Quote from: CoinHoarder on September 27, 2014, 01:04:46 AM

Quote from: Simcom on September 27, 2014, 12:47:15 AM

If only they could generate the initial parameters in a trustless manner. NOBODY who cares about privacy is going to use a coin created by academic researcher funded by the US Department of defense in a system where TRUST must be given to the devs to throw away the master key. That is why zerocoin is superior. Yes there will be bloat issues, Yes the transactions are slower. But at least we will have trustless anonymity with RSA UFOs used to generate the initial parameters. All of zerocash's advantages are for nothing if the gov't has a private key that unlocks all anonymity and enables unlimited minting of coins.

Just to play Devils advocate...

I believe the trust issue has to do with unlimited minting of coins, and if someone were to have the initial parameters they will not be able to anonymity.. that is what Ian from the Zerocoin/Zerocash project stated on Twitter.

Also, it seems that the Zerocash parameters can be generated in the same way you guys have implemented the tea ufo project by the use of multi party computations.

I also read that it is not a case of having to trust everyone involved in the creation of the initial parameters was honest, but you only need to trust that one of them was honest. If 20 people had a part in creating the initial parameters, then you would only need to trust that at least 1 out of those 20 people were honest.

These are almost direct quotes from Ian and Matthew from the ZeroCoin/Zerocash projects.

Yes, that is my understanding exactly, except I have read over and over that it is only possible to generate trustless parameters with zerocoin, not zerocash. Do you have a source that states it is possible with zerocash?

From the zerocash FAQ:

Can one put a backdoor in Zerocash?

Zerocash requires a trusted entity to conduct a one-time setup of the parameters of the system. During the setup procedure, secret random bits are drawn and used to compute the public parameters; the random bits are then destroyed, and the parameters are broadcast. If done correctly, then no secrets or backdoors remain.

If this setup procedure were to be corrupted, the system would continue to provide anonymity guarantees, but it would be possible to "forge" coins. As long as this setup procedure is conducted honestly, it is not possible to corrupt the public parameters of the system.

A different question is the possibility of bugs in the code. Such bugs need to be found and resolved via extensive review and testing, as in any other software project. To facilitate this, Zerocash will be released as open-source software.