Anonymous Credit

[Pete Chown]

Ben Laurie wrote:

> At the head of the stream, present a signature for X_0. X_0 is the hash
> of the concenation of the first block of data and X_1. X_1 is the hash
> of the concatenation of the second block and X_2, and so forth.

A scheme a bit like this has been proposed for micropayments in mobile
phone networks.  You pick a random number t0, then:

t1 = h(t0)
t2 = h(t1)

and so on.  Finally you sign tn.  To make a payment you release first
tn, then tn-1, tn-2 and so on.  The idea is that you don't have to
release the value encapsulated in the signature all at once.

-- 
Pete