[Noisebridge-discuss] Is there an electronic equivalent of cash?

[Danny O'Brien]

On Fri, Dec 11, 2009 at 10:14 PM, Rebecca Bellovin
<rmbellov at math.stanford.edu> wrote:
> On Fri, 11 Dec 2009 21:57:55 -0800
> Jason Dusek <jason.dusek at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>   Is there a way to pay anonymously online, either in
>>   theory or in practice?
>>
>
> In theory, yes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_cash).  This was
> originally work of David Chaum in the '80s using blind signatures
> ("Blind signatures for untraceable payments",
> http://dsns.csie.nctu.edu.tw/research/crypto/HTML/PDF/C82/199.PDF).
> There's also a second paper from 1990 by Chaum, Fiat, and Naor
> ("Untraceable electronic cash",
> http://dsns.csie.nctu.edu.tw/research/crypto/HTML/PDF/C88/319.PDF)
> which improves the protocol: the penalty for spending the same
> electronic coin twice is having your identity revealed!  Both papers
> are pretty readable, and involve pretty much no math.
>
> At some point, Chaum started a company to implement his electronic
> cash scheme, but it went bankrupt some time ago.
>

I'm pretty sure the patents on these techniques are now expired. Let
the 2010 cypherpunk renaissance begin!

d.

> Rebecca Bellovin
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