Transcript

Intro 1:Intro 1:

Wait, wait you're listening- (laughs)

Intro 2:

Kay.

Jad Abumrad:

All right.

Intro 2:

Kay.

Jad Abumrad:

All right.

Intro 2:

You're listening-

Intro 1:

... listening-

Intro 2:

... to Radiolab.

Intro 1:

Radiolab.

Intro 2:

From-

Intro 1:

... WYNC.

Intro 2:

C?

Intro 1:

Yep.

Jad Abumrad:

Hey, I'm Jad Abumrad.

Molly Webster:

I'm Molly Webster.

Jad Abumrad:

This is Radiolab. Uh, Robert Krulwich will be back with us very soon. But today, a story from you.

Molly Webster:

Well, I guess I was just thinking I should probably tell you just the, um, Morgan and I back story of-

Jad Abumrad:

Yes.

Molly Webster:

... of how I heard about the story.

Jad Abumrad:

Cool.

Molly Webster:

So, Morgan and I went to grad school together at NYU so I guess I've known her for almost 11 years.

Jad Abumrad:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

And we're, we're, we're holed up in my apartment, I don't know, this was like No-, last November or something. She comes over. Um, she's sittin' on the giant, I have a big floor pillow, like a Turkish floor pillow. Just-

Jad Abumrad:

Of course you do.

Molly Webster:

... just sittin' on (laughs) just, just sittin' on the floor pillow. And then she's like, "Are you ready to hear the story?". And I said, "Yeah." And she's like, "Okay, I need you to take the battery out of your phone." (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Really?

Molly Webster:

Yeah. And I-

Jad Abumrad:

That's what, she really said that?

Molly Webster:

... and I was like, "What? I have an iPhone. I can't take the battery out of it." And she goes, "Okay, uh, I need you to power it down and put it in another room under a pillow."

Jad Abumrad:

What?

Molly Webster:

(laughs) I was like, "What is going on?" And she-

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs) And then at, by this point she's taking the battery out of her phone. So I, I do it.

Jad Abumrad:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Molly Webster:

I put it in the e-, in my bedroom and I put it under pillows and I turned it off, I came back, I sat down. And then, um, she starts telling me essentially about the ceremony. About going to the launch of this new, uh, currency. Which involved her flying across the country to live in a hotel room for a number of days with a bunch of strangers and then something happened because she came back, um, seemingly paranoid, at least s- in so much as she was hiding phones under pillows.

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) What was it that happened?

Molly Webster:

W- i- it takes a few steps. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) Okay.

Molly Webster:

So let's start with step one, which is-

Morgan Peck:

Hi.

Molly Webster:

... which is Morgan.

Morgan Peck:

I'm Morgan Peck.

Jad Abumrad:

How would you identify yourself? Professionally.

Morgan Peck:

Professionally, I'm a freelance journalist.

Molly Webster:

And in my eyes Morgan has become, like, the historian of the world of digital money.

Morgan Peck:

I started writing about neuroscience, but quickly found out about Bitcoin about a year into my writing, 2011, and have pretty much been writing about it ever since.

Molly Webster:

Now, yes, a lot of people when they hear about digital money, they think-

News 1:

Ransomware. The hijackers held the files ransom, demanding roughly 650 euros paid in Bitcoin.

News 2:

Bitcoin, the virtual currency.

Molly Webster:

Obviously, it has become associated with cyber crime. But for Morgan...

Morgan Peck:

No, no, no, no, no.

Molly Webster:

What attracted her to this whole world, what made her go...

Morgan Peck:

Oh my God, this thing is amazing.

Molly Webster:

She was, like, pulled in by the idealism of it.

Morgan Peck:

There was an extremely active community of people who were talking about, you know, um, completely subverting the financial system, at a time when the financial system was not trusted and was collapsing. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Because Morgan says the birth of Bitcoin goes back to, well, remember 2008?

Morgan Peck:

Boom.

News 3:

Traders here working the phones say a lot of their customers are freaked out.

Morgan Peck:

2008 was the big implosion.

News 3:

What in the world is happening on Wall Street?

Molly Webster:

In September the stock markets crashed, the banks failed.

News 1:

The DOW traders are standing there watching in amazement and I don't blame 'em.

News 2:

Unbelievable.

Molly Webster:

There was bailout.

News 1:

You know, this shakes your core. This shakes your trust in American institutions.

Molly Webster:

And then, just a few months later...

Morgan Peck:

2009, January.

News 1:

It's a hot topic on Wall Street right now, it's very interesting. Digital money called-

News 3:

Bitcoin.

News 2:

Bitcoin.

News 1:

Bitcoin. I can't resist...

Morgan Peck:

Bitcoin showed up.

Molly Webster:

Oh, so Bitcoin was after the big collapse.

Morgan Peck:

It was after, and it was very much a response to that, definitely.

Molly Webster:

'Cause here was this currency that was decentralized, which means it's run and monitored by all the people who use it, which means you don't need a federal reserve. So at the beginning, a lot of people saw Bitcoin as a way to sort of take the power back from the big banks that had just (beep)ed everybody over.

Morgan Peck:

Libertarians were really into it. They thought that it was going to crash d-, it was going to crumble the columns of, of (laughs) every power structure in, you know, the world. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Obviously that didn't happen, it did not take down the world. But Bitcoin has not gon away. It's been a decade; it's still around. But if you talk to people on the inside, they'll tell you one of the things that has dogged Bitcoin from the beginning is this issue of privacy.

Morgan Peck:

The way that the, the, uh, technology works is that, uh, it tracks every single transaction that's every made on the network.

Molly Webster:

Any time anyone with a Bitcoin buys a coffee or a pound of heroin, that transaction is kept in something called the public ledger.

Morgan Peck:

Bitcoin has a ledger, public ledger.

Jad Abumrad:

And is that something that each person has?

Morgan Peck:

It's out there for anyone to see.

Jad Abumrad:

Really?

Morgan Peck:

Yep.

Jad Abumrad:

So every single transaction that's every been done-

Morgan Peck:

Every transaction ever.

Jad Abumrad:

... is, is-

Morgan Peck:

Right there.

Jad Abumrad:

Well that's not private at all.

Morgan Peck:

No. But people thought it was private at the beginning because, oh, we're using the pseudonyms.

Molly Webster:

In other words, in the ledger, you never see anyone's actual name.

Morgan Peck:

There are no names on, in Bitcoin.

Molly Webster:

Like I wouldn't be Molly. I'd be T957G.

Morgan Peck:

The problem is that while there are no names attached, the behavior is out there for anyone to see.

Molly Webster:

Turns out it's really not that hard to match this, like, string of characters with the person that it represents out in the real world. You could just kind of Google it on the internet, see if it pops up anywhere else, what it's associated with. And then you kind of figure out who the person is. And then you can go back into the Bitcoin ledger and search their entire history, can figure out all their business dealings, all their personal dealings, who they know, who they don't know, possibly who their bank is. And you know, people have tried to solve this problem with Bitcoin.

Morgan Peck:

But, there are companies now that actually specialize in doing the network analysis of the Bitcoin block chain and they do it for companies who want to, um, make sure that they're not transacting with, you know, criminals, people who have had, th- they're specifi-

Jad Abumrad:

Wait there are companies that are actively trying to de-anonymize people?

Morgan Peck:

Oh yeah.

Jad Abumrad:

Wow.

Molly Webster:

And so one of the puzzles that, uh, all the internet people think about is, is there a way to get the best of both worlds? Can you have the decentralization that comes with digital money, but can you also get privacy? Almost like cash. I take a dollar bill out of my pocket, I walk down the street, I give it to someone, they give it to someone. No one can trace that money. Can you get the decentralization that comes with digital money and can you wrap that up with the privacy that you get with paper money? And that question-

Zooko Wilcox:

Testing, testing.

Molly Webster:

... brings us to this guy.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello, Zooko here.

Molly Webster:

To somebody named Zooko Wilcox.

Zooko Wilcox:

I'm Zooko and I'm in a different room.

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Okay. He is our master of the ceremony. I have to say you do, um, everyone's like pretty excited I'm talking to a guy named Zooko.

Zooko Wilcox:

Mm.

Molly Webster:

Like, it's just a good name, Zooko.

Zooko Wilcox:

Thanks.

Molly Webster:

Yay, Zooko!

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So anyhow, Zooko is...

Morgan Peck:

He's been working on digital currencies for a long time.

Molly Webster:

And he's extremely trusted.

Jad Abumrad:

Is he a charismatic leader type of thing?

Molly Webster:

Yeah, he is. When he first encountered Bitcoin, he was, like, "Cool."

Zooko Wilcox:

Yes, but I was concerned about the privacy applications.

Molly Webster:

Because...

Morgan Peck:

He's a pretty hardcore cipher punk.

Jad Abumrad:

Oh my God, it's like worlds upon worlds that are opening for us.

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Cipher punks.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah.

Molly Webster:

She said this, it is group of people that care deeply about how to make the internet more private.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think privacy is a human right and that it's a necessary condition for the exercise of, of free choice, of morality and of political participation and of everything that's, uh, of intimacy, everything that's most important it as humans.

Molly Webster:

So this whole thing with Bitcoin and the privacy problem... right up his alley.

Zooko Wilcox:

So I went out my way, studied the Bitcoin source code and I contributed some suggestions and yes, I immediately started fantasizing about what could be better.

Molly Webster:

So then he, being like the privacy, security cipher punk guru (laughs), he becomes the leader of something called Zcash.

Zooko Wilcox:

Zcash.

Morgan Peck:

And Zcash, really it's main, um, contribution to this ecosystem is privacy.

Zooko Wilcox:

So there's this thing called a zero knowledge proof.

Molly Webster:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

And it's a mathematical invention that mathematicians had come up with.

Molly Webster:

It requires something called the z-SNARK parameters to be baked into the protocol. Oh my God. I asked hours of questions and it got me into a conversation about circles and graphs and the shape of numbers.

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

The shape of, what I mean is, the shape of what's, of, of possibility, of-

Molly Webster:

What I came away with (laughs) was that it allows you to prove that something is true without revealing anything about the thing you're trying to prove is true.

Jad Abumrad:

Wow.

Molly Webster:

You just-

Jad Abumrad:

I just need to-

Molly Webster:

I just want you to-

Jad Abumrad:

... lie down now. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Take that and run.

Zooko Wilcox:

This where computer science and mathematics start to overlap into wizardry here.

Molly Webster:

All you need to know is that Zcash promises to give you decentralization with this like, buffet of privacy. But... Zcash has its own flaw.

Zooko Wilcox:

An unfortunate vulnerability in the math.

Molly Webster:

In order to create the currency of Zcash you have to first create a number.

Zooko Wilcox:

A certain, enormous number.

Molly Webster:

And then you use that number to do a bunch of math. And then, like, boom! You have the currency. But it all starts with this number, this key. Problem with that is...

Morgan Peck:

In this system, in this system if somebody got a hold of the private key they could counterfeit Zcash coins.

Zooko Wilcox:

They could counterfeit money.

Morgan Peck:

Just make new coins-

Molly Webster:

Millions and millions and millions of new coins.

Morgan Peck:

... out of thin air.

Zooko Wilcox:

You could cheat.

Morgan Peck:

That's a really big problem when you have a, uh, anonymous currency.

Molly Webster:

'Cause no one would ever know.

Morgan Peck:

Nope.

Molly Webster:

Bitcoin, since it's a public ledger, you can actually see if there's any funny business going on. That's actually why they keep it open.

Morgan Peck:

Right, the lack of privacy in Bitcoin is a security measure.

Molly Webster:

But here, no one would ever know. So the challenge is, how do you get people to buy into a system that has this, like, major vulnerability albeit just right at the very beginning.

Morgan Peck:

There's this one moment where, you know, you have to trust people in a way that's completely existentially defining of the currency.

Molly Webster:

So this is what Zooko's up against. How do I, if I want super privacy, which he does, how do I generate this number in such a way that no one steals it. Not me, not anyone else. And how do I prove to all of the people that might want to use Zcash later that in this tiny little window of, of creation nothing untoward has happened that, that the number has never been tampered with, that human eyes have never been laid upon it. You know, that the entire creation of this system remains pure.

Jad Abumrad:

Is i-, this is very much like an immaculate conception. You're, like-

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

... no humans can have sex to make this baby. But there needs to be a baby. But we almost have to examine the act of sex to make sure-

Molly Webster:

Right.

Jad Abumrad:

... there is no physical contact.

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Is it like that?

Molly Webster:

That's so good. Okay, so here we are. Zooko decides...

Zooko Wilcox:

We'll have a ceremony. The most secure, most sophisticated cryptographic ceremony that's every been performed.

Molly Webster:

Wow, okay.

Morgan Peck:

Here's the thing. While it's trivial to make your own currency, it is not trivial to, um, inspire trust. That's what money is, is the agreement between people to use it and to honor that sort of social contract and the creation of value, to me that's like alchemy. Um, and it's a moment of creation.

Morgan Peck:

I think I'm walking down the street near you, Molly-

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Greenpoint.

Morgan Peck:

... and I get a text message on Signal-

Molly Webster:

A private messenger app.

Morgan Peck:

... uh from Zooko that's like, "Hey, we want you to, we want you to be there."

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Yeah, I was (laughs) so excited. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

You were chosen.

Morgan Peck:

I was chosen, yeah.

Molly Webster:

And, but did you even know what you were being invited to?

Morgan Peck:

No. I had no idea. But I was like, I have to do this. I mean, I cannot miss this. Even if Zcash doesn't make it, even if, you know, it collapses it seemed like a historical moment. So Zooko basically said just wait for our bat call. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So about two weeks later, the bat call.

Morgan Peck:

Come to this, uh, coffee store in Boulder.

Molly Webster:

So Morgan gets on a flight to Denver, rents a car to Boulder, and goes to the coffee shop.

Morgan Peck:

Zooko's there.

Molly Webster:

Standing next to the barista counter.

Morgan Peck:

And actually, he has a huge paper map with him. Spread out all over, like, the barista's area, he's like up in their grill. And then, uh, this other guy Nat showed up.

Molly Webster:

Friend of Zooko's.

Morgan Peck:

Who, uh, was going to film it all.

Molly Webster:

Was that, was that for you? You wanted everything recorded?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah. And it was to serve as a security mechanism and documentation for the public.

Molly Webster:

More on that in a second.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then... Okay.

Nathaniel K:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

They leave the coffee shop, go over to Nat's van.

Morgan Peck:

He mics us both up. I told him they could mic me up.

Zooko Wilcox:

And we're gonna, now we're gonna turn off all of our cell phones. So that if there were any hackers they wouldn't be able to track where we were physically.

Morgan Peck:

I'm trying to think if I have to say goodbye to anyone.

Zooko Wilcox:

We were like, okay. Now we've got the van, we've got our cell phones turned off. The next thing we needed to do-

Morgan Peck:

We're, we're next.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah we're going to the computer store. Was to acquire a computer. Because, like, if there was some hacker who was planning to steal the key, they could have...

Molly Webster:

You know, already planted some malware or tracking device on Zooko's personal laptop.

Zooko Wilcox:

Before we even started. So we all piled into the van, set off. Yeah we can just start heading north.

Molly Webster:

To get a clean computer.

Morgan Peck:

He's decided to go to Denver for this.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah.

Morgan Peck:

But (laughs) he doesn't want to use his phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

No. Hey, I think I need to use my paper map.

Morgan Peck:

Because what if somebody's like, tracking what he's looking at.

Zooko Wilcox:

Let's go straight.

Morgan Peck:

Nat is doing much of this recording while he's driving.

Nathaniel K:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

If this thing is where we think it is...

Jad Abumrad:

Do you have like a black hoodie over you, like, Hezbollah style?

Morgan Peck:

No... no.

Molly Webster:

So they're driving for a little bit.

Zooko Wilcox:

When...

Molly Webster:

All of a sudden they make this pit stop.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) We were like, "Hey, there's a costume store."

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, this is perfect.

Morgan Peck:

This is the right spot.

Zooko Wilcox:

Way to go, Nat. (laughs) We were like, okay, next stop. We're here for a wizard hat. Wizard hat.

Storeperson 1:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Can I see your wizard hat section?

Storeperson 1:

Yeah.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So they walk through this big costume store passed witches hats, tiaras...

Zooko Wilcox:

Hmm...

Molly Webster:

What is the wizard hat you settled on?

Zooko Wilcox:

Um, ooh, it was a Gandalf hat. Gandalf hat. Yeah I love the Gandalf hat.

Molly Webster:

Ah.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think it's good.

Molly Webster:

That is appropriate. The greatest wizard of all.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah. So that's gonna be a winner, thanks.

Storeperson 1:

Yeah, of course.

Molly Webster:

And then... back to the mission at hand.

Morgan Peck:

Van, Denver, computer.

Zooko Wilcox:

We drove down using our paper map with our cellphones off to the computer store.

Molly Webster:

They get there.

Storeperson 2:

Howdy.

Molly Webster:

Walk in.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh yeah. This is the place.

Molly Webster:

Do a little computer shopping.

Zooko Wilcox:

Can we get a side by side comparison of two different ones.

Storeperson 2:

Sure.

Molly Webster:

A few minutes later...

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, I want this one.

Molly Webster:

Zooko gets his computer.

Morgan Peck:

And at that point, the computer is sacred.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's called an i7-6700.

Molly Webster:

... which henceforth is given a new name.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's called the compute node.

Jad Abumrad:

And why is it scared?

Molly Webster:

Well, because this is the computer that will hold the secret number, the number that will give birth to an entirely new currency. So-

Storeperson 2:

All right, sir.

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, thank you very much.

Molly Webster:

... got the compute node, got back in the van, got back to Boulder.

Zooko Wilcox:

And drove to an area that had hotels that we knew of. But where's this hotel?

Morgan Peck:

And we're going around to, like, the hotels in Boulder.

Zooko Wilcox:

Is it this way?

Morgan Peck:

And they're all full.

Zooko Wilcox:

I don't know if they have ethernet in their hotel room.

Morgan Peck:

Or they don't have an ethernet connection.

Zooko Wilcox:

So then we go to another hotel.

Morgan Peck:

I liked that hotel it was really...

Molly Webster:

And another.

Zooko Wilcox:

She wasn't clear on the notion of ethernet.

Morgan Peck:

It's like 7:00 at night. Ahh, what's the plan here?

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) Yes.

Morgan Peck:

The idea was, if you don't know what you're gonna do- (laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

... then they don't know what they're gonna do. Uh, so this is actually a security measure, uh, like if you're totally in the dark about what you're doing, then some hackers, they can't, they can't mount an attack. It's fool proof. (laughs) Yeah.

Molly Webster:

But-

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

... eventually...

Zooko Wilcox:

Millennium has rooms and it has ethernet.

Molly Webster:

They find hotel.

Morgan Peck:

Oh my God.

Zooko Wilcox:

And she even went and double checked.

Molly Webster:

Zooko actually has Nat book the hotel room.

Zooko Wilcox:

For two nights.

Nathaniel K:

Do you want me to come with you?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yep. Do you have a key?

Morgan Peck:

We all check into one room.

Zooko Wilcox:

Ground floor. It's not particularly fancy.

Morgan Peck:

Couple tables, you know, you got your two beds.

Molly Webster:

Then they set up.

Zooko Wilcox:

We're a well organized machine.

Molly Webster:

They totally transform the place.

Morgan Peck:

In general, I'm not gonna help out. They gave me a bed to chill out on.

Zooko Wilcox:

You can concentrate on, on careful observing.

Morgan Peck:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

So what we did was, we stripped the room of all of the lamps and the telephone.

Morgan Peck:

Everything on all the counters gets shoved somewhere.

Zooko Wilcox:

All of that stuff, cleared it away into the closet or the bathtub.

Morgan Peck:

What are you doing?

Zooko Wilcox:

In addition, we-

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, I'm unplugging the TV.

Zooko Wilcox:

... didn't want like the television, for example, which could be remotely controlled by an adversary.

Molly Webster:

So they unplug it, slide it under one of the beds...

Zooko Wilcox:

Goodbye, TV. You know what? Another reason is I hate TVs. Television is the worst.

Molly Webster:

Then they grab the table where they're gonna set up the compute node.

Morgan Peck:

Want to explain again why you're keeping it away from the wall?

Molly Webster:

Pull that out a ways.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh... there's a teeny tiny chance that a team of spies rented the room next door and set up a giant antenna on the other side of the wall.

Molly Webster:

This is like the dopest attack that Zooko is planning against, called side channel attacks.

Zooko Wilcox:

And that's a message by which you could use an antenna.

Molly Webster:

Or like a really high tech microphone...

Morgan Peck:

... to figure out what a computer is doing.

Molly Webster:

For example with some crazy microphone you could listen in to the computer's processor and if you heard something like... Oh, that's Diffie-Hellman key exchange. Or... oh yeah, this is obviously figuring out the full 40960-bit RSA decryption key. Or... oh hey, that's the new beeps video. Or whatever.

Morgan Peck:

So...

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, so please don't put anything on this desk from here on out.

Morgan Peck:

It's pulled away from the wall about, I don't know, five feet, just in case there's somebody set up next door.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then started loading in all the cameras and equipment.

Morgan Peck:

Battery backs, junk food, but then there was also a whole security camera set up.

Zooko Wilcox:

One cool, one really cool thing about these security cameras is that they don't have a radio.

Morgan Peck:

Four security cameras which were from the '80s.

Zooko Wilcox:

Before security cameras came with wifi. Which means we had to buy antique security cameras.

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). And their nigh vision security cameras.

Molly Webster:

And they set those up.

Zooko Wilcox:

So that you could see the other cameras from the first cameras. So you could sell that no ninja snuck in there and like tampered with one of the cameras during the process either.

Molly Webster:

And this security camera set up was, uh, one of the key points in trying to create what Morgan was talking about earlier.

Morgan Peck:

This alchemy.

Molly Webster:

Faith.

Zooko Wilcox:

Trust.

Molly Webster:

Whatever.

Zooko Wilcox:

So the security mechanism this was, this was going to catch any shenanigans.

Molly Webster:

And then Zooko was gonna post this security footage to the internet so, uh, experts, security experts, could scan it an make up their minds. Could the ceremony be trusted.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hold on, where are you gonna sleep tonight?

Morgan Peck:

I mean, I-

Zooko Wilcox:

We could all camp.

Morgan Peck:

... can sleep anywhere.

Zooko Wilcox:

So we set all that stuff up.

Molly Webster:

It's like 9:00 now, 10:00.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, it was late, and, um, I took the computer that we used, the so called compute node, and then from that moment forward, I kept that thing like within arms reach for f-, for 48 hours or so. Oh my God. It was a little bit exhausting trying to be paranoid, and it-

Molly Webster:

It was exhausting trying to be paranoid?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, like I slept with it that night, um, in my bed. I kept my, kept my arm around it.

Molly Webster:

Goodnight sweet prince, and flights of and angels sing me to thy rest.

Jad Abumrad:

Coming up... a rude awakening.

Andrei:

This is Andrei Karameto from the port town of [inaudible 00:22:14], Texas. Radiolab is supported in part by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, enhancing public understanding of science and technology in the modern world. More information about Sloan at www.sloan.org.

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Jad Abumrad:

Jad.

Molly Webster:

Molly.

Jad Abumrad:

Radiolab. Back to Boulder.

Morgan Peck:

Sorry, I can't open the door. That would be helping you.

Zooko Wilcox:

No. So.

Molly Webster:

It's the next morning.

Zooko Wilcox:

Saturday morning.

Molly Webster:

Zooko sits down at his personal computer and he starts making all these...

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello.

Molly Webster:

... video chat calls.

Video Chat:

Hello.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, hi,

Molly Webster:

He calls up a guy in D.C.

Video Chat:

Hey Moses.

Molly Webster:

A guy in Texas.

Video Chat:

Does anyone tell you you sound like Tom Hardy? (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Also-

Video Chat:

Cool, that's pretty cool.

Molly Webster:

Florida.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, really appreciate your help.

Molly Webster:

Slovenia.

Video Chat:

Is John on mine? Let me see. Yes.

Zooko Wilcox:

Good job, pit boss.

Molly Webster:

Another guy in California.

Video Chat:

Thanks.

Molly Webster:

And then there was this mysterious one.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, Fabrese is ready.

Molly Webster:

That was s- only referred to as Fabrese and didn't know where he was. I didn't find out until afterwards that he was actually driving from Vancouver across British Columbia (laughs).

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) What? Who are all these guys?

Molly Webster:

So, for Zooko, it's, it's very unacceptable. He wants to take as much of the trust, you gotta trust me, out of it as possible. And that's what he tried to do. So even though Zooko's gonna record all of this footage, put it up on line, l- later somebody who's gonna be watching that could be like...

Zooko Wilcox:

This was a trick.

Molly Webster:

It's all smoke and mirrors.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's like stage magic.

Molly Webster:

Like, sure, you say you recorded everything but maybe you manipulated the footage. Maybe you didn't even set the cameras up the way you said you did.

Zooko Wilcox:

And so...

Molly Webster:

So what Zooko decided to do was get in touch with all these guys all over the world and try and decentralize this trust.

Morgan Peck:

So, there were six stations.

Molly Webster:

Each with their own compute nodes, security cameras set up, ready to help Zooko make this big, random number.

Morgan Peck:

The private key, so, each s- of the six stations was actually creating one piece of this key.

Molly Webster:

That way they'll be no one person that makes the entire key. It'll just be these little pieces that actually won't every come in contact with one another.

Morgan Peck:

The idea was, nobody will actually have the key itself.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hope this works.

Molly Webster:

So everyone's got their compute node powered on.

Video Chat:

You have to hold the power, okay.

Molly Webster:

And then...

Zooko Wilcox:

Diagnostics complete. Press enter when you're ready to begin the ceremony.

Molly Webster:

... the ceremony begins.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, now this is the top secret part. Where's the, the special box? Yeah. We have to make sure that nobody can, uh, guess or read this secret.

Molly Webster:

Zooko closes the blinds.

Zooko Wilcox:

And so, I'm gonna cover my keyboard with this special box. So I took a cardboard box that one of the computers had come in and sawed it in half so that it was, uh, a half of a cardboard box.

Molly Webster:

He'd put it over the keyboard of the compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, hold on. There. Ready? And then I slid my hands under the cardboard box.

Molly Webster:

And then... he starts punching in all these random letters and numbers into the compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

Just like pound on it, like-

Morgan Peck:

Just, blah.

Zooko Wilcox:

... Cecil Taylor it.

Morgan Peck:

Mash it. Cat walking across the computer.

Jad Abumrad:

Okay.

Morgan Peck:

Yep. And once he's done.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think we're done with the cardboard box. It's served its purpose and now we can auction it on eBay.

Molly Webster:

What the compute node does it is it takes all those random characters and it combines it with more random characters that are generated, like, inside the computer until finally it creates a part of the key.

Zooko Wilcox:

And each of the other five participants had to do the same thing.

Molly Webster:

Do you see who made their piece of the key? Florida, Texas, Slovenia, Canada. Okay, so you've got one key broken into six pieces and the next step is to get all of the pieces to work together to create on thing, which is Zcash. And you wanna do this in such a way that those pieces never touch each other, that they remain hidden so that n- no person could ever get their hands on the power of the whole key. Whew.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah. So...

Molly Webster:

Thank God there's convoluted math to save the day.

Morgan Peck:

Um, may- I think it's a good time to just say what was happening.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

Three, two, one.

Morgan Peck:

So...

Molly Webster:

First thing's first.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, here I come.

Molly Webster:

The guy in California gets on the horn.

Video Chat:

So the stations are Andrew, Peter.

Molly Webster:

He gives everyone basically, like, the batting order and then-

Video Chat:

All right hang on... now.

Molly Webster:

... he sends a message called the go message to station one.

Video Chat:

Preparing the, doing my computations, now.

Molly Webster:

Station one guy and his compute node do some math on his piece of the key.

Video Chat:

Yeah. Okay, um, my compute node just finished. Hell yeah.

Molly Webster:

His compute node spits out a number.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then, it burns it onto DVD.

Molly Webster:

Why DVD? Because all the guys at these stations have ripped out the wifi in their compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

'Cause we don't want a hacker to be able to hack into the compute node.

Molly Webster:

This, by the way, has a pretty cool name.

Zooko Wilcox:

This is called air gapped.

Morgan Peck:

You have a protective field, basically, around the computer that holds the secret.

Molly Webster:

A field of air. Anyway, once the computer is done burning to this DVD, the guy at station one takes it an walks it to another computer.

Video Chat:

It's receiving data as you can see.

Molly Webster:

Uploads it to the internet.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, great.

Molly Webster:

And then the guy at station two.

Peter Van B:

[inaudible 00:27:55]

Molly Webster:

This guy.

Peter Van B:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Molly Webster:

Peter Van Bachenberg.

Peter Van B:

So what happens is, the software I run on my connected computer-

Molly Webster:

... downloads that little answer, puts it onto a DVD.

Peter Van B:

[inaudible 00:28:05] I take the DVD out of the connected computer, walk across the air gap, if you will.

Peter Van B:

Um, I'm putting in the compute node.

Molly Webster:

Then the compute node takes that little answer, combines it with Peter's piece of the key and then...

Zooko Wilcox:

Math. So now is it computing?

Peter Van B:

Yep.

Molly Webster:

Again, the compute node keeps Peter's piece of the key a secret, spits out a new answer, a bigger answer.

Peter Van B:

And then I write on a different DVD...

Molly Webster:

... that new answer.

Zooko Wilcox:

Quick!

Molly Webster:

Takes it out of the compute node.

Peter Van B:

Lift it over the gap.

Molly Webster:

Brings it back across the air gap.

Peter Van B:

To the networked computer.

Molly Webster:

Uploads his answer, then station three grabs and combines it with their key, gets a little bit more of an answer.

Zooko Wilcox:

So exciting.

Molly Webster:

Then station four.

Zooko Wilcox:

My compute node gets to do it's thing.

Molly Webster:

Same thing DVD across the air gap, combine it with their piece of the key.

Zooko Wilcox:

Math. Like serious math.

Molly Webster:

And then you get a little bit more of the answer and just rinse, watch, repeat.

Video Chat:

Wooh!

Molly Webster:

Station five.

Video Chat:

Huzzah!

Molly Webster:

Six. Back to the top of the order. And throughout this entire process the individual shards of the key are kept separate and secret. Yet together, they're doing the math that's getting closer and closer and closer to the final key that will launch Zcash.

Molly Webster:

Was there a, like a, c- t- t- t- t- a titter in the air?

Morgan Peck:

Uh... no. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

I mean it really, it's deet de-deet deet de-deet de-deet.

Zooko Wilcox:

Did you bring a deck of cards?

Nathaniel K:

I brought juggling balls.

Zooko Wilcox:

Cool. I can juggle three balls.

Nathaniel K:

[inaudible 00:29:27]

Molly Webster:

Because the thing is, every one of those math steps...

Morgan Peck:

... took about an hour.

Zooko Wilcox:

Who's next on the list?

Molly Webster:

And they had to do like, three full rotations through this order.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, hey, somebody tell Moses.

Molly Webster:

So most of the weekend was just kind of sittin' around.

Zooko Wilcox:

Shaun?

Molly Webster:

Waiting.

Zooko Wilcox:

Peter?

Molly Webster:

And waiting.

Zooko Wilcox:

Anyone?

Peter Van B:

What's that?

Zooko Wilcox:

Tell Moses.

Peter Van B:

No.

Morgan Peck:

Um, so, yeah we're hanging out.

Video Chat:

Okay, uh, my compute node just finished.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, good to know.

Morgan Peck:

Uh, Zooko has brought along some pork rinds. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

And sour cream, but he's dipping, he's dipping pork rinds in the sour cream.

Zooko Wilcox:

Cool, I'm gonna get our coffee.

Nathaniel K:

Hmm.

Morgan Peck:

Also... napping. Which is the only sleeping that's happened, like, there's like, you know, and hour here... hour there.

Molly Webster:

And as the hours roll by, things are going really well, people are getting their math done, they're passing along these answers, they're getting closer to having their key, when, maybe half way into the process, things get strange.

Molly Webster:

They're each lying in their beds just, kind of, chilling out. Morgan was just waking, Zooko was playing on a tablet.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then, oh...

Morgan Peck:

What?

Zooko Wilcox:

I groaned and said, uh, oh there's work to do. Back to work.

Molly Webster:

So Zooko gets up and he starts talking.

Zooko Wilcox:

When, which is, uh, w- why is my voice echoing back at me?

Morgan Peck:

There's feedback.

Zooko Wilcox:

A feedback loop started echoing. You know, like, going beep boop beep beep beep beep. Beep beep beep.

Morgan Peck:

It was like, uh, wh- incongruous noise, make it stop.

Nathaniel K:

I'm muting all my mics. I don't know where it's feeding back from. Probably this one.

Molly Webster:

He, like, turns off the mic.

Zooko Wilcox:

Ah. And so I was, like, oh okay.

Molly Webster:

And he sits down at the Google Hangout computer.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hook me up with that.

Morgan Peck:

Oh.

Zooko Wilcox:

A tester, tester.

Molly Webster:

And this echo comes back. And if you look at the video you see, he, like, just freezes.

Zooko Wilcox:

Where's that coming from?

Molly Webster:

And then just turns his head to the left, looking off camera.

Zooko Wilcox:

Why do we have play out over there now?

Molly Webster:

At this point, everyone in the room just sort of falls silent and is lookin' around.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah, I start, like, pin pointing it to, like, the, the part of the room that has the security cameras monitor.

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test. Where's this coming from? Test, test. Test, test.

Morgan Peck:

I start listening to that, and I'm like, I think it's coming from over here.

Morgan Peck:

Do it again.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello.

Zooko Wilcox:

I stopped and I said, uh, wait, wait a minute. W- what is playing out over there?

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test.

Zooko Wilcox:

And I looked in the direction of Morgan's bed.

Morgan Peck:

And then I turn around, I pick up my phone.

Morgan Peck:

It's my phone.

Morgan Peck:

And the echo's coming out of my speaker.

Jad Abumrad:

It's coming out of your phone.

Morgan Peck:

It's coming out of my phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Why is your phone playing out sound?

Morgan Peck:

I have no idea.

Zooko Wilcox:

You don't- stop, no, don't mess with it. I wanna see what's going on. It's playing off in this way.

Molly Webster:

He zeroes in on this mic that's on the corner of the computer that's doing the Google Hangouts.

Zooko Wilcox:

Did you connect your phone to this Hangout?

Molly Webster:

He leans over to that.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hold on.

Molly Webster:

Starts fiddling with it.

Morgan Peck:

What?

Zooko Wilcox:

It's coming from this way.

Morgan Peck:

Yep. So, is there a way, hmm...

Molly Webster:

He stands, he sits.

Morgan Peck:

I don't know.

Zooko Wilcox:

Wait, wait, wait, I know it's not coming from the mic. It's coming fr-, it's not coming from this mic, it's coming from the Google Hangout, 'cause I just muted it in software, now it's gone. So my voice from Google Hangout, okay, let's hear Peter's voice. Peter? Uh, I wanna test audio coming from you. Say some stuff.

Peter Van B:

Test. Testing. Testing. All good men [crosstalk 00:34:01] country.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, good.

Morgan Peck:

And then I think Zooko says something like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Morgan, why is your phone playing the audio from our Google Hangout?

Morgan Peck:

Why is our chat coming through your phone?

Jad Abumrad:

Oh, wait. So the audio coming out of her phone is not originating from in the room, it's, it's somehow the Google ch- Hangout chat? That's coming through her phone?

Molly Webster:

Yes.

Jad Abumrad:

That's so weird.

Molly Webster:

Very weird.

Morgan Peck:

It... it was like your cat had just turned into a monster, or, and just started talking to you or like, just turned on you. So, I'm kneeling on the bed with it and I look at it and I think that's when I just, like, threw it, threw it on the bed. Revulsion.

Molly Webster:

So...

Zooko Wilcox:

Can you turn on the screen?

Molly Webster:

... he picks up the phone from the end of her bed and hands it to her and is like, "Can you pull up the screen?"

Zooko Wilcox:

What all, what all apps are running on this phone?

Morgan Peck:

I don't run any apps.

Zooko Wilcox:

Is that doing video, Nat?

Nathaniel K:

Yeah, I'm recording.

Molly Webster:

At this point, the cameras have, like, swiveled so they're focused on the phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, um.

Morgan Peck:

Man, I don't know h- Should we throw it in the river?

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) No. Can you, is this Android?

Morgan Peck:

Yep.

Zooko Wilcox:

What, how do you, can you, like, get a list of apps running, like, by swiping down from the top, or something?

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). I think, I don't know, I'm sorry, I don't-

Zooko Wilcox:

How 'bout that-

Morgan Peck:

... I don't use this, like, at all.

Zooko Wilcox:

... if you swipe down there's that thing that's next to the thing. Here we- what about that thing? No?

Morgan Peck:

Wait, yes. But just give me a second. Give me a second. What's running? Here.

Zooko Wilcox:

I don't see a Hangouts app running.

Morgan Peck:

I def-, well, I didn't s-

Zooko Wilcox:

Test.

Morgan Peck:

... run a Hangouts.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think it stopped. Here, listen to it. Test, test, test. It's stopped, hasn't it?

Molly Webster:

Suddenly the phone stops doing the weird thing it was doing.

Zooko Wilcox:

The freaky audio play out thing.

Jad Abumrad:

It went away.

Molly Webster:

It, it went away, which feels hacker-y.

Jad Abumrad:

Ooh, yeah.

Molly Webster:

Like the hackers have been had and they just realized it.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, that's what I think. That there was an attacker and they screwed up and accidentally turned on the speaker.

Morgan Peck:

Now I feel paranoid.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, it's weird, is it, creepy.

Morgan Peck:

No, this isn't just like, I don't know, I've been, what do you mean, hacked? What kind of hacked would we have been?

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, you find out that private messages and what's been had, had access to them. Um, or that people have been s-, uh, sending messages spoofed to be from you-

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Zooko Wilcox:

... to your friends or colleagues.

Morgan Peck:

Okay, I've never had that happen, whoa.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's kind of horrible.

Molly Webster:

So eventually they just decide to turn off her phone.

Morgan Peck:

Now it becomes a more civilized conversation of, um, what are we gonna do? And, and then Zooko said to me...

Zooko Wilcox:

Would you like to donate your phone to science?

Morgan Peck:

Uh... oh... (laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

That's like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test, test, test, test.

Morgan Peck:

... I think I'd rather donate my body.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Um...

Zooko Wilcox:

Uh...

Morgan Peck:

No.

Zooko Wilcox:

Well.

Morgan Peck:

I wouldn't.

Zooko Wilcox:

What would it take for you to donate your phone to science?

Morgan Peck:

Oh...

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Like in the current state of it right now? Without-

Zooko Wilcox:

Well...

Morgan Peck:

... without, like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, that's a problem.

Morgan Peck:

... saving my, no way, pfft. (laughs) Like, that has so much of my work on it and my-

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Morgan Peck:

... life. I just think that, uh, well I don't think I have to justify why.

Zooko Wilcox:

That's right, you don't have to justify it.

Morgan Peck:

But, I mean...

Zooko Wilcox:

Do you have, uh, do you have pictures of people?

Morgan Peck:

And some pictures, but n- not much.

Zooko Wilcox:

Um, uh...

Jad Abumrad:

I, I, putting myself in your position, I would've been like, I feel, uh, okay.

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Take it.

Morgan Peck:

I don't know. I star- I-

Jad Abumrad:

But you were very immediately, like, the opposite.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah. That's a no, to me. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Why?

Morgan Peck:

To me, i-, my responsibility is not just to myself, you know. Privacy is a shared resource, it's a sh-, or it's a share-, it's something we share with each other. Um, the responsibility is...

Molly Webster:

I will say this is one of the first stories where I get p- what privacy, data protection, like, means. Like, I remember when Morgan was telling me this story, thinking, if someone had hacked into Morgan's phone, how long had they been hacked in for? And I talk to Morgan all the time. And like, oh, weird, I was kind of hacked. You know? And then it's, like, wait who else did you talk to? Was your, ooh your dad was kind of hacked. Oh, oh crap, you exchanged those text messages that weren't on Signal. That person was kind of hacked. And then suddenly it just dawned on me. Duh, like, her privacy isn't just hers.

Morgan Peck:

The things that are on my phone that are private are not only private for me they're private for, for anyone I was talking to. And, and I almost feel like I don't even have a right to give over that phone if I haven't talked to the people that, that that would be exposing. Like, that's not fair.

Molly Webster:

W- like, sometimes when people insist on privacy, it can feel selfish.

Jad Abumrad:

Yeah.

Molly Webster:

But then you realize, like, no, like, if one person doesn't insist on privacy, kind of like a chink in the armor.

Jad Abumrad:

Yeah, and like, suddenly we're all vulnerable.

Molly Webster:

Uh, for about an hour, Morgan and Zooko go back and forth about what to do with her phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Um...

Molly Webster:

But they don't really reach a conclusion.

Morgan Peck:

I feel, I need to walk around. Is anything gonna happen if I go take a little walk?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, you're not gonna miss much, uh, that's, uh, that's planned or scheduled. I'm just hesitating for no good reason. I can't think of any reason wh- for you not to take a walk. I'm just kinda freaked out.

Morgan Peck:

Okay. Yeah. Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Be safe out there.

Morgan Peck:

I'll stay here. What?

Zooko Wilcox:

I said be safe out there. Enjoy.

Morgan Peck:

Do you think I'm a, do you think I'm a secret agent?

Zooko Wilcox:

No I wasn't thinking that.

Morgan Peck:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

I was thinking I was afraid for you.

Morgan Peck:

Oh, I'm not afraid for me.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, I'm not either, I was just feeling that way.

Morgan Peck:

Okay. I'm gonna take a walk 'cause I feel really claustrophobic.

Zooko Wilcox:

Good. Enjoy.

Zooko Wilcox:

So then I had to decide what shall we do? Shall we abort the ceremony? Shall we, um, focus our attention on some sort of investigation of Morgan's phone? What shall we do? Okay. Here's the decision, here's what we're gonna do. Uh, g-, y- get Morgan's phone out of here and otherwise no change.

Molly Webster:

He figured if these people have hacked into Morgan's phone, we have so many security measures in place that we can keep going and we'll figure this out later. So basically what happens is, like, Morgan comes back from her walk.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay. Where were we?

Molly Webster:

They still have another full day of the ceremony left.

Zooko Wilcox:

Please insert a blank DVD to burn disc keys in and then press enter. Okay.

Molly Webster:

And then, it gets to a point m- where they finally have the final key.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay. I'm powering off the compute node. Everybody.

Video Chat:

Do it.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's a big step.

Molly Webster:

And is there a high five?

Zooko Wilcox:

Uh...

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, it's unplugged.

Zooko Wilcox:

No.

Zooko Wilcox:

Whew, we're done!

Video Chat:

Woo hoo.

Zooko Wilcox:

Ah...

Molly Webster:

And then, to sort of cap it off...

Zooko Wilcox:

The last step is-

Zooko Wilcox:

So I mean, if you want to use the angle grinder, you can...

Zooko Wilcox:

... everybody takes their, uh, compute node and ceremonially destroys it. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Because in the case that the computer holds, like, a ghosty fingerprint of that, like, original piece of the key, they just want it gone.

Zooko Wilcox:

We sawed the computer into pieces.

Zooko Wilcox:

Missed.

Zooko Wilcox:

Smashed the pieces with a hammer and dropped the crushed pieces into a giant bonfire.

Molly Webster:

And that was that. And now they were sort of at the moment where they're like, okay, well we, we actually did the technological, like, thing, which was we created the system, and now the bigger question was did they create the alchemy that they needed to inspire trust. Like, were all the protocols and the video footage and all that stuff, was it all enough?

Jad Abumrad:

Especially now that they have this phone thing happen.

Molly Webster:

Especially now that they have the phone thing. They were like, did we do what we needed to do to show the world that they want to buy into this thing.

Molly Webster:

So five days after the ceremony ended...

Morgan Peck:

The currency began.

Molly Webster:

To an insane fanfare.

Jad Abumrad:

Really?

Morgan Peck:

It was crazy.

Announcement:

Zcash is a cryptocurrency build on Bitcoin's code base that is dedicated to protecting your privacy.

Morgan Peck:

'Til, oh gosh, I'm gonna have to look, but I think it went up to, like, $4,000.

Jad Abumrad:

A Zcoin?

Morgan Peck:

One Zcash coin.

Announcement:

It is the first digital currency to combine the...

Morgan Peck:

And that is, the Bitcoin high at the time is, like, f- around 1,400. So that's insane!

Jad Abumrad:

Whoa.

Morgan Peck:

And that's-

Jad Abumrad:

So if the goal on some level, at the very beginning of this conversation was to inspire the community to then use it, it seems like it, it has, it has done that.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah. Yes.

Jad Abumrad:

Do people continue to point back at this phone moment and-

Morgan Peck:

Oh.

Jad Abumrad:

... and wonder and speculate?

Morgan Peck:

Uh, some. Yeah, people have, people want me to, they wanna know, like, wh- how it resolves.

Jad Abumrad:

And how does it resolve? I mean, did you give him your phone?

Morgan Peck:

So, what actually happened was we went to this bonfire (laughs), uh, and then by the end of it, uh, everybody was sort of rushing off. I was rushing to the, to the airport, and just, like, gave my phone to Zooko. And was like, we'll talk about it. I trust you. Don't do anything that I haven't agreed to.

Jad Abumrad:

Oh, so you ended in the, in the, in the, in the spirit of the whole-

Morgan Peck:

Yeah.

Jad Abumrad:

... endeavor, in some way.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah.

Jad Abumrad:

Huh.

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Molly Webster.

Zooko Wilcox:

I didn't get to tell you that we have to do it again.

Molly Webster:

Wait, you have to go through all of this again?

Zooko Wilcox:

So, we have to do it again, because we're up creating the cryptography in Zcash.

Molly Webster:

Good God, man, what have you started?

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) We're gonna do a new ceremony, deploy newer proof cryptography. We're, we keep thinking of improvements we want to make and new innovations.

Jad Abumrad:

This piece was produced by Molly Webster and Matt Kielty. The Denver Ceremony station recordings were created by media maker Nathanial Kramer, thanks Nat. And also thanks to his assistant Daniel Cooper. And lastly, very special thanks to Morgan Peck, her, uh, reporting on the ceremony obviously was sort of the anchor for our piece, uh, and you can find her article at IEEE Spectrum. Uh, we will link you to it from radiolab.org. Okay, we will be back and Robert will be back with me, uh, in a couple weeks. I'm Jad Abumrad.

Molly Webster:

I'm Molly Webster. Thanks for listening.

Will:

Hi, this is Will Zobb. Um, I'm calling from sunny Seattle, Washington. Radiolab is produced by Jad Abumrad. Dillon Keefe is our director of sound design. Soren Wheeler is senior editor. Our staff includes Simon Adler, David Keppel, Tracie Hunte, Matt Kielty, Robert Krulwich, Annie McEwen, Latif Nasser, Melissa O'Donnell, Arianne Wack Molly Webster. With help from Sohum Pawar, Rebecca Chaisson, Nigar Fatali, Phoebe Wang and Katie Ferguson. Our fact-checker is Michelle Harris.

Wait, wait you're listening- (laughs)

Intro 2:

Kay.

Jad Abumrad:

All right.

Intro 2:

Kay.

Jad Abumrad:

All right.

Intro 2:

You're listening-

Intro 1:

... listening-

Intro 2:

... to Radiolab.

Intro 1:

Radiolab.

Intro 2:

From-

Intro 1:

... WYNC.

Intro 2:

C?

Intro 1:

Yep.

Jad Abumrad:

Hey, I'm Jad Abumrad.

Molly Webster:

I'm Molly Webster.

Jad Abumrad:

This is Radiolab. Uh, Robert Krulwich will be back with us very soon. But today, a story from you.

Molly Webster:

Well, I guess I was just thinking I should probably tell you just the, um, Morgan and I back story of-

Jad Abumrad:

Yes.

Molly Webster:

... of how I heard about the story.

Jad Abumrad:

Cool.

Molly Webster:

So, Morgan and I went to grad school together at NYU so I guess I've known her for almost 11 years.

Jad Abumrad:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

And we're, we're, we're holed up in my apartment, I don't know, this was like No-, last November or something. She comes over. Um, she's sittin' on the giant, I have a big floor pillow, like a Turkish floor pillow. Just-

Jad Abumrad:

Of course you do.

Molly Webster:

... just sittin' on (laughs) just, just sittin' on the floor pillow. And then she's like, "Are you ready to hear the story?". And I said, "Yeah." And she's like, "Okay, I need you to take the battery out of your phone." (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Really?

Molly Webster:

Yeah. And I-

Jad Abumrad:

That's what, she really said that?

Molly Webster:

... and I was like, "What? I have an iPhone. I can't take the battery out of it." And she goes, "Okay, uh, I need you to power it down and put it in another room under a pillow."

Jad Abumrad:

What?

Molly Webster:

(laughs) I was like, "What is going on?" And she-

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs) And then at, by this point she's taking the battery out of her phone. So I, I do it.

Jad Abumrad:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Molly Webster:

I put it in the e-, in my bedroom and I put it under pillows and I turned it off, I came back, I sat down. And then, um, she starts telling me essentially about the ceremony. About going to the launch of this new, uh, currency. Which involved her flying across the country to live in a hotel room for a number of days with a bunch of strangers and then something happened because she came back, um, seemingly paranoid, at least s- in so much as she was hiding phones under pillows.

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) What was it that happened?

Molly Webster:

W- i- it takes a few steps. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) Okay.

Molly Webster:

So let's start with step one, which is-

Morgan Peck:

Hi.

Molly Webster:

... which is Morgan.

Morgan Peck:

I'm Morgan Peck.

Jad Abumrad:

How would you identify yourself? Professionally.

Morgan Peck:

Professionally, I'm a freelance journalist.

Molly Webster:

And in my eyes Morgan has become, like, the historian of the world of digital money.

Morgan Peck:

I started writing about neuroscience, but quickly found out about Bitcoin about a year into my writing, 2011, and have pretty much been writing about it ever since.

Molly Webster:

Now, yes, a lot of people when they hear about digital money, they think-

News 1:

Ransomware. The hijackers held the files ransom, demanding roughly 650 euros paid in Bitcoin.

News 2:

Bitcoin, the virtual currency.

Molly Webster:

Obviously, it has become associated with cyber crime. But for Morgan...

Morgan Peck:

No, no, no, no, no.

Molly Webster:

What attracted her to this whole world, what made her go...

Morgan Peck:

Oh my God, this thing is amazing.

Molly Webster:

She was, like, pulled in by the idealism of it.

Morgan Peck:

There was an extremely active community of people who were talking about, you know, um, completely subverting the financial system, at a time when the financial system was not trusted and was collapsing. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Because Morgan says the birth of Bitcoin goes back to, well, remember 2008?

Morgan Peck:

Boom.

News 3:

Traders here working the phones say a lot of their customers are freaked out.

Morgan Peck:

2008 was the big implosion.

News 3:

What in the world is happening on Wall Street?

Molly Webster:

In September the stock markets crashed, the banks failed.

News 1:

The DOW traders are standing there watching in amazement and I don't blame 'em.

News 2:

Unbelievable.

Molly Webster:

There was bailout.

News 1:

You know, this shakes your core. This shakes your trust in American institutions.

Molly Webster:

And then, just a few months later...

Morgan Peck:

2009, January.

News 1:

It's a hot topic on Wall Street right now, it's very interesting. Digital money called-

News 3:

Bitcoin.

News 2:

Bitcoin.

News 1:

Bitcoin. I can't resist...

Morgan Peck:

Bitcoin showed up.

Molly Webster:

Oh, so Bitcoin was after the big collapse.

Morgan Peck:

It was after, and it was very much a response to that, definitely.

Molly Webster:

'Cause here was this currency that was decentralized, which means it's run and monitored by all the people who use it, which means you don't need a federal reserve. So at the beginning, a lot of people saw Bitcoin as a way to sort of take the power back from the big banks that had just (beep)ed everybody over.

Morgan Peck:

Libertarians were really into it. They thought that it was going to crash d-, it was going to crumble the columns of, of (laughs) every power structure in, you know, the world. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Obviously that didn't happen, it did not take down the world. But Bitcoin has not gon away. It's been a decade; it's still around. But if you talk to people on the inside, they'll tell you one of the things that has dogged Bitcoin from the beginning is this issue of privacy.

Morgan Peck:

The way that the, the, uh, technology works is that, uh, it tracks every single transaction that's every made on the network.

Molly Webster:

Any time anyone with a Bitcoin buys a coffee or a pound of heroin, that transaction is kept in something called the public ledger.

Morgan Peck:

Bitcoin has a ledger, public ledger.

Jad Abumrad:

And is that something that each person has?

Morgan Peck:

It's out there for anyone to see.

Jad Abumrad:

Really?

Morgan Peck:

Yep.

Jad Abumrad:

So every single transaction that's every been done-

Morgan Peck:

Every transaction ever.

Jad Abumrad:

... is, is-

Morgan Peck:

Right there.

Jad Abumrad:

Well that's not private at all.

Morgan Peck:

No. But people thought it was private at the beginning because, oh, we're using the pseudonyms.

Molly Webster:

In other words, in the ledger, you never see anyone's actual name.

Morgan Peck:

There are no names on, in Bitcoin.

Molly Webster:

Like I wouldn't be Molly. I'd be T957G.

Morgan Peck:

The problem is that while there are no names attached, the behavior is out there for anyone to see.

Molly Webster:

Turns out it's really not that hard to match this, like, string of characters with the person that it represents out in the real world. You could just kind of Google it on the internet, see if it pops up anywhere else, what it's associated with. And then you kind of figure out who the person is. And then you can go back into the Bitcoin ledger and search their entire history, can figure out all their business dealings, all their personal dealings, who they know, who they don't know, possibly who their bank is. And you know, people have tried to solve this problem with Bitcoin.

Morgan Peck:

But, there are companies now that actually specialize in doing the network analysis of the Bitcoin block chain and they do it for companies who want to, um, make sure that they're not transacting with, you know, criminals, people who have had, th- they're specifi-

Jad Abumrad:

Wait there are companies that are actively trying to de-anonymize people?

Morgan Peck:

Oh yeah.

Jad Abumrad:

Wow.

Molly Webster:

And so one of the puzzles that, uh, all the internet people think about is, is there a way to get the best of both worlds? Can you have the decentralization that comes with digital money, but can you also get privacy? Almost like cash. I take a dollar bill out of my pocket, I walk down the street, I give it to someone, they give it to someone. No one can trace that money. Can you get the decentralization that comes with digital money and can you wrap that up with the privacy that you get with paper money? And that question-

Zooko Wilcox:

Testing, testing.

Molly Webster:

... brings us to this guy.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello, Zooko here.

Molly Webster:

To somebody named Zooko Wilcox.

Zooko Wilcox:

I'm Zooko and I'm in a different room.

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Okay. He is our master of the ceremony. I have to say you do, um, everyone's like pretty excited I'm talking to a guy named Zooko.

Zooko Wilcox:

Mm.

Molly Webster:

Like, it's just a good name, Zooko.

Zooko Wilcox:

Thanks.

Molly Webster:

Yay, Zooko!

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So anyhow, Zooko is...

Morgan Peck:

He's been working on digital currencies for a long time.

Molly Webster:

And he's extremely trusted.

Jad Abumrad:

Is he a charismatic leader type of thing?

Molly Webster:

Yeah, he is. When he first encountered Bitcoin, he was, like, "Cool."

Zooko Wilcox:

Yes, but I was concerned about the privacy applications.

Molly Webster:

Because...

Morgan Peck:

He's a pretty hardcore cipher punk.

Jad Abumrad:

Oh my God, it's like worlds upon worlds that are opening for us.

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Cipher punks.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah.

Molly Webster:

She said this, it is group of people that care deeply about how to make the internet more private.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think privacy is a human right and that it's a necessary condition for the exercise of, of free choice, of morality and of political participation and of everything that's, uh, of intimacy, everything that's most important it as humans.

Molly Webster:

So this whole thing with Bitcoin and the privacy problem... right up his alley.

Zooko Wilcox:

So I went out my way, studied the Bitcoin source code and I contributed some suggestions and yes, I immediately started fantasizing about what could be better.

Molly Webster:

So then he, being like the privacy, security cipher punk guru (laughs), he becomes the leader of something called Zcash.

Zooko Wilcox:

Zcash.

Morgan Peck:

And Zcash, really it's main, um, contribution to this ecosystem is privacy.

Zooko Wilcox:

So there's this thing called a zero knowledge proof.

Molly Webster:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

And it's a mathematical invention that mathematicians had come up with.

Molly Webster:

It requires something called the z-SNARK parameters to be baked into the protocol. Oh my God. I asked hours of questions and it got me into a conversation about circles and graphs and the shape of numbers.

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

The shape of, what I mean is, the shape of what's, of, of possibility, of-

Molly Webster:

What I came away with (laughs) was that it allows you to prove that something is true without revealing anything about the thing you're trying to prove is true.

Jad Abumrad:

Wow.

Molly Webster:

You just-

Jad Abumrad:

I just need to-

Molly Webster:

I just want you to-

Jad Abumrad:

... lie down now. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Take that and run.

Zooko Wilcox:

This where computer science and mathematics start to overlap into wizardry here.

Molly Webster:

All you need to know is that Zcash promises to give you decentralization with this like, buffet of privacy. But... Zcash has its own flaw.

Zooko Wilcox:

An unfortunate vulnerability in the math.

Molly Webster:

In order to create the currency of Zcash you have to first create a number.

Zooko Wilcox:

A certain, enormous number.

Molly Webster:

And then you use that number to do a bunch of math. And then, like, boom! You have the currency. But it all starts with this number, this key. Problem with that is...

Morgan Peck:

In this system, in this system if somebody got a hold of the private key they could counterfeit Zcash coins.

Zooko Wilcox:

They could counterfeit money.

Morgan Peck:

Just make new coins-

Molly Webster:

Millions and millions and millions of new coins.

Morgan Peck:

... out of thin air.

Zooko Wilcox:

You could cheat.

Morgan Peck:

That's a really big problem when you have a, uh, anonymous currency.

Molly Webster:

'Cause no one would ever know.

Morgan Peck:

Nope.

Molly Webster:

Bitcoin, since it's a public ledger, you can actually see if there's any funny business going on. That's actually why they keep it open.

Morgan Peck:

Right, the lack of privacy in Bitcoin is a security measure.

Molly Webster:

But here, no one would ever know. So the challenge is, how do you get people to buy into a system that has this, like, major vulnerability albeit just right at the very beginning.

Morgan Peck:

There's this one moment where, you know, you have to trust people in a way that's completely existentially defining of the currency.

Molly Webster:

So this is what Zooko's up against. How do I, if I want super privacy, which he does, how do I generate this number in such a way that no one steals it. Not me, not anyone else. And how do I prove to all of the people that might want to use Zcash later that in this tiny little window of, of creation nothing untoward has happened that, that the number has never been tampered with, that human eyes have never been laid upon it. You know, that the entire creation of this system remains pure.

Jad Abumrad:

Is i-, this is very much like an immaculate conception. You're, like-

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

... no humans can have sex to make this baby. But there needs to be a baby. But we almost have to examine the act of sex to make sure-

Molly Webster:

Right.

Jad Abumrad:

... there is no physical contact.

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Is it like that?

Molly Webster:

That's so good. Okay, so here we are. Zooko decides...

Zooko Wilcox:

We'll have a ceremony. The most secure, most sophisticated cryptographic ceremony that's every been performed.

Molly Webster:

Wow, okay.

Morgan Peck:

Here's the thing. While it's trivial to make your own currency, it is not trivial to, um, inspire trust. That's what money is, is the agreement between people to use it and to honor that sort of social contract and the creation of value, to me that's like alchemy. Um, and it's a moment of creation.

Morgan Peck:

I think I'm walking down the street near you, Molly-

Molly Webster:

(laughs) Greenpoint.

Morgan Peck:

... and I get a text message on Signal-

Molly Webster:

A private messenger app.

Morgan Peck:

... uh from Zooko that's like, "Hey, we want you to, we want you to be there."

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Yeah, I was (laughs) so excited. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

You were chosen.

Morgan Peck:

I was chosen, yeah.

Molly Webster:

And, but did you even know what you were being invited to?

Morgan Peck:

No. I had no idea. But I was like, I have to do this. I mean, I cannot miss this. Even if Zcash doesn't make it, even if, you know, it collapses it seemed like a historical moment. So Zooko basically said just wait for our bat call. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So about two weeks later, the bat call.

Morgan Peck:

Come to this, uh, coffee store in Boulder.

Molly Webster:

So Morgan gets on a flight to Denver, rents a car to Boulder, and goes to the coffee shop.

Morgan Peck:

Zooko's there.

Molly Webster:

Standing next to the barista counter.

Morgan Peck:

And actually, he has a huge paper map with him. Spread out all over, like, the barista's area, he's like up in their grill. And then, uh, this other guy Nat showed up.

Molly Webster:

Friend of Zooko's.

Morgan Peck:

Who, uh, was going to film it all.

Molly Webster:

Was that, was that for you? You wanted everything recorded?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah. And it was to serve as a security mechanism and documentation for the public.

Molly Webster:

More on that in a second.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then... Okay.

Nathaniel K:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

They leave the coffee shop, go over to Nat's van.

Morgan Peck:

He mics us both up. I told him they could mic me up.

Zooko Wilcox:

And we're gonna, now we're gonna turn off all of our cell phones. So that if there were any hackers they wouldn't be able to track where we were physically.

Morgan Peck:

I'm trying to think if I have to say goodbye to anyone.

Zooko Wilcox:

We were like, okay. Now we've got the van, we've got our cell phones turned off. The next thing we needed to do-

Morgan Peck:

We're, we're next.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah we're going to the computer store. Was to acquire a computer. Because, like, if there was some hacker who was planning to steal the key, they could have...

Molly Webster:

You know, already planted some malware or tracking device on Zooko's personal laptop.

Zooko Wilcox:

Before we even started. So we all piled into the van, set off. Yeah we can just start heading north.

Molly Webster:

To get a clean computer.

Morgan Peck:

He's decided to go to Denver for this.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah.

Morgan Peck:

But (laughs) he doesn't want to use his phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

No. Hey, I think I need to use my paper map.

Morgan Peck:

Because what if somebody's like, tracking what he's looking at.

Zooko Wilcox:

Let's go straight.

Morgan Peck:

Nat is doing much of this recording while he's driving.

Nathaniel K:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

If this thing is where we think it is...

Jad Abumrad:

Do you have like a black hoodie over you, like, Hezbollah style?

Morgan Peck:

No... no.

Molly Webster:

So they're driving for a little bit.

Zooko Wilcox:

When...

Molly Webster:

All of a sudden they make this pit stop.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) We were like, "Hey, there's a costume store."

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, this is perfect.

Morgan Peck:

This is the right spot.

Zooko Wilcox:

Way to go, Nat. (laughs) We were like, okay, next stop. We're here for a wizard hat. Wizard hat.

Storeperson 1:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Can I see your wizard hat section?

Storeperson 1:

Yeah.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Molly Webster:

So they walk through this big costume store passed witches hats, tiaras...

Zooko Wilcox:

Hmm...

Molly Webster:

What is the wizard hat you settled on?

Zooko Wilcox:

Um, ooh, it was a Gandalf hat. Gandalf hat. Yeah I love the Gandalf hat.

Molly Webster:

Ah.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think it's good.

Molly Webster:

That is appropriate. The greatest wizard of all.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah. So that's gonna be a winner, thanks.

Storeperson 1:

Yeah, of course.

Molly Webster:

And then... back to the mission at hand.

Morgan Peck:

Van, Denver, computer.

Zooko Wilcox:

We drove down using our paper map with our cellphones off to the computer store.

Molly Webster:

They get there.

Storeperson 2:

Howdy.

Molly Webster:

Walk in.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh yeah. This is the place.

Molly Webster:

Do a little computer shopping.

Zooko Wilcox:

Can we get a side by side comparison of two different ones.

Storeperson 2:

Sure.

Molly Webster:

A few minutes later...

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, I want this one.

Molly Webster:

Zooko gets his computer.

Morgan Peck:

And at that point, the computer is sacred.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's called an i7-6700.

Molly Webster:

... which henceforth is given a new name.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's called the compute node.

Jad Abumrad:

And why is it scared?

Molly Webster:

Well, because this is the computer that will hold the secret number, the number that will give birth to an entirely new currency. So-

Storeperson 2:

All right, sir.

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, thank you very much.

Molly Webster:

... got the compute node, got back in the van, got back to Boulder.

Zooko Wilcox:

And drove to an area that had hotels that we knew of. But where's this hotel?

Morgan Peck:

And we're going around to, like, the hotels in Boulder.

Zooko Wilcox:

Is it this way?

Morgan Peck:

And they're all full.

Zooko Wilcox:

I don't know if they have ethernet in their hotel room.

Morgan Peck:

Or they don't have an ethernet connection.

Zooko Wilcox:

So then we go to another hotel.

Morgan Peck:

I liked that hotel it was really...

Molly Webster:

And another.

Zooko Wilcox:

She wasn't clear on the notion of ethernet.

Morgan Peck:

It's like 7:00 at night. Ahh, what's the plan here?

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) Yes.

Morgan Peck:

The idea was, if you don't know what you're gonna do- (laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

... then they don't know what they're gonna do. Uh, so this is actually a security measure, uh, like if you're totally in the dark about what you're doing, then some hackers, they can't, they can't mount an attack. It's fool proof. (laughs) Yeah.

Molly Webster:

But-

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

... eventually...

Zooko Wilcox:

Millennium has rooms and it has ethernet.

Molly Webster:

They find hotel.

Morgan Peck:

Oh my God.

Zooko Wilcox:

And she even went and double checked.

Molly Webster:

Zooko actually has Nat book the hotel room.

Zooko Wilcox:

For two nights.

Nathaniel K:

Do you want me to come with you?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yep. Do you have a key?

Morgan Peck:

We all check into one room.

Zooko Wilcox:

Ground floor. It's not particularly fancy.

Morgan Peck:

Couple tables, you know, you got your two beds.

Molly Webster:

Then they set up.

Zooko Wilcox:

We're a well organized machine.

Molly Webster:

They totally transform the place.

Morgan Peck:

In general, I'm not gonna help out. They gave me a bed to chill out on.

Zooko Wilcox:

You can concentrate on, on careful observing.

Morgan Peck:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

So what we did was, we stripped the room of all of the lamps and the telephone.

Morgan Peck:

Everything on all the counters gets shoved somewhere.

Zooko Wilcox:

All of that stuff, cleared it away into the closet or the bathtub.

Morgan Peck:

What are you doing?

Zooko Wilcox:

In addition, we-

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, I'm unplugging the TV.

Zooko Wilcox:

... didn't want like the television, for example, which could be remotely controlled by an adversary.

Molly Webster:

So they unplug it, slide it under one of the beds...

Zooko Wilcox:

Goodbye, TV. You know what? Another reason is I hate TVs. Television is the worst.

Molly Webster:

Then they grab the table where they're gonna set up the compute node.

Morgan Peck:

Want to explain again why you're keeping it away from the wall?

Molly Webster:

Pull that out a ways.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh... there's a teeny tiny chance that a team of spies rented the room next door and set up a giant antenna on the other side of the wall.

Molly Webster:

This is like the dopest attack that Zooko is planning against, called side channel attacks.

Zooko Wilcox:

And that's a message by which you could use an antenna.

Molly Webster:

Or like a really high tech microphone...

Morgan Peck:

... to figure out what a computer is doing.

Molly Webster:

For example with some crazy microphone you could listen in to the computer's processor and if you heard something like... Oh, that's Diffie-Hellman key exchange. Or... oh yeah, this is obviously figuring out the full 40960-bit RSA decryption key. Or... oh hey, that's the new beeps video. Or whatever.

Morgan Peck:

So...

Zooko Wilcox:

All right, so please don't put anything on this desk from here on out.

Morgan Peck:

It's pulled away from the wall about, I don't know, five feet, just in case there's somebody set up next door.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then started loading in all the cameras and equipment.

Morgan Peck:

Battery backs, junk food, but then there was also a whole security camera set up.

Zooko Wilcox:

One cool, one really cool thing about these security cameras is that they don't have a radio.

Morgan Peck:

Four security cameras which were from the '80s.

Zooko Wilcox:

Before security cameras came with wifi. Which means we had to buy antique security cameras.

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). And their nigh vision security cameras.

Molly Webster:

And they set those up.

Zooko Wilcox:

So that you could see the other cameras from the first cameras. So you could sell that no ninja snuck in there and like tampered with one of the cameras during the process either.

Molly Webster:

And this security camera set up was, uh, one of the key points in trying to create what Morgan was talking about earlier.

Morgan Peck:

This alchemy.

Molly Webster:

Faith.

Zooko Wilcox:

Trust.

Molly Webster:

Whatever.

Zooko Wilcox:

So the security mechanism this was, this was going to catch any shenanigans.

Molly Webster:

And then Zooko was gonna post this security footage to the internet so, uh, experts, security experts, could scan it an make up their minds. Could the ceremony be trusted.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hold on, where are you gonna sleep tonight?

Morgan Peck:

I mean, I-

Zooko Wilcox:

We could all camp.

Morgan Peck:

... can sleep anywhere.

Zooko Wilcox:

So we set all that stuff up.

Molly Webster:

It's like 9:00 now, 10:00.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, it was late, and, um, I took the computer that we used, the so called compute node, and then from that moment forward, I kept that thing like within arms reach for f-, for 48 hours or so. Oh my God. It was a little bit exhausting trying to be paranoid, and it-

Molly Webster:

It was exhausting trying to be paranoid?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, like I slept with it that night, um, in my bed. I kept my, kept my arm around it.

Molly Webster:

Goodnight sweet prince, and flights of and angels sing me to thy rest.

Jad Abumrad:

Coming up... a rude awakening.

Andrei:

This is Andrei Karameto from the port town of [inaudible 00:22:14], Texas. Radiolab is supported in part by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, enhancing public understanding of science and technology in the modern world. More information about Sloan at www.sloan.org.

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Jad Abumrad:

Jad.

Molly Webster:

Molly.

Jad Abumrad:

Radiolab. Back to Boulder.

Morgan Peck:

Sorry, I can't open the door. That would be helping you.

Zooko Wilcox:

No. So.

Molly Webster:

It's the next morning.

Zooko Wilcox:

Saturday morning.

Molly Webster:

Zooko sits down at his personal computer and he starts making all these...

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello.

Molly Webster:

... video chat calls.

Video Chat:

Hello.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, hi,

Molly Webster:

He calls up a guy in D.C.

Video Chat:

Hey Moses.

Molly Webster:

A guy in Texas.

Video Chat:

Does anyone tell you you sound like Tom Hardy? (laughs)

Molly Webster:

Also-

Video Chat:

Cool, that's pretty cool.

Molly Webster:

Florida.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, really appreciate your help.

Molly Webster:

Slovenia.

Video Chat:

Is John on mine? Let me see. Yes.

Zooko Wilcox:

Good job, pit boss.

Molly Webster:

Another guy in California.

Video Chat:

Thanks.

Molly Webster:

And then there was this mysterious one.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, Fabrese is ready.

Molly Webster:

That was s- only referred to as Fabrese and didn't know where he was. I didn't find out until afterwards that he was actually driving from Vancouver across British Columbia (laughs).

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs) What? Who are all these guys?

Molly Webster:

So, for Zooko, it's, it's very unacceptable. He wants to take as much of the trust, you gotta trust me, out of it as possible. And that's what he tried to do. So even though Zooko's gonna record all of this footage, put it up on line, l- later somebody who's gonna be watching that could be like...

Zooko Wilcox:

This was a trick.

Molly Webster:

It's all smoke and mirrors.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's like stage magic.

Molly Webster:

Like, sure, you say you recorded everything but maybe you manipulated the footage. Maybe you didn't even set the cameras up the way you said you did.

Zooko Wilcox:

And so...

Molly Webster:

So what Zooko decided to do was get in touch with all these guys all over the world and try and decentralize this trust.

Morgan Peck:

So, there were six stations.

Molly Webster:

Each with their own compute nodes, security cameras set up, ready to help Zooko make this big, random number.

Morgan Peck:

The private key, so, each s- of the six stations was actually creating one piece of this key.

Molly Webster:

That way they'll be no one person that makes the entire key. It'll just be these little pieces that actually won't every come in contact with one another.

Morgan Peck:

The idea was, nobody will actually have the key itself.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hope this works.

Molly Webster:

So everyone's got their compute node powered on.

Video Chat:

You have to hold the power, okay.

Molly Webster:

And then...

Zooko Wilcox:

Diagnostics complete. Press enter when you're ready to begin the ceremony.

Molly Webster:

... the ceremony begins.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, now this is the top secret part. Where's the, the special box? Yeah. We have to make sure that nobody can, uh, guess or read this secret.

Molly Webster:

Zooko closes the blinds.

Zooko Wilcox:

And so, I'm gonna cover my keyboard with this special box. So I took a cardboard box that one of the computers had come in and sawed it in half so that it was, uh, a half of a cardboard box.

Molly Webster:

He'd put it over the keyboard of the compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, hold on. There. Ready? And then I slid my hands under the cardboard box.

Molly Webster:

And then... he starts punching in all these random letters and numbers into the compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

Just like pound on it, like-

Morgan Peck:

Just, blah.

Zooko Wilcox:

... Cecil Taylor it.

Morgan Peck:

Mash it. Cat walking across the computer.

Jad Abumrad:

Okay.

Morgan Peck:

Yep. And once he's done.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think we're done with the cardboard box. It's served its purpose and now we can auction it on eBay.

Molly Webster:

What the compute node does it is it takes all those random characters and it combines it with more random characters that are generated, like, inside the computer until finally it creates a part of the key.

Zooko Wilcox:

And each of the other five participants had to do the same thing.

Molly Webster:

Do you see who made their piece of the key? Florida, Texas, Slovenia, Canada. Okay, so you've got one key broken into six pieces and the next step is to get all of the pieces to work together to create on thing, which is Zcash. And you wanna do this in such a way that those pieces never touch each other, that they remain hidden so that n- no person could ever get their hands on the power of the whole key. Whew.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah. So...

Molly Webster:

Thank God there's convoluted math to save the day.

Morgan Peck:

Um, may- I think it's a good time to just say what was happening.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Molly Webster:

Three, two, one.

Morgan Peck:

So...

Molly Webster:

First thing's first.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, here I come.

Molly Webster:

The guy in California gets on the horn.

Video Chat:

So the stations are Andrew, Peter.

Molly Webster:

He gives everyone basically, like, the batting order and then-

Video Chat:

All right hang on... now.

Molly Webster:

... he sends a message called the go message to station one.

Video Chat:

Preparing the, doing my computations, now.

Molly Webster:

Station one guy and his compute node do some math on his piece of the key.

Video Chat:

Yeah. Okay, um, my compute node just finished. Hell yeah.

Molly Webster:

His compute node spits out a number.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then, it burns it onto DVD.

Molly Webster:

Why DVD? Because all the guys at these stations have ripped out the wifi in their compute node.

Zooko Wilcox:

'Cause we don't want a hacker to be able to hack into the compute node.

Molly Webster:

This, by the way, has a pretty cool name.

Zooko Wilcox:

This is called air gapped.

Morgan Peck:

You have a protective field, basically, around the computer that holds the secret.

Molly Webster:

A field of air. Anyway, once the computer is done burning to this DVD, the guy at station one takes it an walks it to another computer.

Video Chat:

It's receiving data as you can see.

Molly Webster:

Uploads it to the internet.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, great.

Molly Webster:

And then the guy at station two.

Peter Van B:

[inaudible 00:27:55]

Molly Webster:

This guy.

Peter Van B:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Molly Webster:

Peter Van Bachenberg.

Peter Van B:

So what happens is, the software I run on my connected computer-

Molly Webster:

... downloads that little answer, puts it onto a DVD.

Peter Van B:

[inaudible 00:28:05] I take the DVD out of the connected computer, walk across the air gap, if you will.

Peter Van B:

Um, I'm putting in the compute node.

Molly Webster:

Then the compute node takes that little answer, combines it with Peter's piece of the key and then...

Zooko Wilcox:

Math. So now is it computing?

Peter Van B:

Yep.

Molly Webster:

Again, the compute node keeps Peter's piece of the key a secret, spits out a new answer, a bigger answer.

Peter Van B:

And then I write on a different DVD...

Molly Webster:

... that new answer.

Zooko Wilcox:

Quick!

Molly Webster:

Takes it out of the compute node.

Peter Van B:

Lift it over the gap.

Molly Webster:

Brings it back across the air gap.

Peter Van B:

To the networked computer.

Molly Webster:

Uploads his answer, then station three grabs and combines it with their key, gets a little bit more of an answer.

Zooko Wilcox:

So exciting.

Molly Webster:

Then station four.

Zooko Wilcox:

My compute node gets to do it's thing.

Molly Webster:

Same thing DVD across the air gap, combine it with their piece of the key.

Zooko Wilcox:

Math. Like serious math.

Molly Webster:

And then you get a little bit more of the answer and just rinse, watch, repeat.

Video Chat:

Wooh!

Molly Webster:

Station five.

Video Chat:

Huzzah!

Molly Webster:

Six. Back to the top of the order. And throughout this entire process the individual shards of the key are kept separate and secret. Yet together, they're doing the math that's getting closer and closer and closer to the final key that will launch Zcash.

Molly Webster:

Was there a, like a, c- t- t- t- t- a titter in the air?

Morgan Peck:

Uh... no. (laughs)

Molly Webster:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

I mean it really, it's deet de-deet deet de-deet de-deet.

Zooko Wilcox:

Did you bring a deck of cards?

Nathaniel K:

I brought juggling balls.

Zooko Wilcox:

Cool. I can juggle three balls.

Nathaniel K:

[inaudible 00:29:27]

Molly Webster:

Because the thing is, every one of those math steps...

Morgan Peck:

... took about an hour.

Zooko Wilcox:

Who's next on the list?

Molly Webster:

And they had to do like, three full rotations through this order.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, hey, somebody tell Moses.

Molly Webster:

So most of the weekend was just kind of sittin' around.

Zooko Wilcox:

Shaun?

Molly Webster:

Waiting.

Zooko Wilcox:

Peter?

Molly Webster:

And waiting.

Zooko Wilcox:

Anyone?

Peter Van B:

What's that?

Zooko Wilcox:

Tell Moses.

Peter Van B:

No.

Morgan Peck:

Um, so, yeah we're hanging out.

Video Chat:

Okay, uh, my compute node just finished.

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, good to know.

Morgan Peck:

Uh, Zooko has brought along some pork rinds. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

And sour cream, but he's dipping, he's dipping pork rinds in the sour cream.

Zooko Wilcox:

Cool, I'm gonna get our coffee.

Nathaniel K:

Hmm.

Morgan Peck:

Also... napping. Which is the only sleeping that's happened, like, there's like, you know, and hour here... hour there.

Molly Webster:

And as the hours roll by, things are going really well, people are getting their math done, they're passing along these answers, they're getting closer to having their key, when, maybe half way into the process, things get strange.

Molly Webster:

They're each lying in their beds just, kind of, chilling out. Morgan was just waking, Zooko was playing on a tablet.

Zooko Wilcox:

And then, oh...

Morgan Peck:

What?

Zooko Wilcox:

I groaned and said, uh, oh there's work to do. Back to work.

Molly Webster:

So Zooko gets up and he starts talking.

Zooko Wilcox:

When, which is, uh, w- why is my voice echoing back at me?

Morgan Peck:

There's feedback.

Zooko Wilcox:

A feedback loop started echoing. You know, like, going beep boop beep beep beep beep. Beep beep beep.

Morgan Peck:

It was like, uh, wh- incongruous noise, make it stop.

Nathaniel K:

I'm muting all my mics. I don't know where it's feeding back from. Probably this one.

Molly Webster:

He, like, turns off the mic.

Zooko Wilcox:

Ah. And so I was, like, oh okay.

Molly Webster:

And he sits down at the Google Hangout computer.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hook me up with that.

Morgan Peck:

Oh.

Zooko Wilcox:

A tester, tester.

Molly Webster:

And this echo comes back. And if you look at the video you see, he, like, just freezes.

Zooko Wilcox:

Where's that coming from?

Molly Webster:

And then just turns his head to the left, looking off camera.

Zooko Wilcox:

Why do we have play out over there now?

Molly Webster:

At this point, everyone in the room just sort of falls silent and is lookin' around.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah, I start, like, pin pointing it to, like, the, the part of the room that has the security cameras monitor.

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test. Where's this coming from? Test, test. Test, test.

Morgan Peck:

I start listening to that, and I'm like, I think it's coming from over here.

Morgan Peck:

Do it again.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hello.

Zooko Wilcox:

I stopped and I said, uh, wait, wait a minute. W- what is playing out over there?

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test.

Zooko Wilcox:

And I looked in the direction of Morgan's bed.

Morgan Peck:

And then I turn around, I pick up my phone.

Morgan Peck:

It's my phone.

Morgan Peck:

And the echo's coming out of my speaker.

Jad Abumrad:

It's coming out of your phone.

Morgan Peck:

It's coming out of my phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Why is your phone playing out sound?

Morgan Peck:

I have no idea.

Zooko Wilcox:

You don't- stop, no, don't mess with it. I wanna see what's going on. It's playing off in this way.

Molly Webster:

He zeroes in on this mic that's on the corner of the computer that's doing the Google Hangouts.

Zooko Wilcox:

Did you connect your phone to this Hangout?

Molly Webster:

He leans over to that.

Zooko Wilcox:

Hold on.

Molly Webster:

Starts fiddling with it.

Morgan Peck:

What?

Zooko Wilcox:

It's coming from this way.

Morgan Peck:

Yep. So, is there a way, hmm...

Molly Webster:

He stands, he sits.

Morgan Peck:

I don't know.

Zooko Wilcox:

Wait, wait, wait, I know it's not coming from the mic. It's coming fr-, it's not coming from this mic, it's coming from the Google Hangout, 'cause I just muted it in software, now it's gone. So my voice from Google Hangout, okay, let's hear Peter's voice. Peter? Uh, I wanna test audio coming from you. Say some stuff.

Peter Van B:

Test. Testing. Testing. All good men [crosstalk 00:34:01] country.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, good.

Morgan Peck:

And then I think Zooko says something like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Morgan, why is your phone playing the audio from our Google Hangout?

Morgan Peck:

Why is our chat coming through your phone?

Jad Abumrad:

Oh, wait. So the audio coming out of her phone is not originating from in the room, it's, it's somehow the Google ch- Hangout chat? That's coming through her phone?

Molly Webster:

Yes.

Jad Abumrad:

That's so weird.

Molly Webster:

Very weird.

Morgan Peck:

It... it was like your cat had just turned into a monster, or, and just started talking to you or like, just turned on you. So, I'm kneeling on the bed with it and I look at it and I think that's when I just, like, threw it, threw it on the bed. Revulsion.

Molly Webster:

So...

Zooko Wilcox:

Can you turn on the screen?

Molly Webster:

... he picks up the phone from the end of her bed and hands it to her and is like, "Can you pull up the screen?"

Zooko Wilcox:

What all, what all apps are running on this phone?

Morgan Peck:

I don't run any apps.

Zooko Wilcox:

Is that doing video, Nat?

Nathaniel K:

Yeah, I'm recording.

Molly Webster:

At this point, the cameras have, like, swiveled so they're focused on the phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay, um.

Morgan Peck:

Man, I don't know h- Should we throw it in the river?

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs) No. Can you, is this Android?

Morgan Peck:

Yep.

Zooko Wilcox:

What, how do you, can you, like, get a list of apps running, like, by swiping down from the top, or something?

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). I think, I don't know, I'm sorry, I don't-

Zooko Wilcox:

How 'bout that-

Morgan Peck:

... I don't use this, like, at all.

Zooko Wilcox:

... if you swipe down there's that thing that's next to the thing. Here we- what about that thing? No?

Morgan Peck:

Wait, yes. But just give me a second. Give me a second. What's running? Here.

Zooko Wilcox:

I don't see a Hangouts app running.

Morgan Peck:

I def-, well, I didn't s-

Zooko Wilcox:

Test.

Morgan Peck:

... run a Hangouts.

Zooko Wilcox:

I think it stopped. Here, listen to it. Test, test, test. It's stopped, hasn't it?

Molly Webster:

Suddenly the phone stops doing the weird thing it was doing.

Zooko Wilcox:

The freaky audio play out thing.

Jad Abumrad:

It went away.

Molly Webster:

It, it went away, which feels hacker-y.

Jad Abumrad:

Ooh, yeah.

Molly Webster:

Like the hackers have been had and they just realized it.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, that's what I think. That there was an attacker and they screwed up and accidentally turned on the speaker.

Morgan Peck:

Now I feel paranoid.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, it's weird, is it, creepy.

Morgan Peck:

No, this isn't just like, I don't know, I've been, what do you mean, hacked? What kind of hacked would we have been?

Zooko Wilcox:

Oh, you find out that private messages and what's been had, had access to them. Um, or that people have been s-, uh, sending messages spoofed to be from you-

Morgan Peck:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Zooko Wilcox:

... to your friends or colleagues.

Morgan Peck:

Okay, I've never had that happen, whoa.

Zooko Wilcox:

It's kind of horrible.

Molly Webster:

So eventually they just decide to turn off her phone.

Morgan Peck:

Now it becomes a more civilized conversation of, um, what are we gonna do? And, and then Zooko said to me...

Zooko Wilcox:

Would you like to donate your phone to science?

Morgan Peck:

Uh... oh... (laughs)

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

That's like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Test, test, test, test, test.

Morgan Peck:

... I think I'd rather donate my body.

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Um...

Zooko Wilcox:

Uh...

Morgan Peck:

No.

Zooko Wilcox:

Well.

Morgan Peck:

I wouldn't.

Zooko Wilcox:

What would it take for you to donate your phone to science?

Morgan Peck:

Oh...

Zooko Wilcox:

(laughs)

Morgan Peck:

Like in the current state of it right now? Without-

Zooko Wilcox:

Well...

Morgan Peck:

... without, like-

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, that's a problem.

Morgan Peck:

... saving my, no way, pfft. (laughs) Like, that has so much of my work on it and my-

Zooko Wilcox:

Okay.

Morgan Peck:

... life. I just think that, uh, well I don't think I have to justify why.

Zooko Wilcox:

That's right, you don't have to justify it.

Morgan Peck:

But, I mean...

Zooko Wilcox:

Do you have, uh, do you have pictures of people?

Morgan Peck:

And some pictures, but n- not much.

Zooko Wilcox:

Um, uh...

Jad Abumrad:

I, I, putting myself in your position, I would've been like, I feel, uh, okay.

Morgan Peck:

(laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Take it.

Morgan Peck:

I don't know. I star- I-

Jad Abumrad:

But you were very immediately, like, the opposite.

Morgan Peck:

Yeah. That's a no, to me. (laughs)

Jad Abumrad:

Why?

Morgan Peck:

To me, i-, my responsibility is not just to myself, you know. Privacy is a shared resource, it's a sh-, or it's a share-, it's something we share with each other. Um, the responsibility is...

Molly Webster:

I will say this is one of the first stories where I get p- what privacy, data protection, like, means. Like, I remember when Morgan was telling me this story, thinking, if someone had hacked into Morgan's phone, how long had they been hacked in for? And I talk to Morgan all the time. And like, oh, weird, I was kind of hacked. You know? And then it's, like, wait who else did you talk to? Was your, ooh your dad was kind of hacked. Oh, oh crap, you exchanged those text messages that weren't on Signal. That person was kind of hacked. And then suddenly it just dawned on me. Duh, like, her privacy isn't just hers.

Morgan Peck:

The things that are on my phone that are private are not only private for me they're private for, for anyone I was talking to. And, and I almost feel like I don't even have a right to give over that phone if I haven't talked to the people that, that that would be exposing. Like, that's not fair.

Molly Webster:

W- like, sometimes when people insist on privacy, it can feel selfish.

Jad Abumrad:

Yeah.

Molly Webster:

But then you realize, like, no, like, if one person doesn't insist on privacy, kind of like a chink in the armor.

Jad Abumrad:

Yeah, and like, suddenly we're all vulnerable.

Molly Webster:

Uh, for about an hour, Morgan and Zooko go back and forth about what to do with her phone.

Zooko Wilcox:

Um...

Molly Webster:

But they don't really reach a conclusion.

Morgan Peck:

I feel, I need to walk around. Is anything gonna happen if I go take a little walk?

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, you're not gonna miss much, uh, that's, uh, that's planned or scheduled. I'm just hesitating for no good reason. I can't think of any reason wh- for you not to take a walk. I'm just kinda freaked out.

Morgan Peck:

Okay. Yeah. Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

Be safe out there.

Morgan Peck:

I'll stay here. What?

Zooko Wilcox:

I said be safe out there. Enjoy.

Morgan Peck:

Do you think I'm a, do you think I'm a secret agent?

Zooko Wilcox:

No I wasn't thinking that.

Morgan Peck:

Okay.

Zooko Wilcox:

I was thinking I was afraid for you.

Morgan Peck:

Oh, I'm not afraid for me.

Zooko Wilcox:

Yeah, I'm not either, I was just feeling that way.

Morgan Peck:

Okay. I'm gonna take a walk 'cause I feel really claustrophobic.

Zooko Wilcox:

Good. Enjoy.

Zooko Wilcox:

So then I had to decide what shall we do? Shall we abort the ceremony? Shall we, um, focus our attention on some sort of investigation of Morgan's phone? What shall we do? Okay. Here's the decision, here's what we're gonna do. Uh, g-, y- get Morgan's phone out of here and otherwise no change.

Molly Webster:

He figured if these people have hacked into Morgan's phone, we have so many secu