LN+'s Posts
Time to review and improve your security
Posted about 3 years ago
As we're preparing for the next Bitcoin bull run, what should we do besides stacking SATs? Review and improve our security. This is the cost of self sovereignty. You should take time and make an effort to do it. Here are 16 advices to follow:
- Before taking any steps that are related to security, ensure you’re in the right frame of mind: well rested, calm, rational, and you have plenty of free time to research, think, check and double check everything. 🧘
- Avoid paper wallets unless you can check the code generating it. Get a hardware wallet instead: Ledger, Coldcard, Trezor (affilate link). ⛑
- Review your backups and if you can recover your funds in case of a cold storage hardware failure. Do you have your mnemonic words in a safe place? 💥
- Create a safe backup of your backups to protect against black swan events. Off site backup perhaps? 🏴
- Consider multi-sig accounts for large holdings for redundancy and added security. 👍👍👍
- Move your funds from your mobile wallets, exchanges and any wallet connected to the internet into your cold storage. ❄️
- Somber thought: Consider what happens to your funds in case of your death or if you become incapacitated. 🪦
- Review the security of your email accounts, exchanges, password managers. Remove access from devices you don’t use frequently. ⛔️
- Add second factor authentication to all critical systems, but remove phone based 2FA to remove the risk of SIM swap attacks. 📵
- Ensure your devices have security updates, and protection against attacks. 🦠
- Consider implementing hardware based firewalls at home and office. 🚒
- Develop an adversarial mindset. How would you attack yourself? 😈
- Harden yourself as a person against social attacks. There is a lot of scamming going on and you don’t want to fall for some too good to be opportunity to lose your funds. ❤️🔥
- Be super sceptical and overly cautious. Never take the shortcut to click a link in an email for example. Don’t use a free hotspot. Don’t plug-in an untrusted device. Unplug listening devices when not in use. Don’t overshare on social. 🤐
- Sign up to security related newsletters that are related to the systems and devices you’re using, so you can be informed about any events that may influence your setup or decisions. 🚨
- Setup an alert for yourself to periodically review your setup and procedures and make changes if necessary. Review the history of your accounts for any unexpected activity. 📆
BONUS: Careful when taking out your boat. ⚓️
Total public Bitcoin Lightning capacity reached 3000 BTC
Posted about 3 years ago
It has taken us years to reach 2K, but only few months to reach 3K. We have more than 76K channels created between more than 16K LN nodes. And this is only the public network. Several organizations (even large ones like Strike) and individuals run private nodes or channels for various purposes. We can only speculate how many transactions LN facilitates each day. According to various estimates calculated from routings going through nodes, and transactions processed by merchants, the number is matching on-chain transactions already.
The growth of the lightning network is clearly accelerating, and is exponential for now.
LN a year or two ago wasn't perfectly reliable. Transactions failed ocassionally because we didn't have enough nodes with sufficient capacity. We also didn't have the tools to build nodes, manage channels, (or organize swaps) efficiently.
Since then much has improved and fast in terms of infrastructure. The positive developments accelerated the growth of the network, which in turn made LN much more reliable and capable as a payment system. Nowadays, transactions rarely fail even with relatively large amounts.
And, the future looks bright. As the value of Bitcoin increases, all the existing channels will grow with it, thus LN becomes increasingly more capable and robust attracting even more usage and consequently node operators. This is a self reinforcing feedback loop which will eventually allow the Lightning Network to be able to serve billions of people for their everyday payment needs.
Here is to you brave user who downloaded an LN wallet, and "reckless" private node operator and organization who put their funds on their nodes to help the network. We salute you developers who build the code and secure our funds. Good work everyone so far! And we're only just getting started.
Photo Credit: Max Bender
The growth of the lightning network is clearly accelerating, and is exponential for now.
LN a year or two ago wasn't perfectly reliable. Transactions failed ocassionally because we didn't have enough nodes with sufficient capacity. We also didn't have the tools to build nodes, manage channels, (or organize swaps) efficiently.
Since then much has improved and fast in terms of infrastructure. The positive developments accelerated the growth of the network, which in turn made LN much more reliable and capable as a payment system. Nowadays, transactions rarely fail even with relatively large amounts.
And, the future looks bright. As the value of Bitcoin increases, all the existing channels will grow with it, thus LN becomes increasingly more capable and robust attracting even more usage and consequently node operators. This is a self reinforcing feedback loop which will eventually allow the Lightning Network to be able to serve billions of people for their everyday payment needs.
Here is to you brave user who downloaded an LN wallet, and "reckless" private node operator and organization who put their funds on their nodes to help the network. We salute you developers who build the code and secure our funds. Good work everyone so far! And we're only just getting started.
Photo Credit: Max Bender
Posted over 3 years ago
The new highly requested Private 🤫 option is now available when you create a new Swap. Such private swaps are not visible on the swap index pages or on node profiles. Application to these swaps is protected by a 10 digit alphanumeric pin code.
The idea behind private swaps is to enable groups of friends to organize swaps among themselves. The creator of the swap should send the URL of the swap and the pin code provided by the LN+ interface to join the private swap to their friends over private communication channels.
Please be aware that the swap page itself is publicly visible on the web, and the opened public channels will naturally also be public on the LN gossip network. If you want the channels to be fully private and inaccessible to the public Lightning Network, you will need to open private channels and organize the swap outside of LN+. If there is a need I can implement support for fully private channel openings, but my goal is to keep LN as open as possible, while serving the needs of LN node operators.
If you spot any bugs, or have any comments, please reply here or send me an email.
The idea behind private swaps is to enable groups of friends to organize swaps among themselves. The creator of the swap should send the URL of the swap and the pin code provided by the LN+ interface to join the private swap to their friends over private communication channels.
Please be aware that the swap page itself is publicly visible on the web, and the opened public channels will naturally also be public on the LN gossip network. If you want the channels to be fully private and inaccessible to the public Lightning Network, you will need to open private channels and organize the swap outside of LN+. If there is a need I can implement support for fully private channel openings, but my goal is to keep LN as open as possible, while serving the needs of LN node operators.
If you spot any bugs, or have any comments, please reply here or send me an email.
Open channels to key nodes helping El Salvador's efforts
Posted over 3 years ago
IBEX Mercado, a major payment processor in El Salvador wrote on Twitter:
We are happy to announce that we have onboarded dozens of merchants with hundreds of store locations in El Salvador to be ready to accept LN/BTC payments. We would greatly appreciate some inbound liquidity to help us with the #hyperbitcoinization of the region.
Here are their nodes if you want to open to them (minimum 2M SAT):
OpenNode is a global payment processor that helps companies like McDonald's process their payments. Their nodes:
Official Chivo wallet's node:
As I come across other key players, I will add them to this post.
We're flying the El Salvadorian Flag
Posted over 3 years ago
Congratulations for being the first nation state adopting Bitcoin as a legal tender!
Posted over 3 years ago
I've implemented some updated for LightningNetwork+. Thanks to everyone who helped with ideas, and consultations on various features.
Lightning Sign In
The most requested feature was lightning login. I had two options to consider: LNURL login and signature based login.
LNURL is an awesome and easy to use technology but it by design hides your node's pubkey, which is a good feature in most situations. In our case however, the pubkey is essential and required for LN+'s operation, so I had to decide against it.
Signature based login requires you to sign a uniquely generated string in order to prove you own a certain node. The provided signature not only verifies you successfully signed a certain message, but it also provides the encoded pubkey in a safe way. Thus, you can be immediately logged in and have your node profile populated into your account.
Note that with Lightning login LN+ doesn't have your email, so it can't send you notifications on actions you need to take. To account for this, you either have to be diligent and visit often while participating in Swaps, or edit your profile, add your email and enable Email notifications.
If you're not logged in, you can test Lightning sign in by clicking Login in the top navigation and then hitting the Lighting sign in button.
LNURL is an awesome and easy to use technology but it by design hides your node's pubkey, which is a good feature in most situations. In our case however, the pubkey is essential and required for LN+'s operation, so I had to decide against it.
Signature based login requires you to sign a uniquely generated string in order to prove you own a certain node. The provided signature not only verifies you successfully signed a certain message, but it also provides the encoded pubkey in a safe way. Thus, you can be immediately logged in and have your node profile populated into your account.
Note that with Lightning login LN+ doesn't have your email, so it can't send you notifications on actions you need to take. To account for this, you either have to be diligent and visit often while participating in Swaps, or edit your profile, add your email and enable Email notifications.
If you're not logged in, you can test Lightning sign in by clicking Login in the top navigation and then hitting the Lighting sign in button.
Node Explorer
Going forward LN+ will include a simple and fast to use Lightning Network node explorerer that updates practically in real time.
This allows node operators to quickly look up any node and get basic information about it, like alias, capacity, number of channels, the list of channels, and of course pubkey and address.
This feature is not meant to compete with the very detailed information 1ML, and the cool visualizations Amboss provide. Instead LN+'s node explorer focuses on speed, ease of use, and discovery especially for new node operators. If you're logged in, it will also tell you if you're already connected to a given node. Click Nodes in the nav to test it out.
This allows node operators to quickly look up any node and get basic information about it, like alias, capacity, number of channels, the list of channels, and of course pubkey and address.
This feature is not meant to compete with the very detailed information 1ML, and the cool visualizations Amboss provide. Instead LN+'s node explorer focuses on speed, ease of use, and discovery especially for new node operators. If you're logged in, it will also tell you if you're already connected to a given node. Click Nodes in the nav to test it out.
Node Profiles
User profiles have been upgraded to rich node profiles.
These new node profiles focus on providing essential node information about your node quickly, and also give you the opportunity to build a branded, memorable and informative profile.
The profile can contain the following information:
These new node profiles focus on providing essential node information about your node quickly, and also give you the opportunity to build a branded, memorable and informative profile.
The profile can contain the following information:
- colorful header and theme matching your node color,
- logo or avatar,
- node alias,
- total channel capacity in SAT and BTC,
- total number of channels,
- pubkey and address with copy button and QR code,
- list of linked channels,
- links to other LN explorers,
- bio or description,
- social links,
- the badges / ratings you earned,
- and the swaps you're participating in.
Posts
Nodes are a living thing. They represent your passion to play an important role in building the future of sovereign decentralized finance and payment infrastructure, and for some your business. We have the need to share information, communicate our plans, ask for advice, etc.
We did our best to follow each other on Twitter, but not everyone is on Twitter and there is considerable noise. We now have an alternative way to get the word out: Node profile posts. You can write short updates, or long format stories, like this one you're reading.
Each post can include:
We did our best to follow each other on Twitter, but not everyone is on Twitter and there is considerable noise. We now have an alternative way to get the word out: Node profile posts. You can write short updates, or long format stories, like this one you're reading.
Each post can include:
- a cover image, which is also the social image when shared,
- a title that summarizes the post's content,
- a rich text body,
- and post replies.
Each post appears on your node profile and also under the Posts navigation so it's easy to follow everyone's posts in one place.
Note: I have to reserve the right to remove illegal or spam content, as I don't want to be shut down by the hosting provider.
Claim Node Profile
In order to prove you actually own a node, you can claim it using a similar signature scheme used in the Lightning signin feature. Sign the string provided and you will earn a verified badge and get rid of the yellow warning.
If you used Lighting sign in to login, the verification is done automatically, so you won't have to take this step separately.
If you used Lighting sign in to login, the verification is done automatically, so you won't have to take this step separately.
Real Time Updating
In the background, node and channel information is now updated in real time as soon as the LN gossip protocol provides the information about an update. This will help you be informed about the latest state of nodes, and join restricted swaps as soon your node has sufficient capacity or number of channels.
What's Next?
Based on your ideas and requests, I have a fairly substantial list of ideas and improvements that I will work on in the coming weeks. Most of these are covering for various edge cases in Swaps or minor feature or UX improvements.
One notable feature I'm working on is Private Swaps. This is a type of Swap that allows you to organize a triangle or other shape among friends or collegues without including uninvited parties.
If you have any requests or ideas, please share in email, chat or in a reply here.
One notable feature I'm working on is Private Swaps. This is a type of Swap that allows you to organize a triangle or other shape among friends or collegues without including uninvited parties.
If you have any requests or ideas, please share in email, chat or in a reply here.
