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> But you can't get everyone to agree to do that. Bitcoin is essentially a network of mutual trust, right? It is possible to get enough machines on the networ

> But you can't get everyone to agree to do that. Bitcoin is essentially a network of mutual trust, right? It is possible to get enough machines on the network to vote to void the transaction. It is even possible to set up some kind of body or bodies that investigate thefts, and make recommendations about which transactions the community should void. Of course, now we're inching towards a central bank, and so whether such a step would be "in the spirit of Bitcoin" I don't know, but it's probably a requirement if Bitcoin is to be taken seriously as a safe medium of exchange for business purposes. Of course, perhaps it doesn't want to be used as such, which is fine. > sort of like having 100 $1 bills of which two were marked by police — what is the probability that you're a criminal? The convention in the real world is that you are deprived of the stolen property you've received even if you did not know that they were stolen. This may seem undesirable, but it does incentivize ordinary people to perform some basic checks that they are not purchasing stolen goods. Allowing innocent people to keep stolen goods may seem like a fair course of action, but it also can increase the market for stolen goods, and incentivize for thievery, ultimately leading to an escalating situation.

wmf 14y ago
The convention in the real world is that you are deprived of the stolen property you've received even if you did not know that they were stolen. The problem with applying that standard to Bitcoin is that Bitcoins get mixed together, so depriving people of money that's only partially tainted is a disproportionate punishment.
- dlitz 14y ago
  Voiding transactions is a poor technical solution to a social problem. A better solution is to track down the recipients, prosecute them, and have a court order them to pay back a certain number of Bitcoins, just like you would with cash.
ef4 14y ago
> it's probably a requirement if Bitcoin is to be taken seriously as a safe medium of exchange for business purposes Bitcoin is just an alternative to cash. It doesn't aspire to be anything else. Businesses generally don't transact in large amounts of physical cash either. They use trusted institutions and contracts to limit their liability. You can of course build all that infrastructure on top of bitcoins just as easily as you can on top of cash. It's a question of reaching a sufficient amount of economic activity to make it all profitable.

wmf 14y ago

The convention in the real world is that you are deprived of the stolen property you've received even if you did not know that they were stolen. The problem with applying that standard to Bitcoin is that Bitcoins get mixed together, so depriving people of money that's only partially tainted is a disproportionate punishment.

dlitz 14y ago
Voiding transactions is a poor technical solution to a social problem. A better solution is to track down the recipients, prosecute them, and have a court order them to pay back a certain number of Bitcoins, just like you would with cash.

ef4 14y ago

> it's probably a requirement if Bitcoin is to be taken seriously as a safe medium of exchange for business purposes Bitcoin is just an alternative to cash. It doesn't aspire to be anything else. Businesses generally don't transact in large amounts of physical cash either. They use trusted institutions and contracts to limit their liability. You can of course build all that infrastructure on top of bitcoins just as easily as you can on top of cash. It's a question of reaching a sufficient amount of economic activity to make it all profitable.