Dr. Craig Wright took the stage in London to give a keynote speech on October 2—the third and final day of the CoinGeek Live 2020 conference.
In his presentation titled, “From the Internet to Bitcoin: The Digital Ledger to Advance the World’s Technology Infrastructure,” Dr. Wright explored why the ordering of transactions and timestamps are two of the most critical aspects of Bitcoin, why Bitcoin is more than digital cash, and much more…or as Dr. Wright said, his presentation took a look at “the early areas of Bitcoin that people should know and don’t seem to understand.”
To begin his presentation, Dr. Wright explained the importance of time-based ordering, and why there are several security issues in a time-stamp model that relies on third-party service providers,
If the provider gets compromised, every single signature [time stamped event] created by that provider is effectively gone, it becomes worthless. Everything that the provider recorded is now able to be challenged due to the security breach.
However, if Bitcoin is used to record time-stamped, order events, you will have an evidence trail that cannot be changed. If someone was able to hack one Bitcoin node, they would not be able to alter everything that has happened in the past. Because on Bitcoin you would need to hack a majority of the nodes on the network to alter previous transaction history. Although this is possible, it is unfeasible and the cost of conducting this type of attack as well as the level of technical understanding to re-order the blockchain is not something many people possess.
That being said, because Bitcoin is globally distributed and because the Bitcoin blockchain is permanent and immutable, it is perfect for any individual or business that needs to keep ordered, time-stamped records.
As Dr. Wright points out, on Bitcoin, “you can’t go around changing the truth…Bitcoin is not just digital cash, Bitcoin creates the plumbing system that provides the solutions to the problems created by third-party service providers, a central trusted party, and a vulnerable system with several attack vectors.”
If you happened to miss Dr. Wright’s presentation “From the Internet to Bitcoin: The Digital Ledger to Advance the World’s Technology Infrastructure” on October 2, you can watch his full presentation below:
New to blockchain? Check out CoinGeek’s Blockchain for Beginners section, the ultimate resource guide to learn more about blockchain technology.
