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Are we allowed to talk about Bitcoin?

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Dick Whitman, Dec 18, 2013.

Page 2 of 47
  1. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    So MtGox, which used to be the largest bitcoin exchange but had lost market share in the last year, has been shutting down all withdrawals for a week or so now (and been remarkably slow about them before that) and have had a lot of different stories as to why.

    Today, their story is that they had a technical glitch where people could withdraw coins, change the transaction identifier in the blockchain before it became official, and then file a support ticket saying that they never got their coin. MtGox's software would check the transaction identifier, not find it, and automatically issue a "replacement" coin.

    The whole thing continues to be a hilarious internet tulip bulb.
     
    RickStain, Feb 10, 2014
    #13
  2. LongTimeListener

    LongTimeListener Well-Known Member

    MtGox is gone from the Internet. Adding to the hilarity, customers held real cash and Bitcoin in their accounts, and those customers' losses are estimated at $350 million.

    http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn25112-bitcoin-exchange-crash-may-have-cost-users-350m.html#.UwzeYPldVrV
     
    LongTimeListener, Feb 25, 2014
    #14
  3. Big Circus

    Big Circus Well-Known Member

    It's almost as if it's a bad idea to run a currency exchange through a Magic: the Gathering website.
     
    Big Circus, Feb 25, 2014
    #15
    dixiehack likes this.
  4. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    I have no idea if any of this is true. ... So it is just my mind wandering.

    But according to the Mt. Gox "crisis plan" that has been circulating (and it might be fake), more than 744,000 bitcoins were missing -- which would mean that 6 percent of all the bitcoins created were missing from Mt. Gox.

    Logically, if you wanted to profit from stealing bitcoins, you wouldn't bring down the largest exchange website, even if you discovered a security flaw you could exploit. Doing so would crash the price of the bitcoins you had stolen -- which is what has happened.

    Which leaves decent odds that it was the work of hackers. But rather than hacking it just to hack it, my immediate thought was a sovereign government. We know the U.S., China, Russia, etc. all have pretty developed hacking capabilities. And it's in all of their interests to shatter the faith in anonymous digital "currencies" that could compete with their sovereign currencies. Rather than just trying to outlaw it -- something that would have been difficult to enforce anyhow -- why not attack it this way, exposing what was supposed to be its strength as a weakness?

    It really wouldn't surprise me, although we're not likely to ever know.
     
    The Big Ragu, Feb 25, 2014
    #16
  5. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    If MtGox's story is true, they didn't get it all stolen overnight. The thiefs worked for years and stretched it out as long as possible.

    And more likely, MtGox has just been stealing everyone's actual money and bitcoins and finally couldn't maintain the fiction anymore.
     
    RickStain, Feb 25, 2014
    #17
  6. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    Two more online bitcoin wallets/banks/exchanges/whatever were "hacked" today and lost significant "money."
     
    RickStain, Mar 4, 2014
    #18
  7. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    This morning, I saw something about a site called Flexcoin saying it was robbed of about $620,000 worth. What was the second one?

    We were laughing earlier today. Apparently Flexcoin had something in a FAQ on its site that said, "Flexcoin solves nearly every problem that exists with the Bitcoin currency today."
     
    The Big Ragu, Mar 4, 2014
    #19
  8. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zigmt/another_exchange_locked_down_poloniex_aware_that/

    The explanation of how this was coded is some serious amateur hour
     
    RickStain, Mar 4, 2014
    #20
  9. Bob Cook

    Bob Cook Active Member

    "Why do you rob virtual banks?"

    "Because that's where the easily hackable money is."
     
    Bob Cook, Mar 4, 2014
    #21
  10. Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!

    Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!! Well-Known Member

    Evil ... Thy name is Orville Redenbacher!!, Mar 5, 2014
    #22
  11. LongTimeListener

    LongTimeListener Well-Known Member

    Is she real dead or only Bitcoin dead?
     
    LongTimeListener, Mar 5, 2014
    #23
  12. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    Seen on the webs:

    "How many Bitcoin enthusiasts does it take to change a light bulb? ATTENTION, WE HAVE BEEN HACKED, THERE ARE NO LIGHTBULBS."
     
    RickStain, Mar 5, 2014
    #24
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