Re:Time-Lock Encryption (2011)
by vog on Saturday October 18, 2014 @04:47PM
(#8476249)
> By more efficient, I'm talking about being able to force all clients to not work 100% of the time by way of the timelock, not about hashing 2x or 3x as fast.
You can't expect an attacker to play within your rules. There's nothing that prevents an attacker to put all their CPU power against the network.
> Nor can I; however that was the subject of the original article that we're all commenting on, it discusses possible solutions to this (none unfortunately are up to scratch). If such a timelock could exist, then you could reduce the CPU load of bitcoin down to minimal levels without affecting the currency.
If such a timelock could exist, you wouldn't need Bitcoin at all. You could create an entirely new type of network that doesn't need any CPU load at all.
But as of now, the only secure timestamping that doesn't rely on trusting some central authority ... well, that's the proof-of-work concept of Bitcoin. And it works by replacing "physical items" by CPU power (or more exacty, by using energy rather than matter). If you find a third way, it would be great, but it would still have to depend on some physical resource that is limited (and thus being "wasted" for the network's purpose).
You can't expect an attacker to play within your rules. There's nothing that prevents an attacker to put all their CPU power against the network.
> Nor can I; however that was the subject of the original article that we're all commenting on, it discusses possible solutions to this (none unfortunately are up to scratch). If such a timelock could exist, then you could reduce the CPU load of bitcoin down to minimal levels without affecting the currency.
If such a timelock could exist, you wouldn't need Bitcoin at all. You could create an entirely new type of network that doesn't need any CPU load at all.
But as of now, the only secure timestamping that doesn't rely on trusting some central authority ... well, that's the proof-of-work concept of Bitcoin. And it works by replacing "physical items" by CPU power (or more exacty, by using energy rather than matter). If you find a third way, it would be great, but it would still have to depend on some physical resource that is limited (and thus being "wasted" for the network's purpose).