Smashing Bitcoin For Pain And Losses

Threat modeling is a systematic analysis of the security of a system. It became commonplace in the department of energy 30 years ago and has been used by fortune 500 software companies for at least a decade.

After describing the system all of the ways that the system could be attacked are cataloged. For each of those threats the security researcher provides the safeguards, if any, that attempt to prevent the attack and his own judgement on the likely success of an attack.

By applying this technique to bitcoin we get a much clearer view of its incredible value and why alt coins, including the recent forks, not only fall short, but are themselves an attack on bitcoin itself.

In my presentation we will walk through the bitcoin threat model, discuss specific threats that are of particular interest, and have a lengthy Q and A where we reference the threat model to answer question that only seem complex without a systematic analysis to reference.