Darkleaks: The Decentralized Information Blackmarket Opens for Business

Secrets for sale anonymously

Darkleaks

Blockchain technology is not just for cryptocurrencies. Technologists are exploring all kinds of blockchain applications and one of the first is Darkleaks, a new service where people can buy and sell secrets honestly and anonymously. The opening of Darkleaks for trade in secrets is announced over at Medium.com:

Darkleaks is a decentralised blackmarket where you can sell information. It has a mechanism for trustless authentication of documents that are being sold through a novel cryptographic mechanism. The authentication is fair, provably fair. Before paying for the file, a random selection of segments are released chosen by the block chain demonstrating the file's contents match the leaker's claim.

The software uses Bitcoin's block chain to encrypt files which are released when payment is claimed by the leaker. Files are split into segments and encrypted. These segments are unlocked only when the leaker reveals the key by claiming his Bitcoins.

There is no identity, no central operator and no interaction between leaker and buyers. We encourage everyone to download Darkleaks now and start building. The code can be found here.

We give the world a new scheme for selling information of any type, form or kind. This is a gift for you to stop corruption and challenge power.

Darkleaks is the best tool to trade any kind of media, information, video, data and documents that have value.

What kind of merchandise? Darkleaks developers suggest: Hollywood movies, trade secrets, government secrets, proprietary source code, industrial designs like medicine or defense, zero day exploits, stolen databases, proof of tax evasion, military intelligence, celebrity sex pictures, and evidence of corruption.

The site will obviously be useful to information freedom fighters, but will also attract less savory vendors. Information may want to be free, but markets will make more of it available.

Comments

[Rhywun]

Over/under before it's shut down?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

My bet is before it's up and running

[Illocust]

Yeah, I get a feeling anyone caught with this on their computer is going to see the inside of a jail cell.

[Pope Jimbo]

I can't decide if I would love it if the first big secret sold here was a copy of the new FCC regulations or not.

On one hand it would be great to see those regs get out.

On the other hand, the statists would use that as an excuse for why they MUST CRACK DOWN!!! Infuriatingly no one in the media would think to ask them why they kept regulations secret in the first place.

[tarran]

Do you think any of the would-be regulators of the Internet have the technical competence to use a tool like this? 😉

[Rich]

Let me answer that question by posing another: Do you think any of the would-be regulators of the Internet have the technical competence to use a tool like Photoshop?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

That's a depressing thought. The only way to get information about our transparent government is by buying it on the black market.

[tarran]

Gentlemen! This is the FCC! We don't communicate with outsiders!

[sssbobbyr]

I have had extensive dealings with the FCC having started a full power NCE FM radio station in 2007. They will regulate this thing back to where email travels at the pace of the USPS.
Today has been one of the most disgusting and discouraging days I have experienced on hnr in 10 yrs.
Gin. That is all.

[Rhywun]

Beween this and the naked communism of the "Paper of Record" and Bratton's pants-shitting power grabs (see PM links)... yeah, this has been some day.

[TheZeitgeist]

I have a friend - a very good programmer with vast technical knowledge of the 'net - who loves idea of FCC regulating internet; for he believes they will keep Time Warner from throttling his connection past data caps, and keep Time Warner from making him pay for data like electricity from a utility.

Derp.

[The Last American Hero]

Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate! - Oh, I misread the headline.

[HazelMeade]

Why can't the studios apply cryptography to online movie distribution?
Embed some sort of unique bitcoin-like entity into every copy of a file, so that they no longer are infinitely copyable. Make it so any transfer of the file has to get registered in a blockchain as a transaction, sort of like the way bitcoins are transfered. Have some proprietary software you have to use to watch the movie, which prevents you from doing screen captures.

[TheZeitgeist]

Oh, I see you beat me to the point.

[HazelMeade]

Yeah, I mean if you can't crack and duplicate bitcoins, surely there is some way to apply that concept to not duplicating video files, right?

Bit coin seems to have solved the problem of making a digital object uncopyable.

[TheZeitgeist]

One thing I'm pretty surprised by is why nobody is using a distributed blockchain approach for a DRM tool. It would not stop piracy, but it would slow it down from being so casual and easy.

[HazelMeade]

Right. And once youve got things so that it's very difficult to copy these files without authorization, you cease all physical DVD distribution and only distribute in a digital form.