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* [[OKex]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://support.okex.com/hc/en-us/articles/115002713311-OKEx-supports-IOTA-Deposit-and-Spot-Trading|title=OKEx supports IOTA Deposit and Spot Trading|website=OKEx.com|accessdate=6 December 2017}}</ref> (does not allow access by [[United States person|US persons]])
* [[OKex]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://support.okex.com/hc/en-us/articles/115002713311-OKEx-supports-IOTA-Deposit-and-Spot-Trading|title=OKEx supports IOTA Deposit and Spot Trading|website=OKEx.com|accessdate=6 December 2017}}</ref> (does not allow access by [[United States person|US persons]])
* [[CoinOne]]<ref>[https://coinone.co.kr/iota/] {{dead link|date=December 2017}}</ref>
* [[CoinOne]]<ref>[https://coinone.co.kr/iota/] {{dead link|date=December 2017}}</ref>

== Criticism ==

Several issues have been raised against the technology on which IOTA is based.

* Cryptographic design and vulnerabilities <ref>{{cite web|last1=Narula|first1=Neha|title=Cryptographic vulnerabilities in IOTA|url=https://medium.com/@neha/cryptographic-vulnerabilities-in-iota-9a6a9ddc4367|website=Medium|publisher=medium.com|accessdate=21 December 2017|ref=crypto-vuln}}</ref>
* IOTA is centralized (via The Coordinator)<ref>{{cite web|last1=Wall|first1=Eric|title=IOTA is Centralized|url=https://medium.com/@ercwl/iota-is-centralized-6289246e7b4d|website=Medium|publisher=medium.com|accessdate=21 December 2017|ref=iota-centralized}}</ref>
* Design of intended hardware <ref>{{cite web|last1=Johnson|first1=Nick|title=Why I find IOTA deeply alarming|url=https://hackernoon.com/why-i-find-iota-deeply-alarming-934f1908194b|website=hackernoon|publisher=medium.com|accessdate=21 December 2017|ref=deeply-alarming}}</ref>

MIT found a serious vulnerability in their choice of hash functions, one they had written themselves, which could be used to find collisions on commodity hardware.

<blockquote>
In 2017, leaving your crypto algorithm vulnerable to differential cryptanalysis is a rookie mistake. It says that no one of any calibre analyzed their system, and that the odds that their fix makes the system secure is low.

---[[Bruce Schneier]]<ref name="crypto-vuln" />
</blockquote>


As of today, IOTA is centralized, using a central agent called the Coordinator, which is further more not free software, despite IOTA being claimed as an open source project.<ref name="iota-centralized" /> This is especially worrisome since the Coordinator could potentially become a rouge agent (e.g. if secret keys are leaked), and would in that case be able to take over the entire network.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Wall|first1=Eric|title=Coordinator-instantiated milestone partitioning attack #177|url=https://github.com/iotaledger/iri/issues/177|website=Github|publisher=github.com|accessdate=21 December 2017}}</ref>


The design of IOTA is based on the assumption that the IOT devices running IOTA will run on a ternary hardware. The owners are involved in a hardware project, JINN, specifically targeting the creation of such ternary IOT devices. However almost all IOT devices that exist today are based on binary logic, making the software run slower on almost all IOT devices.<ref name="deeply-alarming" />




== References ==
== References ==

Revision as of 10:02, 21 December 2017

IOTA
Latest foundation logo
IOTA logo
Unit
SymbolIOTA, MIOTA[1]‎
Denominations
Superunit
 103KiloIota (Ki)
 106MegaIota (Mi)
 109GigaIota (Gi)
 1012TeraIota (Ti)
 1015PetaIota (Pi)
Demographics
Date of introduction11 June 2016 (2016-06-11)Initial Coin Offering
User(s)Worldwide
Valuation
Supply growthFixed supply of 2 779 530 283 units

IOTA is an open-source distributed ledger (cryptocurrency) focused on providing secure communications and payments between machines on the Internet of Things. Using directed acyclic graph (DAG) technology instead of the traditional blockchain, IOTA's transactions are free regardless of the size of the transaction, confirmation times are fast, the number of transactions the system can handle simultaneously is unlimited, and the system can easily scale.[2][3] IOTA was founded in 2015 by David Sønstebø, Sergey Ivancheglo, Dominik Schiener, and Dr. Serguei Popov.[4][5]

IOTA is overseen by the IOTA Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to developing the technology and maintaining it license-free for all developers to work with.[6] The Foundation has established a collaboration with Volkswagen and Innogy to develop CarPass, an IOTA based technology that enables secure audit trails, digital identities, and charging networks for cars.[7] With the participation of Deutsche Telekom, Microsoft, and Fujitsu,[8] the Foundation opened up a data marketplace using IOTA technology.[9] The IOTA Foundation is also a founding member of the Trusted IOT Alliance, which includes the companies Bosch, Consensys, and USbank.[10]

As of December 2017, the market capitalization of IOTA is $10 billion, making it the 7th largest cryptocurrency in circulation.[11]

Units

The smallest unit of account on IOTA is an Iota, after the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet. Larger unit names are created by adding metric system-like prefixes to the word Iota. Hence one million Iota are called a MegaIota or Miota (Mi), which is the base unit of Iota used for trading on cryptocurrency exchanges. In order of size, unit names[12] are:

Iota = 1 Iota = 1i = 1i
KiloIota = 1 Kiota = 1Ki = 1,000i
MegaIota = 1 Miota = 1Mi = 1,000,000i
GigaIota = 1 Giota = 1Gi = 1,000,000,000i
TeraIota = 1 Tiota = 1Ti = 1,000,000,000,000i
PetaIota = 1 Piota = 1Pi = 1,000,000,000,000,000i

Note that this is not to be confused with the binary prefix notation where 1 KiB is 1024 Bytes.

History

2015

IOTA founded by David Sønstebø, Sergey Ivancheglo, Dominik Schiener, and Dr. Serguei Popov. The fixed supply of 2,779,530,283,277,761 Iota were created. As there is no mining, no more Iota will be created. A few months later, IOTA began open beta testing.

2016

While beta testing continued, trading began over-the-counter between users for the next 11 months.

2017

In May, IOTA announced a $10 million ecosystem fund to promote larger corporate collaborations, community projects, and developer acquisition initiatives.[13] By June, IOTA was listed by its first exchange: Bitfinex[14] Outlier Ventures, a venture capital firm, invested 7 figures into IOTA, their first direct investment into a distributed ledger technology.[15] SatoshiPay announced a transition from the use of bitcoin to the use of IOTA as the transaction cost of bitcoins increase.[16]

By August, the IOTA Foundation forged a partnership with REFUNITE, the world's largest missing persons database, in order to use IOTA technology to help reunite families during and after conflicts.[17] Additionally, IOTA's Flash Network (supporting extreme high speed, instantaneous nano payments) became active, ahead of Bitcoin and Ethereum's versions.[18] Several researchers claimed to have found a vulnerability in IOTA's cryptography which the IOTA Foundation refuted by stating the cryptography in question was already replaced. [19] Sopra Steria announced a partnership with IOTA to create a framework to optimize security between devices on the Internet of Things.[20]

In November, the IOTA Foundation was officially announced as a registered not-for-profit entity under German law.[6] Shortly after, the Data Marketplace was announced and brought online[21] LATTICE80, a Singapore based Fintech hub and largest of its kind, cemented an agreement to open an IOTA innovation lab for the Internet of Things.[22] Additionally, IOTA hired Cybercrypt ApS to develop IOTA's hash technology (Curl), to its next maturation phase.[23]

Based on the success of IOTA Data Market Place, Robert Bosch Venture Capitol, the corporate venture capitol firm, made their first cryptocurrency investment by buying a significant amount of IOTA tokens. [24]

Design

IOTA tangle Each square box in this diagram represents a transaction being sent. For each new transaction, two random, unconfirmed transactions are validated in the tangle. Each validation (n) of a transaction increases the likelihood of a transaction being genuine, up to a threshold of (c). In this figure, red boxes indicate transactions where n > 0, but below a certain confirmation threshold, n < c. The grey boxes represent transactions where n = 0. The green boxes represent transactions that have been validated a sufficient number of times, in order to be accepted as confirmed by the recipient address, n ≥ c.

Transactions

For an IOTA user to send out a transaction, the user must validate two other, randomly selected transactions. A sent transaction must accumulate a sufficient level of verification (i.e. must be validated a sufficient number of times by other users) in order to be accepted as “confirmed” by its recipient. IOTA works with a single administrator called the Coordinator which confirms all transactions in a set of released milestones. Without the Coordinator, the IOTA DAG is not considered sufficiently secured in its early stages. The Coordinator is meant to be removed when the network is sufficiently large.[2]

The Tangle

Instead of using a blockchain, IOTA uses a directed acyclic graph (DAG). IOTA's DAG is colloquially referred to as the "tangle", and is a generalization of the block chain protocol (a blockchain is a special case of a DAG[12]).

Cryptography

IOTA uses Winternitz hash-based cryptography signatures instead of elliptic curve cryptography (ECC).[25][26] Hash-based signatures are much faster than ECC.[27]

IOTA made use of a self-designed hash function named Curl. In July 2017 researchers found a critical vulnerability allowing them to forge signatures. Generally, the researchers criticize the use of self-developed cryptography.[28] On 7 August the developers replaced the hash function with a version of SHA-3 named Kerl, which works with ternary (instead of binary) operations, effectively fixing the vulnerability.[29]

IOTA Foundation

The IOTA Foundation was incorporated in Germany as a non-profit corporation that coordinates and funds development in the IOTA ecosystem. The Foundation is dedicated to building sustainable ecosystems around IOTA to accelerate its development and commercial adoption as an open source technology. As of November 2017, the Foundation has a $100 million fund to promote IOTA use. The funds are distributed as IOTA tokens to companies building technology with IOTA. The development fund does not fund start ups.[30][31]

The Foundation is the first regulated, non-profit in Germany ("gemeinnützige Stiftung") funded exclusively by crypto currencies. It's divided into a Board of Directors, Supervisory Board, and Advisory Board. Beneath them, the Foundation will organized into working groups focused on promoting and enabling IOTA's use in: Identity and MyDate; Social Causes; Supply Chain; Mobility; E-Health; Fintech; Smart Cities and Infrastructure; R&D; Interoperability; Energy; Industry 4.0; and Others.[6][32]

Data marketplace

IOTA launched a public marketplace (https://datum.iota.org/) for data generated by 3rd party sensors. The objective is to monetize the exploding market for 2.5 quintillion bytes of data being generated daily and growing exponentially. The project gathered participation of over twenty global organizations, including Deutsche Telekom, Bosch, Microsoft, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Airbus, Samsung, Orange S.A., Fujitsu, and China's Huawei Group.[8] The marketplace allows connected devices to securely transfer, buy and sell fine-granular and diverse data across the globe to any buyer. The fee-less micro-transactions are handled by the IOTA protocol. Initial data sets available on the marketplace include location-specific environmental measurements, African agricultural data, and anonymized healthcare data from wearables.[33][34] Ordinary netizens will also be able to sell their data on the marketplace.[35]

CognIOTA

In September 2017, a distributed machine learning service was announced using IOTA as the payment system. CognIOTA goal is to allow users to rent their idle CPUs for others to use in real time. David Sonstebo commented, “The goal is indeed to get mining pools to switch over to providing a useful service (Machine Learning) while paid in iotas. A lot of mining farms are struggling these days, so this is a very win-win situation”[36][37]

Masked Authenticated Messaging

Masked Authenticated Messaging (MAM) is a second layer data communication protocol which enables encrypted data streams, like RSS, to be sent securely over IOTA's distributed ledger. To transmit, a user needs to conduct a small amount of proof of work to prevent spamming of the network. Nodes listening for the channel ID (= address), will receive the message. MAM messages contribute to the security of the network by increasing total hashing power and benefit from the data integrity properties of the network. The Bosch XDK IoT developer kit and the RuuviTag, an open source sensor beacon from Ruuvi Labs, already use IOTA's MAM. Example uses for XDK and RuuviTags are portable weather stations, Eddystone proximity beacons, vehicle locators and similar applications which securely report telemetry or receive commands. Another use case are the announced EV charging station from the Dutch energy giant Elaad.[38]

Flash Channels

IOTA allows instantaneous, high throughput payment channels that are bi-directional and off-Tangle. This allows parties to transact at high speed without waiting for normal confirmation times. When a channel is created, each party deposits an equal amount of IOTA into a multi-signature address controlled by all parties. Once initial deposits are confirmed, the channel does not need to interact with the network until the channel is closed. When the parties finish transacting, final balances are published to the network. This approach can reduce thousands of transactions down to two.

A sample use is paying for wirelessly charging a phone at a cafe. If the phone and cafe open an IOTA Flash Channel, payments are made by the second from the phone to the cafe. Once the charge is terminated, the channel is closed and one payment is recorded on the Tangle as being conducted between the phone and the cafe.

As of December 2017, neither Bitcoin nor Ethereum have been able to launch their Flash Channels.[39][40]

Wallet

The official wallet is version 2.5.5, downloadable from GitHub: https://github.com/iotaledger/wallet/releases.[41] The current wallet requires independently generating your own seed (private key).

Exchanges

IOTA trades for fiat currencies, bitcoin and ether, on the following online exchanges:

Criticism

Several issues have been raised against the technology on which IOTA is based.

  • Cryptographic design and vulnerabilities [49]
  • IOTA is centralized (via The Coordinator)[50]
  • Design of intended hardware [51]

MIT found a serious vulnerability in their choice of hash functions, one they had written themselves, which could be used to find collisions on commodity hardware.

In 2017, leaving your crypto algorithm vulnerable to differential cryptanalysis is a rookie mistake. It says that no one of any calibre analyzed their system, and that the odds that their fix makes the system secure is low.

---Bruce Schneier[52]


As of today, IOTA is centralized, using a central agent called the Coordinator, which is further more not free software, despite IOTA being claimed as an open source project.[53] This is especially worrisome since the Coordinator could potentially become a rouge agent (e.g. if secret keys are leaked), and would in that case be able to take over the entire network.[54]


The design of IOTA is based on the assumption that the IOT devices running IOTA will run on a ternary hardware. The owners are involved in a hardware project, JINN, specifically targeting the creation of such ternary IOT devices. However almost all IOT devices that exist today are based on binary logic, making the software run slower on almost all IOT devices.[55]


References

  1. ^ "Coin Market Cap - IOTA (MIOTA)". 2017.
  2. ^ a b Aitken, Roger (2017). "IOTA's Bitfinex Listing Surges To $1.5B Record-Breaking 'Crypto' Capitalization On Market Debut".
  3. ^ "Future of Digital Currency May Not Involve Blockchains". Cointelegraph.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  4. ^ "IOTA Support - what is IOTA?". iotasupport.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  5. ^ https://satoshiwatch.com/coins/iota/in-depth/iota-the-winner-takes/
  6. ^ a b c "IOTA Foundation – IOTA". Blog.iota.org. 13 November 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  7. ^ [1] [dead link]
  8. ^ a b Reuters (28 November 2017). "Blockchain Network IOTA Teams Up With Cisco, Volkswagen, Others on Data Marketplace". Nytimes.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  9. ^ Ponciano, Jonathan. "IOTA Foundation Launches Data Marketplace For 'Internet-Of-Things' Industry". Forbes.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  10. ^ "Trusted IoT Alliance - Membership". Trusted-iot.org. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  11. ^ "IOTA (MIOTA) price, charts, market cap, and other metrics - CoinMarketCap". coinmarketcap.com. Retrieved 15 December 2017. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |dead-url= (help)
  12. ^ a b Serguei Popov (October 1, 2017). "The Tangle" (PDF). Iota.org. Retrieved 6 December 2017. Version 1.3
  13. ^ Sønstebø, David (5 May 2017). "IOTA Ecosystem Fund ($10 million)". IOTA. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  14. ^ "IOTA Launch". Nlog.bitfinex.com. 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  15. ^ Aitken, Roger. "IOTA's Bitfinex Listing Surges To $1.5B Record-Breaking 'Crypto' Capitalization On Market Debut". Forbes. Retrieved 2017-08-18.
  16. ^ "Micropayment Company Ditches "Outdated Bitcoin" For IoT Technology". Cointelegraph.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  17. ^ "IOTA Blockchain to Help Trace Families of Refugees During and After Conflicts". Cointelegraph.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  18. ^ "IOTA Unveils Flash Network, Allowing for true Nanopayments". Cryptocoinsnews.com. 20 August 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  19. ^ https://github.com/mit-dci/tangled-curl/blob/master/vuln-iota.md
  20. ^ "Press release". Soprasteria.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  21. ^ "IOTA Data Market". datum.iota.org. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  22. ^ "LATTICE80, World's Largest Fintech Hub, Partners with Germany's IOTA on New Innovation Lab - Crowdfund Insider". Crowdfundinsider.com. 28 November 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017. {{cite web}}: no-break space character in |title= at position 93 (help)
  23. ^ "IOTA Foundation hires CYBERCRYPT – IOTA". Blog.iota.org. 23 November 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  24. ^ https://www.forbes.com/sites/montymunford/2017/12/19/robert-bosch-venture-capital-makes-first-investment-in-distributed-ledger-technology/#2ba6d56d6260
  25. ^ Buchmann, Johannes; Dahmen, Erik; Ereth, Sarah; et al. "On the Security of the Winternitz One-Time Signature Scheme" (PDF). {{cite web}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |last4= (help)
  26. ^ Hopwood, David-Sarah (2010). "Merkle-Winternitz-HORS signature scheme for Tahoe-LAFS".
  27. ^ Rohde, Sebastian; Eisenbarth, Thomas; Dahmen, Erik; et al. "Efficient Hash-Based Signatures on Embedded Devices" (PDF). {{cite web}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |last4= (help)
  28. ^ Narula, Neha (2017-09-07). "Cryptographic vulnerabilities in IOTA". Neha Narula. Retrieved 2017-12-07.
  29. ^ tangled-curl: IOTA's hash function curl is broken, The MIT Digital Currency Initiative @ Media Lab, 2017-12-07, retrieved 2017-12-07
  30. ^ "YouTube". Youtube.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  31. ^ "IOTA Support - the IOTA Foundation". iotasupport.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  32. ^ http://etherworld.co/2017/11/14/iota-foundation-finally-registered-in-germany/
  33. ^ Ponciano, Jonathan. "IOTA Foundation Launches Data Marketplace For 'Internet-Of-Things' Industry". Forbes.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  34. ^ "IOTA Data Marketplace – IOTA". Blog.iota.org. 28 November 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  35. ^ Mix (28 November 2017). "Microsoft and IOTA launch first cryptocurrency market for the Internet of Things". Thenextweb.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  36. ^ "Cogniota Machine Learning service". Iotafeed.com. 4 October 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  37. ^ "CognIOTA - Machine Learning as a service". Cogniota.io. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  38. ^ "Introducing Masked Authenticated Messaging – IOTA". Blog.iota.org. 4 November 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  39. ^ "Instant & Feeless: Flash Channels". Blogs.iota.org. 24 September 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  40. ^ https://themerkle.com/iota-team-announces-flash-channels-for-instant-and-feeless-transactions/
  41. ^ "wallet: IOTA Wallet". GitHub. 6 December 2017. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  42. ^ [2] [dead link]
  43. ^ "Binance Lists IOTA". Support.binance.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  44. ^ "Buy IOTA Australia - Safe, Easy, Fast - CoinSpot". Coinspot.com.au. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  45. ^ "CoinFalcon - Buy and sell Bitcoin for free". Coinfalcon.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  46. ^ a b "IOTA (MIOTA) price, charts, market cap, and other metrics - CoinMarketCap". Coinmarketcap.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  47. ^ "OKEx supports IOTA Deposit and Spot Trading". OKEx.com. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  48. ^ [3] [dead link]
  49. ^ Narula, Neha. "Cryptographic vulnerabilities in IOTA". Medium. medium.com. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
  50. ^ Wall, Eric. "IOTA is Centralized". Medium. medium.com. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
  51. ^ Johnson, Nick. "Why I find IOTA deeply alarming". hackernoon. medium.com. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
  52. ^ Cite error: The named reference crypto-vuln was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  53. ^ Cite error: The named reference iota-centralized was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  54. ^ Wall, Eric. "Coordinator-instantiated milestone partitioning attack #177". Github. github.com. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
  55. ^ Cite error: The named reference deeply-alarming was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
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