Author: Peter Todd 2017-09-13 09:24:34
Published on: 2017-09-13T09:24:34+00:00
The email thread discusses the implementation of Confidential Transactions (CT) as a softfork in Bitcoin. CT transactions only differ from regular transactions by proving that the sum of input values is greater than or equal to the sum of output values through a CT proof, without revealing the actual sums. To ensure each CT transaction's sum of inputs and outputs is valid, a pool of "shielded" outputs with an unknown value is proposed. There are three main cases for spending these shielded outputs: spending unshielded outputs to CT-shielded outputs, spending CT-shielded outputs to unshielded outputs, and spending CT-shielded outputs to CT-shielded outputs. The third case may result in extra outputs and consume a significant percentage of blockchain space if shielded-to-shielded transactions are common. However, the benefit of this implementation is almost trivial compared to its cost, hence the proposed tradeoff does not make sense.
Updated on: 2023-06-12T18:07:37.036213+00:00