4 ms·

I think this is the first time I've understood zero-knowledge communication.

by natly 4y ago

go_to_moon 4y ago
This isn't zero knowledge, like, at all "The essence of zero-knowledge proofs is that it is trivial to prove that one possesses knowledge of certain information by simply revealing it; the challenge is to prove such possession without revealing the information itself or any additional information."
- lvass 4y ago
  "In cloud computing, the term zero-knowledge (or occasionally no-knowledge or zero access) refers to software services that store, transfer or manipulate data such that it is only accessible to its owner, not to the service provider."
  - drdaeman 4y ago
    > In cloud computing Your quote heavily misspells "bullshit marketing" ;) For marketing reasons, people try give things fancy names, even if those names are misused and are completely wrong. This is exactly what happened with all those "zero-knowledge encrypted cloud storages" and so on.
    - agucova 4y ago
      This seems to imply terms can only have and only one “right” definition, which is not how languages work, at all. Clearly there are two big clusters of meaning for “zero-knowledge” and they seem distinct enough to not overlap. Seems fine to me.
      - drdaeman 4y ago
        Well, you're right. My problem is that they started doing this my using "zero knowledge" as a term from cryptography. The trend had started in early 2010s or so, as cryptocurrencies and all things crypto became popular, people realized they could use that vibe for profit. So cloud storage providers in particular had realized "zero knowledge" sounds cool and fancy and started using it in their marketing despite stealthily assigning it entirely different meaning from where they took it from (well, some had their cryptographic designs all backwards recognizably even to my uneducated brain - false promises when most customers don't have sufficient knowledge and awareness, business as usual). They were critiqued for it, and they just shrugged it off because who gives a fuck about some angry nerds insisting on some correct word usage. And so this shit caught on, and yes, now we have two meanings. I suppose I got to let it go, but I feel upset about the outcome.
drdaeman 4y ago
As far as I understand it (and I'm not a cryptographer!), it is not zero knowledge. Zero knowledge means you can prove you know something without disclosing any additional information about it, at all - that's why it's called "zero". And here, a hash of crush name is exposed, so it's not. Check this out for a much better explanation: https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/70877/is-a-hash-a-zero-knowledge-proof https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/70877/is-a-hash-a...
- lvass 4y ago
  >Zero knowledge means you can prove you know something without disclosing any additional information, at all This is physically impossible and definitely not what ZK means.
  - drdaeman 4y ago
    I could be wrong, yes. But why impossible? Take this example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof#Discrete_log_of_a_given_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof#Discrete_... - all parties exchange are essentially random numbers (which doesn't count as "additional information"), yet they establish the fact that Peggy knows x. There's that footnote about how r must be truly random, of course, but as long as everything's done right there is no additional information there whatsoever, only random noise. Side note: one thing I certainly don't understand are NI-ZK - while I think I have some rough understanding of how interactive ZK proofs work - well, I mean, I've read Quisquater et al.'s "How to explain zero-knowledge protocols to your children" - but I'm pretty clueless how they manage to make such things non-interactive.
    - lvass 4y ago
      Any information exchange must go through a medium and it's not possible to create one with zero metadata.
      - drdaeman 4y ago
        Oh, I think I see your point now. But I think it's a weird argument, to be honest. I suppose the fact that it's Peggy and Victor who are running that protocol is simply irrelevant. They're talking about that value of x after all, and nothing related to that topic is revealed beyond the proof of the fact that Peggy knows it. If she'd appear in person, wherever she wears a red shirt or a white one would be might be considered "information" but it would be completely out of scope.

I think this is the first time I've understood zero-knowledge communication.

by natly 4y ago

I think this is the first time I've understood zero-knowledge communication.

This isn't zero knowledge, like, at all "The essence of zero-knowledge proofs is that it is trivial to prove that one possesses knowledge of certain information by simply revealing it; the challenge is to prove such possession without revealing the information itself or any additional information."

lvass 4y ago
"In cloud computing, the term zero-knowledge (or occasionally no-knowledge or zero access) refers to software services that store, transfer or manipulate data such that it is only accessible to its owner, not to the service provider."
- drdaeman 4y ago
  > In cloud computing Your quote heavily misspells "bullshit marketing" ;) For marketing reasons, people try give things fancy names, even if those names are misused and are completely wrong. This is exactly what happened with all those "zero-knowledge encrypted cloud storages" and so on.
  - agucova 4y ago
    This seems to imply terms can only have and only one “right” definition, which is not how languages work, at all. Clearly there are two big clusters of meaning for “zero-knowledge” and they seem distinct enough to not overlap. Seems fine to me.
    - drdaeman 4y ago
      Well, you're right. My problem is that they started doing this my using "zero knowledge" as a term from cryptography. The trend had started in early 2010s or so, as cryptocurrencies and all things crypto became popular, people realized they could use that vibe for profit. So cloud storage providers in particular had realized "zero knowledge" sounds cool and fancy and started using it in their marketing despite stealthily assigning it entirely different meaning from where they took it from (well, some had their cryptographic designs all backwards recognizably even to my uneducated brain - false promises when most customers don't have sufficient knowledge and awareness, business as usual). They were critiqued for it, and they just shrugged it off because who gives a fuck about some angry nerds insisting on some correct word usage. And so this shit caught on, and yes, now we have two meanings. I suppose I got to let it go, but I feel upset about the outcome.

drdaeman 4y ago

As far as I understand it (and I'm not a cryptographer!), it is not zero knowledge. Zero knowledge means you can prove you know something without disclosing any additional information about it, at all - that's why it's called "zero". And here, a hash of crush name is exposed, so it's not. Check this out for a much better explanation: https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/70877/is-a-hash-a-zero-knowledge-proof https://crypto.stackexchange.com/questions/70877/is-a-hash-a...

lvass 4y ago
>Zero knowledge means you can prove you know something without disclosing any additional information, at all This is physically impossible and definitely not what ZK means.
- drdaeman 4y ago
  I could be wrong, yes. But why impossible? Take this example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof#Discrete_log_of_a_given_value https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof#Discrete_... - all parties exchange are essentially random numbers (which doesn't count as "additional information"), yet they establish the fact that Peggy knows x. There's that footnote about how r must be truly random, of course, but as long as everything's done right there is no additional information there whatsoever, only random noise. Side note: one thing I certainly don't understand are NI-ZK - while I think I have some rough understanding of how interactive ZK proofs work - well, I mean, I've read Quisquater et al.'s "How to explain zero-knowledge protocols to your children" - but I'm pretty clueless how they manage to make such things non-interactive.
  - lvass 4y ago
    Any information exchange must go through a medium and it's not possible to create one with zero metadata.
    - drdaeman 4y ago
      Oh, I think I see your point now. But I think it's a weird argument, to be honest. I suppose the fact that it's Peggy and Victor who are running that protocol is simply irrelevant. They're talking about that value of x after all, and nothing related to that topic is revealed beyond the proof of the fact that Peggy knows it. If she'd appear in person, wherever she wears a red shirt or a white one would be might be considered "information" but it would be completely out of scope.