Introducing BitMarkets Fully P2P markets with no trusted third parties

[rogerver]

This looks like a pretty amazing project:

https://vimeo.com/135888102


https://voluntary.net/bitmarkets/

FREE, OPEN & UNCENSORED
Free client, no fees, no altcoin. Open source code available on Github under an MIT license. Posts go directly to the Bitmessage network and therefore uncensorable.



https://voluntary.net/bitmarkets/slides/Bitmarkets.pdf

Has anyone actually used this yet?

What do people think?

Why has Open Bazaar gotten so much more attention than this one?

[mharter]

I couldn't find it on Open Bazaar but do they use multi sig accounts for their transactions? Or do they still use an escrow system? I am a big fan of the multi sig accounts...you don't need to trust the other member, the multi sig does it for you.

[rogerver]

I couldn't find it on Open Bazaar but do they use multi sig accounts for their transactions? Or do they still use an escrow system? I am a big fan of the multi sig accounts...you don't need to trust the other member, the multi sig does it for you.

This is a separate project from Open Bazaar.
This one is using a multisig escrow system as well as TOR and Bitmessage.

You can read all about it or install their client at: http://bitmarkets.org

[grabberfish]

Looking at their website I see only an OSX client. Surely if they can do OSX then they can also do Linux?

I'd love a Mac, but I also like my privacy and do not trust them to keep my data secure.

[stevedekorte]

Looking at their website I see only an OSX client. Surely if they can do OSX then they can also do Linux?
I'd love a Mac, but I also like my privacy and do not trust them to keep my data secure.

We're working on Linux and Windows ports and are using GNUstep so it will be a single code base on all of those platforms.

[stevedekorte]

I couldn't find it on Open Bazaar but do they use multi sig accounts for their transactions? Or do they still use an escrow system? I am a big fan of the multi sig accounts...you don't need to trust the other member, the multi sig does it for you.

OpenBazaar uses 2of3 multisig and "trusted" third party escrow. Bitmarkets uses 2of2 multisig with mutual security deposits, which makes it impossible for someone else to profitably defraud you (and this is true for both sellers and buyers).

[grabberfish]

Looking at their website I see only an OSX client. Surely if they can do OSX then they can also do Linux?
I'd love a Mac, but I also like my privacy and do not trust them to keep my data secure.

We're working on Linux and Windows ports and are using GNUstep so it will be a single code base on all of those platforms.

If only all devs were like you! I look forward to powering up on Debian. Thank you.

[cryptokeeper]

Great... More of a reason to promote Drug related items/markets and Fake IDs and other illegal paraphernalia.

[stevedekorte]

Great... More of a reason to promote Drug related items/markets and Fake IDs and other illegal paraphernalia.

Such items are easily purchased anywhere. That's not what Bitmarkets is about.

What bitmarkets offers is a way to return our rapidly disappearing privacy and to eliminate two types of parasites currently present in all markets:

1) the middlemen that sit between buyers and sellers and extract rents from their position of owning the communication channel
2) the scammers that exploit trust to defraud others (buyer's that ask for wrongful chargebacks and sellers that don't deliver what they promise)

[helloworld]

Very cool project, bookmarked.

[SamPatt]

Hey Sam Patterson here, I work on OpenBazaar.

I can't speak for everyone on the OB project but we all got started on it in order to see decentralized trade become widely adopted. So we're happy to see multiple attempts to make this work. I've been following Bitmarkets for a while, Steve has been passionate about the same goals I have: eliminating middlemen and allowing truly free trade to flourish.

I haven't been able to try it yet though, since it's OSX only and I run Linux. I know it'll be available on all OS soon and I look forward to it.

There are a few differences in the approaches between OpenBazaar and Bitmarkets. One is that Bitmarkets focuses more on privacy; it uses Tor by default and relies on Bitmessage. OpenBazaar doesn't use Tor. It also doesn't use Bitmessage, though that's mostly because when we looked at it we felt it wasn't adequate for our needs. OpenBazaar does use full end-to-end encryption, so trade on the network is private, but IP addresses are exposed.

Bitmarkets also uses 2-of-2 multisig for all trades. I think it remains to be seen if this approach is actually something that most consumers want. OpenBazaar uses two approaches now. One is direct transactions for trade between parties that trust each other; there is no multisig at all. The other method (which is our recommended method) is 2-of-3 multisig, with a trusted third party called a moderator having the third key. These moderators are chosen on an open marketplace.

Keep in mind that the moderator is only pulled into the trade if there is a dispute. If the buyer and seller are both satisfied with the transaction, then funds are released without the moderator even knowing the transaction took place. Since 95% of transactions aren't disputed, this means that trusted third parties are only necessary a small portion of the time. We feel most ecommerce users actually see having a moderator available as a positive thing, whereas only a few privacy-concerned folks like ourselves will even see the benefit of eliminating third parties altogether. Plus, 2-of-2 runs into problems with funds getting stuck if one party is non-responsive or loses keys, etc.

I know originally Bitmarkets placed restrictions on buyers being able to communicate with sellers, to avoid any party pressuring the other to release funds. I don't know if this is still how it works. I feel that communication between parties in the transaction is important to facilitate trade.

I imagine that over the next few years that we'll see a combination of all the different aspects of various decentralized markets that worked and create something that is appealing to a mass audience. It's exciting to be there at the beginning and see all the different approaches. Let's make trade free!

[stevedekorte]

Keep in mind that the [OpenBazaar] moderator is only pulled into the trade if there is a dispute...

Hey Sam,

Thanks for opening up this topic. I think it's the most important one for decentralized markets to deal with.
The problem with escrow agents / moderators is that:

1) they only have one person's word against another and therefore have no way to fairly resolve a dispute (which also means the moderator themselves is defrauding you in suggesting otherwise)

2) they can exploit reputation to stage an exit scam (proxy sales and then post from proxy ids and use their 2of3 signatures to sign all funds to themselves without delivery)

These exploits aren't obvious to people used to real world identity and reputations systems because they haven't considered how pseudonymity changes the potential for sybil and proxy attacks, how easily such attacks can be automated, and how pseudonymous reputation can be bought and sold.

I hope I'm wrong about this but I expect the users of any markets built on 2of3 escrow to suffer from increasing levels of these attacks until they switch to 2of2 with mutual deposits or give up on privacy by using real world identities. You can already see this pattern of exit scams in existing 2of3 pseudonymous markets where tens of millions of dollars in value have been stolen this way - and a marketplace of escrow agents is no different than many markets which act as agents. Fortunately, 2of2 mutual escrow gives us the means to (eventually) end it.

[rogerver]

I'm really glad to see both of these projects getting more and more attention.
I don't think most of the world realizes just how powerful these tools will be.

I'm also undecided on 2 of 2 vs 2 of 3 escrow systems.
I think the real proof will be seeing them both in action and seeing which one runs into more trouble.

A big THANK YOU to both teams is owed!

[tokeweed]

Oh wow. I'll be spreading the word on BitMarkets as well. Thanks for posting this thread.

Edit: Just read through the pdf. At first glance, I think BitMarkets has the better solution concerning escrows. But that's just me. I'm pretty sure OpenBazaar will be awesome as well.

[SamPatt]

I think the real proof will be seeing them both in action and seeing which one runs into more trouble.

Exactly. The great thing about these projects being open source is that any of them can - somewhat easily - pull parts from one project that work and abandon the parts of their own that don't work. Until we have enough people actually using the markets we'll never know, but I'm hoping the next year or two will change all that.

[ultraticum]

Very cool. Have often thought decentralized censure-resistant commerce will be a killer app for Bitcoin.

Are they basically saying that, because not many sellers will want to consistently lose 1x, not many buyers will lose 2x from seller fraud?

I can kindof see the logic, but any clarification of that game theory would be helpful.

[knight22]

Is bitmarket already ready to use?

[tokeweed]

I guess it is.

[stevedekorte]

Are they basically saying that, because not many sellers will want to consistently lose 1x, not many buyers will lose 2x from seller fraud?
I can kindof see the logic, but any clarification of that game theory would be helpful.

Right, neither party is able to profit from defrauding the other. And you can be absolutely certain that no one can profitably defraud you as the payment and deposits can only be released if you sign the transaction.

Slide 11 from this presentation has a chart with all scenarios:
https://voluntary.net/bitmarkets/slides/Bitmarkets.pdf

[stevedekorte]

Is bitmarket already ready to use?

Yes, it's been fully working since last November but we've just started publicly promoting it in the last few months.

As developers, we thought simply releasing a working product would be enough to kickstart the marketplace and we didn't announce the product or promote it until it was working. In hindsight, this wasn't good a "marketing" strategy. However, it's gotten a very positive reception wherever we've presented it and people are starting to become aware of it. (Thanks Roger!)

[tokeweed]

Is bitmarket already ready to use?

Yes, it's been fully working since last November but we've just started publicly promoting it in the last few months.

As developers, we thought simply releasing a working product would be enough to kickstart the marketplace and we didn't announce the product or promote it until it was working. In hindsight, this wasn't good a "marketing" strategy. However, it's gotten a very positive reception wherever we've presented it and people are starting to become aware of it. (Thanks Roger!)

Cool. Any plans on releasing a Linux version? Or windows at least?

[OzzieBitcoins]

have you guys heard of Coinffeine... that's another decentralized btc trading app.
Wonder if anyone has used both and is able to compare the two.

[tokeweed]

Hi Ozzie. Coinffeine is an exchange like Bitstamp. Both BitMarkets and OpenBazaar are market places like Ebay.

Imagine the Silk Road, but decentralized. This is gonna be huge.

[Ishotas]

Looks very promising indeed, I'm surprised its been around for almost one year yet barely anyone seems to have heard about it (unlike OpenBazaar). I wonder how many btcs will get burned under this perma-lock system.

The timeline shows that Windows and Linux versions are going to be released before November. Is there a confirmed release date for us non-OSX users?
Would love to try it out.

[stevedekorte]

Looks very promising indeed, I'm surprised its been around for almost one year yet barely anyone seems to have heard about it (unlike OpenBazaar). I wonder how many btcs will get burned under this perma-lock system.

The timeline shows that Windows and Linux versions are going to be released before November. Is there a confirmed release date for us non-OSX users?
Would love to try it out.

There's no confirmed date. Riccardo has only gotten it linking on Linux at this point and we're not sure how much more there is left to do. The Windows port is looking like it will be in 2016. I'm considering moving the UI code to the iOS frameworks so we can port to Microsoft's new Objective-C compiler.

[harrymmmm]

Why has Open Bazaar gotten so much more attention than this one?

I'd say it was a result of it being the only (afaik) fork of Amir's darkmarket. It gained publicity and legitimacy at that time, and capitalized on it since then.
In hindsight, openbazaar never really got anywhere. New release soon, but i doubt it will be anything eye popping.

[manfred_karrer]

Why has Open Bazaar gotten so much more attention than this one?

I see 3 main factors:
- The publicity Amir Taaki got for DarkMarket (from where OB is forked)
- The reddit discussion after the fork about the project re-naming.
- BitMarkets is OSX only (but luckily they work on other OS versions).

Its funny somehow but typical how promotion works.
For complex conceptual or technical issues (how to build a P2P market) it is not easy to get people motivated for promoting and to help to get it bootstrapped, but when people can partizipate by simply suggesting a name and discussing the pro and cons about the "dark" in DarkMarket the
many people get excited . (Not saying they did that intentionally, such stuff just happens and its kind of luck)

But it is really a pity that BitMarkets did not get more attention so far. Great that you are pushing it a bit!

[manfred_karrer]

The problem with escrow agents / moderators is that:
1) they only have one person's word against another and therefore have no way to fairly resolve a dispute (which also means the moderator themselves is defrauding you in suggesting otherwise)
2) they can exploit reputation to stage an exit scam (proxy sales and then post from proxy ids and use their 2of3 signatures to sign all funds to themselves without delivery)

Hi Steve,

I agree with you that those protection mechanisms (moderator, reputation) are problematic, but would like to add that the 2of2 multisig approach comes with a blackmail risk which might become a serious problem once the platform gets more successful.

I used a very similar model initially for Bitsquare but one contributor [1] found out a scenario where blackmail will become a serious issue:
As one user will always have more funds in the escrow as the other, the one with less funds can send the peer a pre-signed payout transaction to his favor.
Lets say Alice is the seller and has as security deposit 1 BTC in the 2of2 multisig escrow and Bob as buyer has 2 BTC in the escrow (security deposit + purchase price).
As soon the escrow tx is confirmed in the blockchain, Alice could send Bob a payout tx with a different output as planned:
For instance: 1,5 BTC to Alice, 1,5 BTC to Bob.
If Bob does not sign and broadcast that tx he will never get anything back (not the purchase nor the security deposit, so he loses 2 BTC). So it is rational that he will accept the blackmail as he don't need to trust Alice for anything as he already got that pre-signed tx - the only thing he needs to do is to sign it as well and broadcast the tx.
And that missing 2nd communication/negotiation/trust step is the reason why this blackmail scenario might be highly successful (at least game theory will say that).

Of course if the users cannot communicate and if there are no tools to create the payout transaction it will make it harder, but I think criminals will find a way around that. They can simply post on public forums, and people will know where to look when a trade get frozen. Crypto-locker is probably a good example how successful scam can be. And tools to make it easy to sign can be provided by them as well. Alternative clients which will be compatible but add those features (communication, signing) might be another path for those scammers to get around that problem.

But I am aware that there is no perfect solution out and to have a few different approaches is great to see what works best in reality.

For Bitsquare it is a bit easier as a P2P currency exchange has less difficult requirements (no shipping of goods, just transfer of money).
We will use PageSigner [2] for instance to give the arbitrator a tool to get a tamper proof evidence if a bank transfer has been done or not. The arbitration system [3] is also decentralized and is using a security deposit itself to avoid that an arbitrator will collude with a trader.

Good luck with your project and hope to see to more flourishing in future!
Br,
Manfred

[1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?actio ... le;u=99579
[2] https://tlsnotary.org/
[3] https://bitsquare.io/arbitration_system.pdf

[craigonesun]

After reading all the posts in this thread, it now seems to me that it will be at least another year before either if any of these services will be up and running smooth with happy users...