In recent days, several Bitcoin exchanges have suspended certain kinds of payments due to “transaction malleability” issues. There has been a lot of talk about why this happened, and some finger-pointing. In this post, I will try to unpack what “transaction malleability” is and why it has proven to be a problem for some companies.
ECHR Fast-tracks Court Case on PRISM and TEMPORA (and VERYANGRYBIRDS?)
January 29, 2014 by
So. The NSA and GCHQ piggyback on Angry Birds to spy on its 1.7 billion users. potential terrorists. Not only that, but everything on smartphones can be compromised: “if its on the phone, we can get it”. Will it ever stop? A few days ago, the European Court of Human Rights (‘ECHR’) made the unique move […]
It matters what the NSA does
January 23, 2014 by
It seems axiomatic that if we want to have an informed conversation about the legality, ethics, and policy implications of the NSA’s actions, it is useful to know what the NSA is doing. Yet a vocal subset of NSA defenders seem to be taking the contrary position, that information about the agency’s activities serves no […]
NSA call data analysis: inside or outside government?
January 21, 2014 by
Last week the President suggested that the NSA’s database of phone call data be stored outside the government, and he asked his Administration to study how this could be done. Today I’d like to start unpacking the options.
