

Bitcoin Network Speed Breaks 1 Petahash per Second - geektips
http://thegenesisblock.com/bitcoin-network-reaches-1-petahash-per-second/?

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ctz
So 10^15 H/s is about 2^50 H/s, or 2^71 H/Y.

Assuming you could rededicate the whole network to attacking SHA-1 (which you
practically couldn't, the ASICs would need replacing) you could break 2^10
intermediate SHA-1 signed CA certs per year, and compromise the whole current
deployment of HTTPS.

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p1mrx
Your math suggests that you can break a certificate with 2^61 hash operations,
but this page says 2^61 operations will only give you a _collision_ :

[https://code.google.com/p/hashclash/](https://code.google.com/p/hashclash/)

With the ability to generate collisions, it becomes easier to trick a CA into
signing an evil certificate, but collisions don't help if you want to break
someone else's certificate.

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mrb
By "break", ctz meant "create 2^10 certificates". Creating arbitrary
intermediate CAs would indeed compromise the safety of HTTPS.

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fpgaminer
Whatever you may think about Bitcoin itself, the _story_ of Bitcoin is
impressive. Bitcoin started as a small, open source hacker project by an
anonymous fellow on the internet. Somehow, this has snowballed to the point
where an entire datacenter's worth of custom computing power is being thrown
at it. That's inspiring and amazing no matter how you slice it.

Amidst the on-going onslaught against our digital world, it's refreshing to
see what people can accomplish using open source ideals.

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o_s_m
It would be nice if all that electricity could be used to help the less
fortunate on this planet.

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ISL
If it means frictionless commerce with anyone worldwide, perhaps it will?

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eterm
Nothing about bitcoin is tending towards frictionless commerce.

That is an argument people make to excuse the huge waste of power (by
extension generating a large amont of pollution) that goes into bitcoin.

The reality is that all the forces that slow down electronic dollars also slow
down other electronic currencies.

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drcross
The energy required to obtain gold from the earth, when you compare it to
bitcoin, makes your comment farcical

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eterm
Currencies aren't backed by gold. They're backed by governments. The united
states dollar is just as much a "virtual currency" as bitcoin.

~~~
toomuchtodo
All currencies are a shared delusion. If everyone believes something has
value, it does.

