Comment on Proton Now Has a Bitcoin Wallet

• corbin@infosec.pub ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  If you want to beat inflation, dump the money in a high-yield savings account, or a 401k, or a stock index, or any of the other options that have something resembling banking protection/regulation. There are so many better options than a speculative investment that you lose entirely with a social engineering attack or a SIM swap.

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  • jarfil@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Lower risk, lower reward. Keep in mind that 401k is not 100% guaranteed either.

    lose entirely with a social engineering attack or a SIM swap.

    SIM swap? You mean like SMS 2FA? (don’t use SMS 2FA, BTW).

    Anyway, if your risk scenario includes a “wallet inspector”, you definitely shouldn’t buy Bitcoin, or carry money around.

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    • prole@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Nobody is going to SIM swap you unless you have a shitload of crypto and let everyone know about it. It’s not an easy attack, so it would have to be targeted. Pretty easy to not be a target (not having millions of dollars of crypto on a wallet helps).

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      • jarfil@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        I want to have a shitload of crypto and let everyone know about it… where do I post my receiving address…? 😅

        Anyway, my point was more about not using a SIM as a security mechanism, ever. It wasn’t designed as one, and still isn’t.

        As for being a target… something like 2 years ago, I had a chance to get a glimpse at a C&C panel for some malware. It didn’t bother checking your balance, just vacuumed all and every password from every app on an infected phone, along with all sorts of data about the phone, SIM, SIM2, etc. Cloning a SIM is so easy, they’ll do it just to get your $50 worth of NFTs.

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• dgriffith@aussie.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  What if I want to buy a cheese sandwich today with BTC?

  A cheese sandwich can remain the same fixed price in dollars for years, with only the relatively slow change in actual value due to inflation.

  I’ve seen BTC swing 10% in 24 hours. Does the cheese-sandwich-maker have to look up the rate this instant and calculate a spot price for me?

  Will they have more or less dollars at the end of the day, when they need to pay their bills and buy more cheese from their suppliers?

  “Just buy cheese from someone who takes BTC”, doesn’t help, it just kicks the can further down the road.

  “Just add a bit of a buffer in the price to take fluctuations into account”, means that I go buy a cheese sandwich with dollars from next door because it’s 50 cents cheaper for the same thing.

  As an investment vehicle, BTC is doing hot laps of the track, but until its volatility issues are sorted and it becomes “boring”, it’s not going anywhere as an actual currency.

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  • jarfil@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Welcome to currency exchanges.

    If you want to buy a sandwich in Indian Rupees… you either find someone selling sandwiches for Indian Rupees, or you have to exchange them to whatever the seller will accept (USD? CAD? AUD? EUR?..)

    Yes, FOREX has some swings, it’s not for everyone. Bitcoin may swing more ore less than other currencies, depending on the day.

    Does the cheese-sandwich-maker have to look up the rate this instant and calculate a spot price for me?

    If you travel around, you’ll find countries where sellers do exactly that: they pull out a smartphone, check the spot price, add some margin, and tell your the price in USD for whatever you’re trying to buy.

    Alternatively, you can swipe a credit card that will do all of that automatically. BTW, there are BTC backed credit cards too.

    buy cheese from someone who takes BTC […] just kicks the can further down the road.

    That’s how money works: you kick it all the way around the street, over and over, changing from can, to stone, to ball, to… etc. Those who manage to start with a can and end up with a Lambo, win. Those who end up with a single grain of sand, lose.

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    • knokelmaat@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Your last paragraph is not how money should work at all. Money should represent value that ideally doesn’t change, so that the money I receive for selling a can is worth a can, not a Lambo an not a grain of sand. What your describing is closer to speculation and pyramid schemes (NFTs for example).

      Either try and explain to me how BTC could be an ideal currency that fixes the problems in existing currency, or try to explain me how it’s really cool as an investment thing to siphon money from others, but don’t try and do both at the same time.

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      • jarfil@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Money should represent value that ideally doesn’t change

        Money represents human desire and trust. A can today doesn’t necessarily have the same value as the same can tomorrow; maybe someone came up with 1000 extra cans, maybe someone licked that can (ew!), maybe deliveries have been cut for the week and it’s the last can of soda in a hundred mile radius.

        A can is worth “exactly” itself, only in the moment of a single transaction.

        A can is worth “about the same” amount of a given currency, only when there is a steady delivery of cans from a steadily working factory producing millions of cans from a steady supply of raw materials with a trust in an expected steady production rate, against a trust in an expected steady demand, with a trust in the given currency’s expected steady exchange rate for other products.

        At any other moment, a can’s price can change wildly.

        What your describing is closer to speculation

        Welcome to money.

        and pyramid schemes (NFTs for example).

        That is doubly wrong… but let’s focus.

        explain to me […]

        BTC is not an “ideal currency”, just another currency. It intends to fix only one problem: to bypass banking dependence. For other problems, you’ll need other currencies.

        To “siphon money from others” is an inherent quality of all money; if you don’t believe me, try getting some money (with any value) without “siphoning” it from someone else.

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