Re: [ANN][KMD][dPoW] Komodo ICO - Zero Knowledge Privacy Secured by Bitcoin

sorry guys, I do not understand what is Komodo? Is it Zcash fork?

Hey, no problem!

Yes we use the Zcash technology, all credit to them! However, we are not a simple fork as we have added our own technology on top of it. We use NXT style PoS along with a new consensus method called dPoW. The dPoW is an innovation of our own, which will secure Komodo with bitcoin's hashrate (and other coins can secure their blockchains via Komodo).

Another big component is Iguana, which is another project that is in its finish line. We haven't really talked about it yet, but Iguana and Komodo will complement each other.

We will be explaining everything, so sign up for our newsletter and you won't miss anything!
https://komodoplatform.com/

Here is our first article, describing a little bit about dPoW
https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@komodoplatform/komodo-has-been-born

Core Media wrote a great article about Komodo, check it out too!
http://coremedia.info/index.php/blockchain-news/item/303-komodo-zero-knowledge-privacy-secured-by-bitcoin/303-komodo-zero-knowledge-privacy-secured-by-bitcoin

More will come! Wink

How are you guys managing the toxic waste from the "trusted setup"?

From: http://weuse.cash/2016/06/09/btc-xmr-zcash/

"Another problem ZCash faces is the trusted setup, the so called cryptographic toxic waste problem. This is some data that is needed when the initial parameters of ZCash are created, but needs to be deleted afterwards. If somehow someone gains access to this toxic waste, this entity can create coins out of thin air without anyone noticing. This is a serious problem because this makes a malicious backdoor in ZCash a real possibility.

The fact that ZCash is a US-based company, doesnt really help with building confidence in this cryptocurrency. Its not unthinkable some agency will require the ZCash team to make a copy of this toxic waste and hand it over to them. Just google what the US government did to the owners of e-gold, Liberty Reserve and the Liberty Dollar, and youll understand what kind of pressure they can exert on the owners of the ZCash company. If coins can be created at will, the inflation will diminish the value of the coin."

The zcash devs are not very likely to be doing any funny business and I think their mechanism to create the parameters requires only one participant to be honest to avoid the problem. Also, the process to create these parameters has been quite carefully thought through:

http://diyhpl.us/~bryan/papers2/bitcoin/snarks/Secure%20sampling%20of%20public%20parameters%20for%20succinct%20zero%20knowledge%20proofs.pdf

If you read the paper you will quickly realize the highest caliber mathematics that permeates the entire zcash project. Considering the level of scrutiny and care that will be used to create the zcash parameters, I do not see being able to do any better (or come close).

I have confirmed that zcash forks will be able to use the same parameters as zcash and that is the plan. The alternative is to generate our own parameters but that will create a set of issues that even if solved, it wont create any better set of parameters. It is simpler to use the same parameters.

James