Bitcoin - Decentralized Digital P2P Cryptocurrency

Another Bitcoin provider was hacked recently.

RT.com Bitcoinia Hacked

Upwards of $90,000 worth of Bitcoins have been stolen from an exchange service website this week, marking the second time in nearly two months that the cyber-currency has been compromised due to a security breach.

The administrators of Bitcoinica, a website that allows Bitcoin holders to trade in their e-currency for a value in US dollars, say that an attacker infiltrated their servers on May 11 and depleted the company’s online wallet of 18,547 virtual currency coins — worth roughly $87,000 USD. As a result, the website has suspended their transaction service while they open up an investigation to try to identify who broke into their servers and how the breach was accomplished.

There will need to be more advances made in security before I do many more dealings in Bitcoins.

Apparently some users' Bitcoin wallets were also depleted in another separate attack recently.

Although Bitcoins have become increasingly popular because they can be used to purchase goods and services when other currency is not feasible, some skeptics have condemned the system for poor security practices. Only ten weeks before the latest breach, hackers infiltrated the e-wallets of Bitcoin customers hosted on cloud-hosting provider Linode and managed to apprehend over 46,703 BTC (almost $228,845 USD worth).

Think twice before purchasing Bitcoins, especially if you don't keep them in multiple wallets, on multiple systems, under more encryption, and outside of the cloud.

Also, we're looking at a little under 9million BTC in circulation as of right now.

blockchain.info...

Originally posted by sligtlyskeptical
If I understnd correctly, the amount of bitcoins outstanding remains the same and their value is decreased in order to expand the currency. So as bitcoins get accepted they are worth less and less. Reminds me of another currency that we already use.

The problem with our current currency system is that currency can only be created by attaching debt. Wealth is derived from currency and other tangible assets one holds. Tangible asset values increase by inflation only, so no real wealth is gained. A bar of gold is still a bar of gold. A house is still a house, etc. This leaves currency as the only means to increase real wealth. Since all new currency is also debt, then amount of wealth derived from currency isssuance can only be negative in the sum, due to the attached interest. Thus we all our forced to fight over a smaller and smaller pot of real currency. Mathematically what is happening, has to happen.

We need to recognize that this is the case and change how we issue our currency. If they want to call it bitcoins instead of dollars, that is ok with me. We need to issue our currency into circulation, rather than borrow it. We need to ensure that the amount of debt free currency increases as our production and the size of our economy grows. We haven't seen any increase in real money outstanding since the fed reserve took over in 1913. They like to hoot and holler about the money printing machine, but that machine only prints negative wealth, so everyone is being deluded. Same goes for the fractional reserve banking system.

Allow our government to issue currency as neccesary without debt attached. Allow banks to only lend money they have on deposit. Fix these two things and you don't have to fix much else.

There are only 21 million bitcoins that will ever be created. Right now bitcoins are produced at a pretty high inflation rate to get the currency out there. 50 every 10 minutes. At the end of this year it will be cut in half and 4 years from now, cut in half again. Bitcoins are traded on the open market and people decide how much it is worth. Even with all this inflation.. the value has remained amazingly stable for the past several months. (around 5 dollars). Comparing bitcoins to the federal reserve printing dollars is not a very good comparison.

reply to post by Anonymous404


I've never used this, but the kid who created it is pretty amazing. Do you trade on the GLBSE?

reply to post by mayabong


No, I haven't...but I love the concept. I'm going to have to investigate it further.

Originally posted by Anonymous404
reply to post by mayabong

 

No, I haven't...but I love the concept. I'm going to have to investigate it further.

Been trading on it for a while. Gonna be a big player in the bitcoin world. Each ticker, usually has an associated thread on the bitcoin forums so you can learn about what each company does. I just bought some bonds of Gigamining, first time buying bonds, still figuring out how they work really. lol

reply to post by mayabong


Since you state the bitcoin has stayed constant in terms of dollars, that would mean they have also lost the same amount of purchasing power as the dollar. Funny how you say you can't compare the two and then you do

Originally posted by sligtlyskeptical
reply to post by mayabong

 

Since you state the bitcoin has stayed constant in terms of dollars, that would mean they have also lost the same amount of purchasing power as the dollar. Funny how you say you can't compare the two and then you do

I was talking about the fact that the fed can create more money whenever it wants. Bitcoin is hardcoded to be finite and noone can decide just to print more of them. Right now yes its highly inflationary but wont be years down the road. .

reply to post by sligtlyskeptical


They would be the same if the Fed, when the dollar left the gold standard, said "We're only going to put this much money in circulation for the rest of time."

I hate getting on late on bitcoin mining, bt I'm assuming its to late to mine for bitcoins, you'd need a mining specific rig or a cluster of comps to get anything out of it.

Originally posted by Guard5002
I hate getting on late on bitcoin mining, bt I'm assuming its to late to mine for bitcoins, you'd need a mining specific rig or a cluster of comps to get anything out of it.

Yeah at first the CPU mining was easy. The the GPU's took over.. now the GPU's are going to the stone age after FPGA boards came out (alot less power usage). Now FPGA will be going the way of the dinosaur when ASIC (I think thats it) come out in a few months.

Instead of mining yourself, you can invest in mining companies on the GLBSE and they do all the work for you and pay you dividends weekly from their earnings. Good deal.

anyone else feeling mighty happy currently? i got on the bitcoin train early, mainly cause of my conspiracy leanings and wanting access to the darkweb where its used as the primary means to get anywhere decent.

mined for a few years, did good on the GPU boom and traded brought/sold alot from friends who thought it was a waste and didn't want to bother anymore. currently sitting on 2k bitcoins and contemplating the cash-out or long-haul game. either way when it gets over $100 i think i'll take out some and pay off the rest of my house lol.

if this plays out like some are thinking i could be a multi-millionare in a few years time who knows



might even buy a few of these badboys

products.butterflylabs.com...

I'm still confused by it all.

I got in early too, and had it going for a while, but it seemed to take forever to do anything and the little bits I did supposedly earn, never seemed to arrive. Obviously, after I gave up on it, I didn't think to back anything up.

So I just reinstalled multibit - or installed, as opposed to the original client - and this seems quick, fast, succinct.. but I still don't get it.

Sadly it doesn't base itself on my hardware or personal ID, which I had hoped thereby allowing it to know who I was, but that doesn't seem how it generates an id.

So I reinstalled the original client. Argh there goes my system ssd again, and a different user ID to boot, so I thought screw it, and just got rid of it again.

Multibit is still here, and I've been on a generic 'enter your id, watch these videos and get peanuts' website, which has given me a pending amount that is only to serve one purpose. Verify that I'll get anything.

So far, 45 mins later nothing. The website says it can take a few hours but up to 24. So I'm waiting.

but why? What is the difference between the vlient that downloads a ton, takes hours to synch, and then simply seems to go idle. And multibit, which seems to install and run sync, then .. seems to go idle.

I am so lost. I certainly am not going to put a lot of faith in my ability to grasp the thing at this point, but I know ChaoticOrder is big on it, and so I'm hoping they keep tabs on this thread.

I spend a lot of time doing online surveys and stuff which pay pretty much nothing.. Id rather build up an amount in bitcoins that I treat the same.. a nothing until it's something.

Probably way too late for the boat now anyway, given the recent upsurge in popularity.

Why do I always do that. I was doing things on computers long before the net, that people now have turned into million dollar companies.. I sit on my bum and wonder why that swine who just comes along, benefits from something, which in my mind, had no worth... I always miss out. lol

*shakes fist at the world!!!*

so late as it may be, I may as well put some of my spare time to use if these things do indeed pay the 0.00000001 or whatever.. one day I might have a full coin.

But not if I cant work out the damned software. Which, is what threw me for a six in the first place.

So.. multibit. any one know if this is a good client, or if not, how do I port the id/wallet whatever, to a different client so that the test amounts I'm waiting for doesn't disappear into the ether.

I dont want to spend more time making tests that never eventuate only to find out that the client has a base of users that claim it sucks compared to others... google aint no help.

There is something very odd about all of this.

I think somebody is actually running something very dangerous behind the idea that it is a new form of currency. I think somebody has figured out a way to hi-jack a huge amount of computing power by taking over a big 7GB block of memory on your computer. The ''wallet'' is a giant chunk of memory. I believe it is being used in a giant crypto attack.

The entire cyber-jacking has hidden itself behind the idea that there is money to be made in some sort of new digital currency. There are people that love the idea for various reasons. There are fanatics bringing mega-computing power online to mine for bitcoins. There are the ultimate scammers that are cashing in on the trading of bitcoins. People bought bitcoins at 10 cents and sold them for $140. Some people made millions. A whole ton of people are duped.

This anonymous bitcoin fiend has created a huge distributed computing device wrapped around the world working to crack some encryption keys.... and for what purpose? For all we know, our greatest enemy is working to crack the encryption on our military secrets by utilizing an enormous distributed computer device mechanism. There are even people rushing to bring more computing power online... and for what? To make money? Come on. This stinks to high heaven. If you want to start a new money system have a world wide lottery to distribute 21 million bitcoins to all those who would like to participate. But no. Nope. There is something like a penny stock scheme occurring in one arena, while a covert brute force attack on an unknown encryption scheme is occurring in another arena. The idea of MONEY makes people rush in like fools.

I believe this is a very bad scene. There is somebody behind it all utilizing all the participants' computers as part of something very bad.

reply to post by XXX777


As of LATE....I have been trying to get my head around the Bitcoin Boom or boomdoggle. I find your view quite interesting, especially now that Bitcoin has slumped and the DOW is raging.

OK. I admit I don't fully understand this bitcoin crap. But... What happens when someone wants to buy (or sell) something with a value greater than 21M bitcoin? Or the total value of all bitcoin transactions at a set point in time exceed that 21M bitcoin max? Seems like a problem. Sure, depending on the "value" of a bitcoin, 21mil could be a lot of "value," but if this system became what it seems you guys want, you're gonna get to that point sooner or later. Then what?