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I think GNU Taler[1] solves the untracabilty problem in a way that most people should be happy with. Consumers have all of their transactions private from every

by cyphar 9y ago

I think GNU Taler[1] solves the untracabilty problem in a way that most people should be happy with. Consumers have all of their transactions private from everyone (the seller cannot tell how much money they have, what other transactions they've made, or where the money comes from; a government cannot tell what transactions a person has made). But seller transactions can be audited for tax reasons, to avoid tax fraud. And best of all, it's not yet another cryptocurrency. It's a payment system that works over any currency (traditional VISA, or crypto-currencies). Of course, this means that Taler "tokens" cannot be used as a store of value, other than as a proxy for the underlying store of value. So you would only hold Taler tokens like you would cash in your wallet. They even have really nice easy integrations into browsers and backend processing. (I don't work on GNU Taler, I've just been saddened that such an interesting project has gotten so little press outside of GNU circles.) [1]: https://taler.net/ https://taler.net/

Ericson2314 9y ago
Yeah this is such a simple improvement over the current payment cartel, dodging the scaling issues and taxation issues through its conservatism. I wish we could all switch to this and then resume comparing altcoins.
EthanHeilman 9y ago
Is GNU Taler an anonymous ecash mint?
- cyphar 9y ago
  Their website[1] gives more detailed information on how it works than I can here. Effectively, yes, but the system explicitly supports having different mints that operate over different currencies. And while what consumers (people sending money) spend their money on is completely anonymous and cannot be correlated, merchants (people receiving money) can still have their income audited and taxed accordingly. The system was designed by a university research team in Europe and became a GNU project a year or two ago. [1]: https://taler.net/en/architecture.html https://taler.net/en/architecture.html
  - EthanHeilman 9y ago
    The FAQ says blind signatures which would definitely confirm it as an eCash mint. Wish they had a sentence on the website that said "we implement the CHL eCash scheme over the blah curve" for the technical folks. >And while what consumers (people sending money) spend their money on is completely anonymous and cannot be correlated, merchants (people receiving money) can still have their income audited and taxed accordingly. Can't be linked but they can be correlated since you have a weak timing channel from issuance of tokens to redemption.
CryptoPunk 9y ago
GNU Taler wants to give the government a backdoor. That's privacy in the same way the Clipper chip in the 1990s was privacy.
- cyphar 9y ago
  This is a misunderstanding of GNU Taler, unless you're using a completely new definition of the word "backdoor". Customer transactions are completely anonymous -- that's the anonymity guarantee provided by GNU Taler. Mints are auditable (the amount of coins they've given out and received, and that they haven't given money to people who didn't have the associated coins). And thus how much money a particular merchant has traded to the mint for real currency can be figured out. There is no reasonable analogy between this (which has a given set of privacy guarantees, but not others) and the clipper chip (which was an attempt to remove all privacy guarantees from all cryptography). The only way you can consider this to be a backdoor is if you think that allowing a government to know how much money a business has made (something that you are legally required to declare for tax purposes) is a bad thing. This seems like an immature view to me -- taxes are very important for a country to continue functioning.
  - CryptoPunk 9y ago
    According to the website, GNU Taler gives governments an exclusive view of all of a merchant's private transactions: https://taler.net/en/governments.html https://taler.net/en/governments.html "With Taler, the receiver of any form of payment is easily identified by the government, and the merchant can be compelled to provide the contract that was accepted by the customer. Governments can use this data to tax businesses and individuals based on their income, making tax evasion and black markets less viable. Thus, despite offering anonymity for citizens spending digital cash to buy goods and services, Taler also ensures that the state can observe incoming funds. This can be used to ensure businesses engage only in legal activities, and do not evade income tax, sales tax or value-added tax." It's not a backdoor in exactly the same way the Clipper chip was, but it's a backdoor nonetheless. The fact that the government is the gatekeeper in GNU Taler means that it would have been unable to empower people to get around the financial blockade against Wikileaks the way cryptocurrency did. That's a practical consequence of giving up privacy and decentralization. >>This seems like an immature view to me -- taxes are very important for a country to continue functioning. It's not immature to point out that this gives the government a backdoor to monitor private transactions. You think this reduction in privacy is necessary to levy sales/income taxes. That's a value judgment, not a refutation of the fact that this is a backdoor. Something doesn't stop being a [negatively associated noun] because you think its effect is positive. Speaking the truth instead of sugar coating it for ideological reasons is not immature.

by cyphar 9y ago

Ericson2314 9y ago

Yeah this is such a simple improvement over the current payment cartel, dodging the scaling issues and taxation issues through its conservatism. I wish we could all switch to this and then resume comparing altcoins.

EthanHeilman 9y ago

Is GNU Taler an anonymous ecash mint?

cyphar 9y ago
Their website[1] gives more detailed information on how it works than I can here. Effectively, yes, but the system explicitly supports having different mints that operate over different currencies. And while what consumers (people sending money) spend their money on is completely anonymous and cannot be correlated, merchants (people receiving money) can still have their income audited and taxed accordingly. The system was designed by a university research team in Europe and became a GNU project a year or two ago. [1]: https://taler.net/en/architecture.html https://taler.net/en/architecture.html
- EthanHeilman 9y ago
  The FAQ says blind signatures which would definitely confirm it as an eCash mint. Wish they had a sentence on the website that said "we implement the CHL eCash scheme over the blah curve" for the technical folks. >And while what consumers (people sending money) spend their money on is completely anonymous and cannot be correlated, merchants (people receiving money) can still have their income audited and taxed accordingly. Can't be linked but they can be correlated since you have a weak timing channel from issuance of tokens to redemption.

CryptoPunk 9y ago

GNU Taler wants to give the government a backdoor. That's privacy in the same way the Clipper chip in the 1990s was privacy.

cyphar 9y ago
This is a misunderstanding of GNU Taler, unless you're using a completely new definition of the word "backdoor". Customer transactions are completely anonymous -- that's the anonymity guarantee provided by GNU Taler. Mints are auditable (the amount of coins they've given out and received, and that they haven't given money to people who didn't have the associated coins). And thus how much money a particular merchant has traded to the mint for real currency can be figured out. There is no reasonable analogy between this (which has a given set of privacy guarantees, but not others) and the clipper chip (which was an attempt to remove all privacy guarantees from all cryptography). The only way you can consider this to be a backdoor is if you think that allowing a government to know how much money a business has made (something that you are legally required to declare for tax purposes) is a bad thing. This seems like an immature view to me -- taxes are very important for a country to continue functioning.
- CryptoPunk 9y ago
  According to the website, GNU Taler gives governments an exclusive view of all of a merchant's private transactions: https://taler.net/en/governments.html https://taler.net/en/governments.html "With Taler, the receiver of any form of payment is easily identified by the government, and the merchant can be compelled to provide the contract that was accepted by the customer. Governments can use this data to tax businesses and individuals based on their income, making tax evasion and black markets less viable. Thus, despite offering anonymity for citizens spending digital cash to buy goods and services, Taler also ensures that the state can observe incoming funds. This can be used to ensure businesses engage only in legal activities, and do not evade income tax, sales tax or value-added tax." It's not a backdoor in exactly the same way the Clipper chip was, but it's a backdoor nonetheless. The fact that the government is the gatekeeper in GNU Taler means that it would have been unable to empower people to get around the financial blockade against Wikileaks the way cryptocurrency did. That's a practical consequence of giving up privacy and decentralization. >>This seems like an immature view to me -- taxes are very important for a country to continue functioning. It's not immature to point out that this gives the government a backdoor to monitor private transactions. You think this reduction in privacy is necessary to levy sales/income taxes. That's a value judgment, not a refutation of the fact that this is a backdoor. Something doesn't stop being a [negatively associated noun] because you think its effect is positive. Speaking the truth instead of sugar coating it for ideological reasons is not immature.