persuasive. Which if your goal is to convince people is a highly relevant metric of strength to use. As disappointing as it might be pure logic is rarely enough in the real world.
  - explainplease 9y ago
    You state the obvious. The point is to encourage rational thinking and discourage emotional reaction. One person at a time.