[Cryptography] Is it mathematically provably impossible to construct a mechanism to test for back doors in programs?

[Natanael]

Den 2 jun 2014 17:31 skrev "Phillip Hallam-Baker" <phill at hallambaker.com>:
>
> On Sat, May 31, 2014 at 11:22 AM, ianG <iang at iang.org> wrote:
> > Talking about proof of work and so forth, seen on the net:
> >
> >
> > ==================
> > In Bitcoin, such a fork is useless, since you’re just increasing the
> > amount of time you would need to catch up. In blockchain-based proof of
> > work, however, it is a serious problem. The reason is that if you start
> > a fork straight from the genesis block, then while your mining will be
> > slow at first, after a few hundred blocks you will be able to fill the
> > blockchain up with contracts that are very easy for you to mine, but
> > difficult for everyone else. One example of such a contract is simply:
>
> Why do we have to make such a fetish of the block chain being computed
> by 'wading through treacle'?
>
> BitCoin has achieve notoriety and fame but little else. it is a
> complete failure as a currency, the float is purportedly worth $5
> billion but nobody would claim that anywhere near $5 billion of
> bitcoin commerce has occurred. Most of the transactions are endless
> churning to create the illusion of activity.
>
> We can achieve a robust notary infrastructure that is proof against
> defection for considerably less money. Let there be 32 independent
> notary log maintainers who maintain a Harber-Stornetta style hash
> chain log (i.e. what is used in Certificate Transparency). Each notary
> has very limited defection opportunities and any defection would be
> quickly noticed.
>
> Now let each notary include the outputs from the other notaries once
> an hour. Now it requires every notary to defect for a defection to
> succeed without being noticed.
>
>
>
> Unlike the BitCoin system, this one does not waste more electricity
> than is used by some nation states (currently they are consuming more
> electricity than Cyprus). Further the possibility of the log being
> rewritten is considerably less, the system is always predictable.

That's pretty much Ripple.

Please tell me how to convince the world to all trust those notaries.

Will they be anonymous? If so, how can we be certain that they are
reliable? Will they be public? If so, how can we trust they aren't under
coercion (NSL:s, etc)? Why would for example the Chinese or Indian citizens
know who those people are or why they can trust them? How will it be
bootstraped, how are the first coins issued? How are notaries replaced over
time (they will have to be replaced over time)? What do we do if suddenly
half the notaries say one thing and the other half says something else
(network split)?

Too many problems.
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