Bitcoins experience

[gunrock]

How would you redesign bitcoin to be more secure? In what way is it insecure?


Is Bitfloor getting hacked somehow worse than Craig getting ripped off by HSBC?

Firstly, I get your point. Bitcoins are no more insecure on a technical level, than having a bank account hacked or debit card cloned and having funds removed.


However, on a non-technical level, banks have business processes in place that offer cover the theft in those situations (provided they can't evade doing so by claiming it was your fault - accusing you of insecure practices, etc.) and rarely (in my experience with Barclays and Halfax banks where I've had all my money stolen in one case and my wallet being pickpocketed on holiday) do they fail to refund your money. To my knowledge HSBC rarely steal from customers (though I believe you if it's happened to you - we all know banks can be greedy, officious, bastards).


With bitcoins, if someone hacks your machine and copies your wallet, then brute forces it with a compute farm. Your cash is gone, forever.

 

[Timstertoo]

How would you redesign bitcoin to be more secure? In what way is it insecure?


Is Bitfloor getting hacked somehow worse than Craig getting ripped off by HSBC?

Firstly, I get your point. Bitcoins are no more insecure on a technical level, than having a bank account hacked or debit card cloned and having funds removed.


However, on a non-technical level, banks have business processes in place that offer cover the theft in those situations (provided they can't evade doing so by claiming it was your fault - accusing you of insecure practices, etc.) and rarely (in my experience with Barclays and Halfax banks where I've had all my money stolen in one case and my wallet being pickpocketed on holiday) do they fail to refund your money. To my knowledge HSBC rarely steal from customers (though I believe you if it's happened to you - we all know banks can be greedy, officious, bastards).


With bitcoins, if someone hacks your machine and copies your wallet, then brute forces it with a compute farm. Your cash is gone, forever.

No one is forcing you to keep your BitCoins online. You can also put them on a USB stick, copy that stick 3 times and put it in three seperate locations so you can also deal with the chance of a fire etc. For instance in your safe at home, or your matrass if you don't have a safe.

 

[gunrock]

No one is forcing you to keep your BitCoins online. You can also put them on a USB stick, copy that stick 3 times and put it in three seperate locations so you can also deal with the chance of a fire etc. For instance in your safe at home, or your matrass if you don't have a safe.

yes, but at some point you need to plug it in to a computer to spend or bank your bitcoins, and if your computer is compromised (and the guy who lost 250k a few months back didn't know his machine had) then you may get screwed. Besides,what you suggest is little different from sticking your cash in the mattress - a fire risk to your cash.


I'm not saying it's a definite, but a shop that sells niche and expensive product might be a target and ED has worked long and hard enough for his cash (and still has a way to go to be free of debt and investors to repay) that it'd be silly to risk it, IMHO.

 

[WizardStan]

Well, it's possible to do that, but if you find out that the thief is spending the stolen money in Russia, what are you going to do? Call the cops?

Also it's not recognised as money by states. So you're going to call the cops to say that someone stole your virtual internet tokens you use to buy illegal drugs from the dark web without paying any taxes over it. (ok, bit over the top, but you catch my drift :rolleyes: )

Considering that people have been tried and convicted of theft for stealing virtual items in WoW with no actual monetary value, I would say yes, they should care about the quarter million dollars worth of virtual tokens that have a direct currency conversion rate.


At any rate, it's not like it hasn't been possible to get bitcoin insurance for quite some time now. If anyone has concerns they can take out a policy to protect themselves against theft, same as you'd have at a bank.

 

[Timstertoo]

No one is forcing you to keep your BitCoins online. You can also put them on a USB stick, copy that stick 3 times and put it in three seperate locations so you can also deal with the chance of a fire etc. For instance in your safe at home, or your matrass if you don't have a safe.

yes, but at some point you need to plug it in to a computer to spend or bank your bitcoins, and if your computer is compromised (and the guy who lost 250k a few months back didn't know his machine had) then you may get screwed. Besides,what you suggest is little different from sticking your cash in the mattress - a fire risk to your cash.


I'm not saying it's a definite, but a shop that sells niche and expensive product might be a target and ED has worked long and hard enough for his cash (and still has a way to go to be free of debt and investors to repay) that it'd be silly to risk it, IMHO.

Well, it's possible to do that, but if you find out that the thief is spending the stolen money in Russia, what are you going to do? Call the cops?

Also it's not recognised as money by states. So you're going to call the cops to say that someone stole your virtual internet tokens you use to buy illegal drugs from the dark web without paying any taxes over it. (ok, bit over the top, but you catch my drift )

Considering that people have been tried and convicted of theft for stealing virtual items in WoW with no actual monetary value, I would say yes, they should care about the quarter million dollars worth of virtual tokens that have a direct currency conversion rate.


At any rate, it's not like it hasn't been possible to get bitcoin insurance for quite some time now. If anyone has concerns they can take out a policy to protect themselves against theft, same as you'd have at a bank.

Bit-pay.com will send you your money daily to your bank account. I've been playing with the idea of accepting them in my bar as a bit of a gimmick.

 

[skeezix]

Don't do bitcons yet; you've got enough worry


Bitcoins are still new, and have a lot of issues.. as everyone noted, like what, 5 exchanges been hacked int he last year?


These exchanges don't put enough brains into security (really, they're just sites run by a few people, not security experts.. ) and they're running essentially like banks/exchanges.. but not treated like one.


Let someone else bleed on the leading edge.


jeff

 

[neko]

Don't do bitcons yet; you've got enough worry


Bitcoins are still new, and have a lot of issues.. as everyone noted, like what, 5 exchanges been hacked int he last year?

You can use bit-pay or fastcash4bitcoins and have the money transferred to your bank account the next day, and not leave funds in the hands of a third party.


If not bitcoins, then ED needs to offer a payment method that does not involve one of the following scenarios:


1. My credit card gets declined, and I have to try to explain to my bank that the $700+ charge from Germany was not fraudulent.


2. I go to the bank, wait in line, pay them $35 for an international wire transfer, and they insist that I sign paperwork swearing that they're not responsible if I send money to a Nigerian scammer.


3. I sign up for a Paypal account, send ED money, and hope that Paypal doesn't consider a large payment from a new account suspicious and put a hold on the transaction.


4. I ask someone with an existing Paypal account to send money to ED, and hope that this payment gets associated with my order.


Compared to the above, bitcoins seems like a really good idea. But maybe you have a better suggestion?

 

[skeezix]

PErhaps naive on my part, but it woudl seem most of the worlds high tech stores work in terms of credit card, and a few will work with paypal, cheques/money orders, and wire transfers. That about covers 99% of people... pretty good if you ask me. As somerone who ran a few stores, its one of those things.. I started out with the naive best intentions are served everyone and handled 200 support emails a day or more, just to be nice. But in the end, you can 'over serve', you can do too much for those few people. I know, its awful but.. fter years of suffering I'd say.. the number of potential customers using Bitcoins _right now_ is low, and the risk and amount of work to support them is probably not worth it, unless you have lots of free time and really want to go the extra mile.


*shrug* EDs a superhero, we know, but still.. is it _Really_ worth it?


BCS might take off, but I'd leave it for someone else to get cut on (as has been shown to have been wise, in the last couple of years.)


How many BCS _success_ stories are there relative to ouchy stories?


I'm not against BCS in general (and hey, Canada is making their own version of them right now, along with other countries), but we're not there _yet_ imho.


jeff


i) If you make a CC payment and it is declined (your bank refused to honor it, despite valid credit limit), then thats fine.. means your bank is protedcting you? ITs not like they're on your rear beating you up.. they just assuemd a small random company in another country was ripping you off. Thats _good_. You're probably supposed to call the CC/bank in advance to pre-authorize the transaction, or let them know your global shopping policies. Theyr'e grateful for that. I dunno about you, but I've shipped thousands and thousands of units around the world, and never had a problem with CC's payments


ii) they don't "insistr yo...."; you just sign saying you treat it like cash; its your problem. Signign is procedure.. tis not some extra step, you overdramatize it.


iii) if your account is brand new, perhaps theyu're right to be suspicious; but if you put your money in there, and send it, they probably don't care. More to point, thousands of other people have used paypal for this purpose, so you know it works


iv) EDs pretty clever more, I doubt he cares which jpaypal account gets used.. you make an order, fill in some paypal info, it just takes the payment on your order. But if there was a problem, you coudl email him, he's ED, he's right here.

 

[neko]

Sure, most of these issues can be dealt with one way or another, but it is a hassle. Knowing this, I've been putting off ordering a new Pandora. If ED took bitcoins, I would have ordered & paid already.


If ED won't take bitcoins, I'll email him and try to work something out (probably paypal). I know that ED often has a long backlog of emails tho.

 

[skeezix]

So you're the one person then, ok


I'd say.. if those are hastle, but BCS are not, thats unusual


jeff

 

[neko]

I've bought bitcoins before, so that's not really a big deal.


I've also done bank wires, and I was dramatizing it a bit, but yes they did make me sign a bunch of paperwork, and I had to wait for the branch manager to approve it. It's doable, but it takes a while, and there is a fee.


As for credit card charges getting declined, I've had this happen when ordering internationally, and it's often difficult to find out why.


The specific issue with using a different paypal account is that the paypal payment will have the wrong name and address. If ED can deal with that, then I can send him money with Paypal.

 

[_wb_]

A potentially important aspect of this discussion is: what's the overhead? If you pay with credit card, wire transfer or paypal, does ED get all the money you're spending or are there fees involved? E.g. I paid mine with a European wire transfer, which doesn't cost me nor ED anything, so that's nice. But it doesn't work outside the EU. It would be nice to have an option that doesn't have transaction fees, and maybe bitcoins could be such an option (I dunno, maybe BC also has transaction fees).

 

[neko]

A potentially important aspect of this discussion is: what's the overhead? If you pay with credit card, wire transfer or paypal, does ED get all the money you're spending or are there fees involved? E.g. I paid mine with a European wire transfer, which doesn't cost me nor ED anything, so that's nice. But it doesn't work outside the EU. It would be nice to have an option that doesn't have transaction fees, and maybe bitcoins could be such an option (I dunno, maybe BC also has transaction fees).

Bit-pay charges 3% for USD payouts and 4% for other currencies. Fastcash4bitcoins includes their fee in the exchange rate but it's typically around 3-4%. Paypal and credit card fees are around 3% + currency conversion fees. Bank wires from outside the EU are fairly expensive ($25-$35, regardless of amount).


For buying bitcoins, TangibleCryptography offers a 1% discount on amounts over $500, so it ends up being slightly cheaper for me to pay with bitcoins than CC or Paypal.

 

[_wb_]

Couldn't we find a way to group transactions from the same country and do it with one fixed-cost bank wire? E.g. if 5 people from the same non-EU country want to buy a Pandora, 4 of them send their money to the 5th guy, who does the actual transaction. Say the transaction costs are $30, this is probably the cheapest way. But of course there are issues of trust and having to wait to make the grouping work.


Essentially what we need is something like what Link is doing for the USA. It makes not only money transfer cheaper, but also delivery.

 

[Null]

The best analogy is cash. Once you give cash to someone you have no way to get the money back.

You need to play more GTA.

 

[Impulss]

as I'm a uni student without alot of.money. I do have a fair few bit coins though. So there is always a possibility of getting some extra sales out of people in my situation.


Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

 

[skeezix]

So in other words, you're using university machines to mine bitcoins and hopinh to turn them into a free pandora?


jeff

 

[Tenka]

So in other words, you're using university machines to mine bitcoins and hopinh to turn them into a free pandora?

I've thought about doing the first half of that. It's nothing most schools would notice, let alone understand enough to care about.

 

[abc]

Was there already an decision on not supporting Bitcoin? Maybe we can add an bounty option to the softwarestore or combine it with www.freedomsponsors.org?

 

[EvilDragon]

Well, I'm not sure whether there's a plugin for PrestaShop...