‘Mutable’ Torrents Proposal Makes BitTorrent More Resilient - Polidicks

[quote]“Torrent sites (such as The Pirate Bay) could share a magnet link they control, which contains their public key. What they would store at this ‘address’ is the infohash of a torrent which contains a database of all their torrents,” he says. “Users who trust them would bookmark the magnet link, and when they click on it, a torrent will start downloading. Specifically, they’d start downloading the database dump of the torrent site.” While that might not yet sound like magic, the ability to change the value held in the DHT proves extremely useful. “The cool thing is that when the torrent site decides to share more torrents (new releases, better quality stuff, more quality reviews), all they need to do is update the value in the DHT with a new torrent containing a new .rss file.[/quote] source: [url]https://torrentfreak.com/mutable-torrents-proposal-makes-bittorrent-resilient-160813/[/url]

They're... [I]evolving![/I]

Orrrrr... if a torrent gets infected with a virus... this is one of the reasons why torrents are static. and were designed static. If a virus targets torrenters specifically it could hop around like if it had a TGV connection to everyone.

Okay, even with the 'layman' explanation, I'm a bit confused on what they mean.

[QUOTE=Blizzerd;50880208]Orrrrr... if a torrent gets infected with a virus... this is one of the reasons why torrents are static. and were designed static. If a virus targets torrenters specifically it could hop around like if it had a TGV connection to everyone.[/QUOTE] That would require someone obtaining the private key for the website, which is pretty unlikely.

[QUOTE=gawkermedia;50880220]That would require someone obtaining the private key for the website, which is pretty unlikely.[/QUOTE] is it? what if the website is compromised? what if the virus infected the website and compromised it? you could get an epic chain reaction like that pretty fast.

[QUOTE=Sir Whoopsalot;50880211]Okay, even with the 'layman' explanation, I'm a bit confused on what they mean.[/QUOTE] Basically its a distributed database. So instead of going to legallinuxisotorrentfiles.com you can paste in a magnet link which downloads all available files/magnet links that legallinuxisotorrentfiles.com would otherwise host. Then whenever legallinuxisotorrentfiles.com releases new legally distributed linux iso files, they can update the magnet link with new/updated content. The end user doesn't have to do anything, so theoretically the software that you run on your computer to download your legally distributed linux iso files will automatically update the database of content/magnet links. So when johnny-I-don't-like-legally-distributed-linux-iso-files comes along with a lawsuit and shutters the website it will effectively have no effect whatsoever. So long as someone holds the private key (i.e. password) for the public key (i.e. the shit you copy/paste into your personal computer) there is nothing anyone can really do. TL;DR bittorrent is evolving into a medium which makes it fairly impervious to legal takedowns and also makes it faster, easier and more efficient to use as the onus on searching the database is placed on the end-user rather than a website. Also seeing as there is no more "website" to speak of it means that there are no malware-ridden advertisements, there is no easy censorship that a government or entity can do. [editline]13th August 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=Blizzerd;50880234]is it? what if the website is compromised? what if the virus infected the website and compromised it? you could get an epic chain reaction like that pretty fast.[/QUOTE] That'd only really apply if end-users are installing executable content from the website (i.e. pirated software which is usually ridden with keyloggers, trojans and the like anyway). In terms of "media" (i.e. legally distributed audio and video files) it is unlikely that any exploit would have much effect unless someone found a specific exploit for media programs. In any case, its not like you can just change the files in a torrent because other seeds would already be seeding it. I'm sure there is some way to exploit the system, but the time/effort/reward is probably way out of tune for it to be worth most people's time.

The government's cut so many heads off this hydra that now they're regrowing with diamond-plated necks.

[QUOTE=Shugo;50882129]The government's cut so many heads off this hydra that now they're regrowing with diamond-plated necks.[/QUOTE] Yes. Exactly. That is why when people look at something like bitcoin and say it is a failure because of MtGox they are wrong. As long as the underlying technology is disruptive, reliable, resilient and novel any failures along the way only lead to it being strengthened. People seem to have an anticipation nowadays when it comes to technology that if something has a minor/major failure it is the end of the world. By that same standard no company should ever branch out and try things differently. i.e. Valve should never have risked it all and made the Steam network because it had many initial criticisms and failures. But instead they went all at it and changes the course of digital distribution for everyone.

[QUOTE=gawkermedia;50882805]Yes. Exactly. That is why when people look at something like bitcoin and say it is a failure because of MtGox they are wrong. As long as the underlying technology is disruptive, reliable, resilient and novel any failures along the way only lead to it being strengthened. People seem to have an anticipation nowadays when it comes to technology that if something has a minor/major failure it is the end of the world. By that same standard no company should ever branch out and try things differently. i.e. Valve should never have risked it all and made the Steam network because it had many initial criticisms and failures. But instead they went all at it and changes the course of digital distribution for everyone.[/QUOTE] Its evolution baby. *right here right now from fatboy slim starts playing*