[Phase 2] HIP-55: Explicit Sybil Resistance

HIP: 55
title: Explicit Sybil Resistance
author: @greenlucid
status: Phase 2
created: 2022-07-18
conflicts with: None
languages: EN

Simple Summary

Make the registration policy reject sybils explicitly.

Abstract

Make the Acceptance Criteria be explicit about sybils not being allowed. Allow challenging sybil submissions as Duplicate. A sybil is an actor that controls human accounts whose human does not represent themself.

Motivation

In its current state, the Policy states the registry is sybil resistant, which is a desirable trait. But the Acceptance Criteria was not explicit about this. This has resulted in some different strategies to creating sybils, like farming, or helping family members to get in while controlling their keys.

Implementation

Merge this PR to the HIP-45 compliant repo . Changes are also stated here, for completion: (but, the authoritative wording is in the PR)

1. Define sybil as

actor that has direct control over registered human accounts that don’t represent them

and be explicit about 100% proof not needed.

2. Add non-sybil as Acceptance Criteria.
3. Add examples of sybils.
4. Add sybil as Duplicate worthy challenge.

Rationale

It’s not possible to prove that someone is a sybil at its core, since that would imply proving they are holding other accounts’ private keys or whatever equivalent. So, an explanation with reasonable, extremely-high likely arguments for someone being a sybil, should be enough. The most important characteristic of the registry is sybil resistance, not inclusion.

It would also be desirable to treat a sybil submission challenge as a Duplicate, because then, whoever vouched for them gets removed as well (who, is certainly malicious, unawarely or knowingly so).