zlacker

I explored a startup idea that really didn't make sense unless there was a way to ensure users were unique humans in an anonymous and privacy preserving way.

Researched it substantially and realized it's an unsolved problem. Anything that makes a dent is incomplete and comes with ugly tradeoffs. For a time I wondered if I should try and solve it myself, but I could never think any solution that hadn't already been/being tried. Years later I'm left curious if it's even possible to solve the problem.

My point is that captcha won't solve this, and solving this problem is a lot harder than it seems at first, and might not even be solvable (which I know is hard to accept).

If someone does find an elegant privacy ensuring way to solve it, I think the impact would extend far beyond HN and could make a big difference to the future of civilization as a whole.

>>FloorE+(OP)
Having to invite people in person and maintaining a network of trust could work. There would always be people ignoring friends selling accounts to bots, but ultimately I guess it would be mostly too costly.

>>FloorE+(OP)
It is a solved problem with ZKPs

>>FloorE+(OP)
https://eu-digital-identity-wallet.github.io/eudi-doc-archit...

>>FloorE+(OP)
Yes, I'd thought about roughly the same premise before and came to the conclusion that it really is a hard thing to do.

Even if you use state ids for it, who's to say that a particular state won't be...loose with issuing ids that can then go on to be used for bots.

It's even a problem with humans as well - one human can be having a pleasant conversation with the other, not aware that that person isn't being genuine, or is lying, has ulterior motives or has been instructed on what to say by someone else.

>>baxuz+q2
I studied ZKPs. You and I must have very different understandings of the actual scope of the problem. Like I said, everything that exists or is being worked on that makes a dent (including ZKPs) is incomplete or has ugly trade offs.

Maybe you are thinking purely from a math / theoretical perspective, but I'm thinking of a compete solution that's practical to use to solve the problem for sites like HN and many others.

>>FloorE+V8
That is true, and I'm also working in the industry.

We are currently in dire need of ZKP providers / abstractions that will aggregate both eIDs and tradition IDV (scans).

However it's extremely important that the technical capability is there. The next step is to build upon it, and I think that it's a great time for something like this due to all the horrible implementations of identity verifications currently available — that is 3rd party companies collecting scans of documents and biometrics.