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Pretty sure all hell would break loose financially so there would definitely be signs. Think how much value is locked up behind cryptography.

cj 2y ago
Presumably any organization/government smart enough to break cryptography would be smart enough not to do anything that would reveal their ability, unless they wanted their ability known.
- derekmhewitt 2y ago
  This actually happened in WW2, after fully breaking the Enigma codes the Allies had to carefully choose which intelligence to act on and not act on, sometimes with poor results for their own side. But the alternative would have been that the Germans would have to conclude their communications were compromised and change something, rendering a lot of the effort to crack enigma in the first place moot. The Turing movie mentioned in another comment is excellent and touches on this topic.
staunton 2y ago
> Think how much value is locked up behind cryptography. It's actually "so much value" that it's not possible to take much of it if you reveal that you did. People can "fork (parts of) the financial system" even more easily (per actor) than what happens with cryptocurrencies. Sure, it's a huge hassle with huge overhead but you cannot reveal the capability and also take more than that hassle is worth. I think this means that anyone capable of doing it would not reveal the ability as as a first priority, as others here have also suggested. Especially for a state actor, the trade-off is very clear.
- notfed 2y ago
  It'd be sort of a funny situation if this happened now, because a fork necessarily rolls back recent transactions. So, imagine if people are made aware of a break, and it caused a bank run (on Bitcoin for let's say). Well, tons of transactions would be reversed, including peoples' attempt to cash out. If the attack repeats the next day, the fork would happen again. It'd be utter chaos.
  - kortilla 2y ago
    There isn’t any going back until they have a version that supports different crypto (a hard fork). It’s not clear how you could possibly allow exits unless you literally ban all transactions on the chain after a certain date. At that point though, why would anyone be on the buy side of the sell to USD?
int0x29 2y ago
I addition to the incentive to hide it and not stir up any obvious evidence, anyone with enough money to throw at the problem probably doesn't want to wreck the current financial system
notfed 2y ago
True; to demonstrate that, only one word is needed: Bitcoin.

cj 2y ago

Presumably any organization/government smart enough to break cryptography would be smart enough not to do anything that would reveal their ability, unless they wanted their ability known.

derekmhewitt 2y ago
This actually happened in WW2, after fully breaking the Enigma codes the Allies had to carefully choose which intelligence to act on and not act on, sometimes with poor results for their own side. But the alternative would have been that the Germans would have to conclude their communications were compromised and change something, rendering a lot of the effort to crack enigma in the first place moot. The Turing movie mentioned in another comment is excellent and touches on this topic.

staunton 2y ago

> Think how much value is locked up behind cryptography. It's actually "so much value" that it's not possible to take much of it if you reveal that you did. People can "fork (parts of) the financial system" even more easily (per actor) than what happens with cryptocurrencies. Sure, it's a huge hassle with huge overhead but you cannot reveal the capability and also take more than that hassle is worth. I think this means that anyone capable of doing it would not reveal the ability as as a first priority, as others here have also suggested. Especially for a state actor, the trade-off is very clear.

notfed 2y ago
It'd be sort of a funny situation if this happened now, because a fork necessarily rolls back recent transactions. So, imagine if people are made aware of a break, and it caused a bank run (on Bitcoin for let's say). Well, tons of transactions would be reversed, including peoples' attempt to cash out. If the attack repeats the next day, the fork would happen again. It'd be utter chaos.
- kortilla 2y ago
  There isn’t any going back until they have a version that supports different crypto (a hard fork). It’s not clear how you could possibly allow exits unless you literally ban all transactions on the chain after a certain date. At that point though, why would anyone be on the buy side of the sell to USD?

int0x29 2y ago

I addition to the incentive to hide it and not stir up any obvious evidence, anyone with enough money to throw at the problem probably doesn't want to wreck the current financial system

notfed 2y ago

True; to demonstrate that, only one word is needed: Bitcoin.