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One day you can start calculating private keys based on public keys. This is the biggest crypto puzzle: find private key of Sathoshi Bitcoin wallet with 1 mln

One day you can start calculating private keys based on public keys. This is the biggest crypto puzzle: find private key of Sathoshi Bitcoin wallet with 1 mln bitcoins. Over $50 Bln prize for one crypto puzzle. This would be AlphaGo moment of quantum computing if you could make that one attack successful even while paying huge price (e.g. years of quantum datacenter work).

unilynx 6y ago
Cashing out and actually getting $50B may be as much of a challenge as finding the private key
- umvi 6y ago
  Why, do people actively monitor that wallet for activity? I'm assuming if any BTC at all moves out of that wallet it'll cause a massive correction to BTC price as people can no longer assume that those bitcoins are off the market.
  - vbezhenar 6y ago
    I'm sure that enough geeks have all kinds of triggers to spot that kind of activity.
- Invictus0 6y ago
  Hypothetically, you could publicly announce that you'll sell the stash at the rate of 1% per year, to demonstrate faith in the continued growth of bitcoin in order to finance <humanitarian project> and reassure the market that it won't massively crash.
  - renata 6y ago
    And you could even sign the announcement with one of Satoshi's wallet keys.
gjm11 6y ago
Imagine that you find Satoshi's private key and start trying to sell his million bitcoins. Approximately one minute after you start this process, someone will figure out that either (1) bitcoins no longer securely belong to anyone or (2) Satoshi thinks selling off all his bitcoin is a good idea. Approximately two minutes after you start this process, the price of bitcoin will plummet. Sorry, you will not be taking home $50B today.
- mabbo 6y ago
  You're not thinking big enough. Anyone can sell bitcoins and make money. But if you have the power to destroy bitcoin, well then you can short the entire bitcoin market and clean up. Frankly, I would just walk into the door of a large hedge fund and sell them to the key for $5B. They'll do far better than I ever could, and $5B is more money than I can possibly use in my lifetime, while being a tiny cost of business for them.
  - m3kw9 6y ago
    Following the progress of computations, even if there is a whiff of it getting close (1year) away, Bitcoin would have suffered runs based on theory possibly becoming reality alone
- Itsdijital 6y ago
  There is a theory that the key to satishi's wallet is hidden somewhere in the beginning of the blockchain. So it might not be too wild if coins started moving
  - generalizations 6y ago
    How could it possibly still be secure, then? Also, I've never heard of that theory and it sounds interesting. Source?
    - Itsdijital 6y ago
      https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5313377.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5313377.0 I'm not sure of the details and my understanding of it is limited. But it seems there is some kind of statistical anomaly in the nonces of early blocks, and some people suspect that he purposely formed this anomaly the leave a clue or encode the private key for the wallet.
gautamcgoel 6y ago
I thought bitcoin was based off EC crypto, not RSA.
- SAI_Peregrinus 6y ago
  EC crypto is just as vulnerable to Shor's algorithm as RSA is.
jsmith99 6y ago
Assuming nothing has been spent previously from the wallet, you would have to break SHA256 before you could even find the public key you needed to factor. Bitcoin addresses are based on hashes of the public key and SHA256 appears quantum resistant.
alacombe 6y ago
ECC is totally different than RSA principles discussed here.
X6S1x6Okd1st 6y ago
IIRC public keys are only revealed on bitcoin once you authorize an out going transaction. There are large bitcoin addresses that have never revealed their corresponding public key such as https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/37XuVSEpWW4trkfmvWzegTHQt7BdktSKUs https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/37XuVSEpWW4trkfmvWzeg... As long as you never reuse an address bitcoin would continue to be resistant to quantum attacks even if you can factor private keys from public keys, you still need to invert a hash function to go from address to public key.

unilynx 6y ago

Cashing out and actually getting $50B may be as much of a challenge as finding the private key

umvi 6y ago
Why, do people actively monitor that wallet for activity? I'm assuming if any BTC at all moves out of that wallet it'll cause a massive correction to BTC price as people can no longer assume that those bitcoins are off the market.
- vbezhenar 6y ago
  I'm sure that enough geeks have all kinds of triggers to spot that kind of activity.
Invictus0 6y ago
Hypothetically, you could publicly announce that you'll sell the stash at the rate of 1% per year, to demonstrate faith in the continued growth of bitcoin in order to finance <humanitarian project> and reassure the market that it won't massively crash.
- renata 6y ago
  And you could even sign the announcement with one of Satoshi's wallet keys.

gjm11 6y ago

Imagine that you find Satoshi's private key and start trying to sell his million bitcoins. Approximately one minute after you start this process, someone will figure out that either (1) bitcoins no longer securely belong to anyone or (2) Satoshi thinks selling off all his bitcoin is a good idea. Approximately two minutes after you start this process, the price of bitcoin will plummet. Sorry, you will not be taking home $50B today.

mabbo 6y ago
You're not thinking big enough. Anyone can sell bitcoins and make money. But if you have the power to destroy bitcoin, well then you can short the entire bitcoin market and clean up. Frankly, I would just walk into the door of a large hedge fund and sell them to the key for $5B. They'll do far better than I ever could, and $5B is more money than I can possibly use in my lifetime, while being a tiny cost of business for them.
- m3kw9 6y ago
  Following the progress of computations, even if there is a whiff of it getting close (1year) away, Bitcoin would have suffered runs based on theory possibly becoming reality alone
Itsdijital 6y ago
There is a theory that the key to satishi's wallet is hidden somewhere in the beginning of the blockchain. So it might not be too wild if coins started moving
- generalizations 6y ago
  How could it possibly still be secure, then? Also, I've never heard of that theory and it sounds interesting. Source?
  - Itsdijital 6y ago
    https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5313377.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5313377.0 I'm not sure of the details and my understanding of it is limited. But it seems there is some kind of statistical anomaly in the nonces of early blocks, and some people suspect that he purposely formed this anomaly the leave a clue or encode the private key for the wallet.

gautamcgoel 6y ago

I thought bitcoin was based off EC crypto, not RSA.

SAI_Peregrinus 6y ago
EC crypto is just as vulnerable to Shor's algorithm as RSA is.

jsmith99 6y ago

Assuming nothing has been spent previously from the wallet, you would have to break SHA256 before you could even find the public key you needed to factor. Bitcoin addresses are based on hashes of the public key and SHA256 appears quantum resistant.

alacombe 6y ago

ECC is totally different than RSA principles discussed here.

X6S1x6Okd1st 6y ago

IIRC public keys are only revealed on bitcoin once you authorize an out going transaction. There are large bitcoin addresses that have never revealed their corresponding public key such as https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/37XuVSEpWW4trkfmvWzegTHQt7BdktSKUs https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/37XuVSEpWW4trkfmvWzeg... As long as you never reuse an address bitcoin would continue to be resistant to quantum attacks even if you can factor private keys from public keys, you still need to invert a hash function to go from address to public key.