Imagine you are a king of old, afraid of being assassinated. Your king’s guard tells you that they’ve got you covered, but too many kings have been killed in your area over the last century for you to feel that safe. How can you learn of your actual vulnerability, and of how to cut it?
We had some challenge coins made at my job from https://www.militarycoinsus... and I always thought they were a way to show appreciation and recognition for accomplishments. This was kind of a crazy article but actually very interesting there are some ways I think this system would be theoretically exploited but still very interesting.
The function of the Challenge Coins is to to improve real security, even at the cost of sacrificing a little of the appearance of security.The goal of the TSA is the exact opposite.
What a great way for potential assassins to legally and publicly demonstrate their abilities to assinate you for real. A hard to fake signal which is literally confirmed by the potential victim. No need to have colluded in advance, as the potential conspirators will seek you out after the fact.
I was just reading about the recent "Grievance Studies" hoax papers story. Perhaps academic publications could use something like this to demonstrate that they actually enforce good standards of research.
The challenge coin can be revealed after a 'hoax paper' is successfully accepted for publication.
The reward for successful penetration would likely have to be less than the anticipated value of having published the paper plus the value of the challenge coin itself. If the reward were larger than that, then the author of any _real_ paper that was successfully published would be incentivized to buy a challenge coin and redeem it immediately after publication.
Investigation of would-be assassins drives down the value for "real" assassins (who value the coin only as a get-out-of-jail-free card) relative to "fake" assassins (who value only the prize). The king should prefer not to investigate those who turn in the coin to avoid punishment.
The king also learns that his security isn't working, and can try increasingly radical changes in search of a fix. Without such a system, he might never know he has a problem.
I successfully cash in my challenge coin for N. I decline to explain my methods for an additional N. Perhaps I do this additional times. Each time I repeat my method, the king gets an opportunity to learn more about my method; this makes its value go down. It also bolsters its reputation as repeatable; this makes its value go up.
After one or more successes, I advertise that I have a repeatable method of cashing in challenge coins, and I am selling my method at auction. The king is welcome to attend; perhaps he will win the auction for less than his maximum bid of N.
Agreed, although I personally do suspect that opacity would be more effective. More importantly, this seems like something worth testing. If the tests indicate that opacity is less effective, then challenge coins become that much more interesting.
Government provided security of the people isn't about actual security. It's about eyewash. After 9/11 the National guard was posted on the Golden Gate Bridge. Without rifles, because they were unavailable. Why? To reassure the people they are safe. Several years ago, TSA ordered the relax of rules on carry on knives by passengers. Right up to rollout, the plan was in place. Until public outcry stopped the rollback.
Like many things, a lot of security is about eyewash.
That aside, I really do like the idea of prediction markets. This is right up there with open source software, where millions of eyeballs make all bugs shallow.
Challenge Coins
What is the best place to get challenge coins? I'd like to get some.
We had some challenge coins made at my job from https://www.militarycoinsus... and I always thought they were a way to show appreciation and recognition for accomplishments. This was kind of a crazy article but actually very interesting there are some ways I think this system would be theoretically exploited but still very interesting.
The function of the Challenge Coins is to to improve real security, even at the cost of sacrificing a little of the appearance of security.The goal of the TSA is the exact opposite.
What a great way for potential assassins to legally and publicly demonstrate their abilities to assinate you for real. A hard to fake signal which is literally confirmed by the potential victim. No need to have colluded in advance, as the potential conspirators will seek you out after the fact.
I was just reading about the recent "Grievance Studies" hoax papers story. Perhaps academic publications could use something like this to demonstrate that they actually enforce good standards of research.
The challenge coin can be revealed after a 'hoax paper' is successfully accepted for publication.
The reward for successful penetration would likely have to be less than the anticipated value of having published the paper plus the value of the challenge coin itself. If the reward were larger than that, then the author of any _real_ paper that was successfully published would be incentivized to buy a challenge coin and redeem it immediately after publication.
interesting, could you elaborate?
I can't quite explain it, but your concept immediately reminded me of this old Dilbert cartoon: http://dilbert.com/strip/19...
Investigation of would-be assassins drives down the value for "real" assassins (who value the coin only as a get-out-of-jail-free card) relative to "fake" assassins (who value only the prize). The king should prefer not to investigate those who turn in the coin to avoid punishment.
The king also learns that his security isn't working, and can try increasingly radical changes in search of a fix. Without such a system, he might never know he has a problem.
I successfully cash in my challenge coin for N. I decline to explain my methods for an additional N. Perhaps I do this additional times. Each time I repeat my method, the king gets an opportunity to learn more about my method; this makes its value go down. It also bolsters its reputation as repeatable; this makes its value go up.
After one or more successes, I advertise that I have a repeatable method of cashing in challenge coins, and I am selling my method at auction. The king is welcome to attend; perhaps he will win the auction for less than his maximum bid of N.
Agreed, although I personally do suspect that opacity would be more effective. More importantly, this seems like something worth testing. If the tests indicate that opacity is less effective, then challenge coins become that much more interesting.
I would think that a TSA that really worked would grind things to a halt.
"Prediction Market" could be rolled into a valuable decision making tool for business or government.
Government provided security of the people isn't about actual security. It's about eyewash. After 9/11 the National guard was posted on the Golden Gate Bridge. Without rifles, because they were unavailable. Why? To reassure the people they are safe. Several years ago, TSA ordered the relax of rules on carry on knives by passengers. Right up to rollout, the plan was in place. Until public outcry stopped the rollback.
Like many things, a lot of security is about eyewash.
That aside, I really do like the idea of prediction markets. This is right up there with open source software, where millions of eyeballs make all bugs shallow.
Prediction markets could be used to say which groups and individuals of your "loyal" associates are most likely to assassinate you.
It isn't obvious that opacity makes it seem to outsiders like assassination would be harder.