Re: [Tails-dev] Update Electrum documentation for Tails 1.8 …

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Author: Michael English
Date:  
To: The Tails public development discussion list, sajolida
Subject: Re: [Tails-dev] Update Electrum documentation for Tails 1.8 upgrade to version 2.5.4
Sajolida,

s7r thinks that the SPV documentation that I wrote earlier should not be
changed. You had stated at one point that you did not want to document
the change of default base unit. Could you state your current opinions
based on the conversation so far? Perhaps you could add the small
non-controversial changes that I listed at the bottom of my previous
email until we can come to a consensus about the other proposals.

Cheers,
Michael English

Michael English:
> My main goal with the documentation is informing users of the
> vulnerabilities of Electrum in Tails to promote secure practices.
>
> I don't think that Bitcoin should be installed in Tails in the first
> place for the following reasons:
> Bitcoin is unstable software/protocol
> Tails runs off of memory
> We have to trust a remote server
> Tor traffic can be manipulated
>
> Would you log in to your bank over Tor even if it was encrypted with
> SSL? Money can't be stolen with Electrum, but the SPV verification can
> cause servers to withhold information from their clients leading to an
> incorrect balance.
>
> Until we can get the prefnet=tor option, I would like to recommend that
> the user manually selects a trusted onion server in place of the SPV
> documentation to protect against an out-of-date bitcoin balance. Then,
> the user would have a strongly encrypted connection exchanging accurate
> information about the bitcoin network.
>
> Also, we should include the change of default base unit and link to
> https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Units .
>
> I have a few small grammar edits and clarifications to the first few
> lines of the existing documentation:
> Remove comma after passphrase, put a comma after seed, and change so to
> lowercase.
> Also, change the period after blockchain to a comma and change the so to
> lowercase again.
> Add “for extra security” after “offline working session.”
>
> If you disagree, please tell me what specific information should be
> written instead.
>
> Cheers,
> Michael English
>