Black markets vs. cryptoanarchy

[Mike Ingle <inglem@adnetsol.com>]

Cryptoanarchy will have arrived when you can openly _advertise_ these
services and still stay in business indefinitely. Most of the things we
talk about - even Jim Bell's assassination market - already exist, but
they cannot be advertised. You have to go looking for them, at some
risk to both buyer and seller. If the seller is visible enough for you
to find him, he is visible enough to get caught.

For example, there is plenty of 'pirate' material on the net, but it
tends to go away as soon as the addresses become well-known.
Cryptoanarchy will be here when you can advertise yourself as a
distributor of pirate software (or anything else you want to sell), do
business with a publicly known contact address, and still not get
caught. 'Black markets' exist due to the inability to do this.

Currently the techniques of anonymity are limited to two: indirection
for source anonymity and broadcast for recipient anonymity. We are more
or less where crypto was before the invention of public key. You can
gain security by spreading risk among multiple parties (key
distributors for crypto, or remailers for anonymity) but you can't 
'make your own anonymity' like you can make your own security with 
public key crypto.

A theoretical discovery is needed particularly in the area of recipient
anonymity. Good sender anonymity and weak recipient anonymity leads to
'hit and run' behavior such as spamming email and newsgroups, but not
to anonymous markets.

						Mike

> >Crypto-anarchy benefits the poor more than the rich.  The underlings
> >of society are going to love it.
> 
> In fact, they basically already practice it. Not with computers, of course,
> but in terms of not reporting cash income, not reporting tips, engaging in
> barter work with others, and gambling in various non-sanctioned markets.
> 
> (Numbers games and sports betting are huge markets. Interestingly, such
> markets also validate much of what we say about "reputations." After all,
> when was the last time you heard about a bookie being sued in court for not
> paying up? And private justice is administered, as welshers are disposed of
> directly, without a  long, expensive trial. Nearly everything in "crypto
> anarchy" has direct parallels in "underworld and black markets." Some say
> they are really the same thing. Perhaps.)
> 
> --Tim May