Re: Fate of Ecash if RSA is cracked?

[frantz@netcom.com (Bill Frantz)]

At  5:04 AM 6/3/96 +0000, Greg Miller wrote:
>On Sun, 2 Jun 1996 17:42:49 -0500 (CDT), you wrote:
>
>>What would happen with all ecash that's been issued? Of course
>>criminals would be able to forge large amounts of authentic-looking
>>ecash, so banks should not be honoring requests to convert e-cash into
>>real cash.
>
>        As I understand it, ecash shouldn't be withdrawn until shortly before
>it
>is spent.  If the RSA algorithm is broken, then then banks could refuse the
>withdrawal (and depositing) of money as ecash.  The remainder of the money in
>each users' account would have to be withdrawn through conventional methods.
>
>        Of course all the outstanding (between withdrawl and deposit) ecash
>could be a problem.

Banks running Digicash might be able to credit you account for cash on your
disk using the same mechanisms they use to recover your ecash after a hard
disk crash.  You shouldn't need too much electronic identification since
the only result is to move money to yourself.


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