Re:Blockchain Healthcare 2016 Report – Promise and Pitfalls
by grubles on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:17AM
(#12650215)
As per [0], cryptography standards such as ECRYPT II tend to say that Bitcoin's 256-bit ECDSA keys are secure until at least 2030-2040.
[0] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Quantum_computing_and_Bitcoin
Re:Blockchain Healthcare 2016 Report – Promise and Pitfalls
by bduerst on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:42PM
(#12653882)
Just because the bitcoin wiki says it, doesn't make it a good prediction. Experts also used to say that a computer couldn't beat a Go Grandmaster until 2030.
The other points are still problems of using bitcoin right now.
- You can't guarantee which block the transaction is on [1], which means all your customer encryption is asynchronous (slow).
- Your customers are assuming that you're keeping your private keys safe, which is not any different than trusting a non-bitcoin verification provider.
- The first quantum computer is going to destroy ECDSA, meaning your private keys will be reversed and every health product depending on your service will be trustless. Merkle trees can theoretically be used in a post-quantum world [2], but the method by which you're generating the root for the tree is not safe because you're relying on a network you don't control (Bitcoin).
How is this competitively good for healthcare?
[1] http://www.ibtimes.com/bitcoins-big-problem-transaction-dela...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-quantum_cryptography#Hash...