Way to tell that transaction was issued by a specific person/company [combined summary]

• Way to tell that transaction was issued by a specific person/company Gregory Maxwell 2013-08-23 06:55:32+00:00
• Way to tell that transaction was issued by a specific person/company Maciej Trebacz 2013-08-23 06:26:51+00:00

Published on: 2013-08-23T06:55:32+00:00

Summary:

In a 2013 email conversation, Maciej Trebacz proposed a feature to Bitcoin that would allow multiple addresses to be signed with a single private key and include the signature in a transaction. This feature would be beneficial for reputable wallet services as it would enable transactions that require zero confirmations from the other party, ensuring the transaction is from a trusted source that won't attempt double spending. However, another party in the conversation opposed this proposal, citing concerns about privacy implications.The second party argued that adding such a feature would increase transaction size and fees, while also requiring additional effort from other parties to transmit, process, and store the information indefinitely. Furthermore, implementing this feature would expose the identity of one of the transaction parties to the entire world, compromising the privacy of all involved. Privacy in Bitcoin relies on pseudonymous identities in each transaction, which gives it an advantage over centralized payment systems. The second party suggested using the payment protocol instead, as it can provide additional metadata and signatures without compromising privacy. Alternatively, providing users with a signmessaged txid can serve as a promise to pay without the need for highly public communication.Currently, the Bitcoin protocol does not support including arbitrary data in transactions, as this would make them non-standard and unrelatable by clients. As a result, if a user has multiple addresses, they cannot sign them with a single private key and include the signature in the transaction. However, it is suggested that a reputable wallet service could issue transactions requiring zero confirmations by adding a signature to demonstrate trustworthiness, similar to Mt.Gox's "green address. "To implement this feature without forking the chain, it is proposed to add support for specific scripts in the protocol. These scripts should not exceed 34 bytes, and further definition is required for their use. While there may be other mechanisms within the Bitcoin protocol that could achieve this, the idea raises the question of whether such a feature should be considered and added to the protocol.

Updated on: 2023-08-01T05:41:44.831206+00:00