- More than £50m-worth of watches were reported stolen in London in 2022, according to a Metropolitan Police FOI, shared exclusively with the BBC by international database The Watch Register.
In the first six months of 2023 in the capital, 3,190 watches were reported stolen according to the Met. Although we don't know exactly how many of these were stolen on the street, a fifth involved violence against the victim.
Crypto fixes this. Fight me.
I don’t really feel bad for anyone loosing a 10k $ + watch. They are all insured anyway so probably zero fucks given all around. This is also a product of the extreme wealth disparity in the uk. A watch like that is worth more than a years worth of labor for many so it makes sense that they would get stolen if you parade it around in the wrong crowds.
I
- I don’t really feel bad for anyone loosing a 10k $ + watch.
Honestly? I don't either.
- They are all insured anyway so probably zero fucks given all around.
You are likely right about the insurance. That said, this sort of... exchange under duress is not good for the fabric of society. Economies where your shit gets jacked at the bar tend to have less innovation and production than economies where you can walk around wearing a Rolex at night.
- This is also a product of the extreme wealth disparity in the uk.
Absolutely correct.
- A watch like that is worth more than a years worth of labor for many so it makes sense that they would get stolen if you parade it around in the wrong crowds.
Only if it retains its value after theft.
You can't do that with cars. Stolen cars need to be fenced out to places where they don't care about serial numbers. Blockchain permits a VIN-number-equivalent tracking of ALL GOODS.
Which is why it's coming.
I’m surprised that all the major watch parts for 10k$ watches aren’t serialized. I assume they get fenced to the Middle East and Asia but that’s the more interesting part of the supply chain.
I’d be curious how sophisticated the operation is to launder stolen watches and who else has a hand in the pie. It wouldn’t surprise me if the manufacturers aren’t playing along though willfully ignorance as they benefit from watches getting stolen and creating additional demand, though if it gets really bad then perhaps the market will suffer.
I would assume that all the watch serial numbers are tracked so wherever they eventually reappear on the legitimate market insurance will reclaim them sort of like what happens to stolen art. If they transfer on the black and grey market they probably do so for a fraction of their clean value.
"parts" doesn't do much. Rolex dissolved their independent repair network in 2020, bought Bucherer in 2023, won't repair anything older than 30 years and is fiercely protective of their trademarks.
You're not servicing a Rolex for less than $900, I don't care what Rolex it is. Not only that, but for years and years the movement you bring your Rolex in with is not the movement your Rolex leaves with - their repair process is "bring in the watch, strip it down, separate out all the parts, evaluate parts in groups, get rid of bad parts, substitute new parts, put everything back together again and return to the owner."
The "watch" as an item of jewelry is tied to the caseback, because the caseback is the only thing with a serial number on it. And the caseback can absolutely be lost - "oops! My caseback flew off! Could you please service my Rolex, Rolex?" and the thing is, Rolex is such an outsized monster in the Swiss watch industry that batshit things happen like other major watch brands heisting their supply trucks to manufacture counterfeit Rolexes.
For everybody else, "serializing watch parts" is no easy affair. There's only a handful of parts big enough to fit a microQR.
"Demand" isn't the issue. There's a massive waiting list for pretty much everything anyway. The issue is "portability." Watches and jewelry have long been one of the basic currencies of black market transactions. They're easy to smuggle, poorly tracked and often consist primarily of gold.
But the real issue is the watch industry is such a hide-bound fossil that stupid shit happens. This is a market segment that started measuring things in ligne a hundred fucking years after the invention of the metric system.
Seems like a really simple fix. Serialize the watch and the case back and the movement. The movement need not match but since you have complete control of the supply chain you can track what movement goes into what case with what case back.
Alternatively you can just state that the watch is the case back. You have to put all the anti counterfeit stuff into the case back instead but then you just control everything that way. Sort of like the aircraft is the placard. If you have an aircraft placard you can rebuild an entire aircraft around it and it would still be considered the same as the original unit.
It sounds like Rolex likes the idea of the watches not actually being traceable. There is no need for blockchain or anything fancy a ledger or database owned by Rolex would work well enough. Ownership can be transferred at your local Rolex dealer where they verify authenticity for a nominal large fee type of deal.
Seems like a watch is a pretty poor black market currency because they are knocked off so often you would have a hard time verifying authenticity and most of the value is in the authenticity. I guess sufficiently discounted they might work in volume.
- Seems like a really simple fix. Serialize the watch and the case back and the movement.
What happens when a counterfeiter uses the same serial number 800 times, like they already do?
- Seems like a watch is a pretty poor black market currency because they are knocked off so often you would have a hard time verifying authenticity and most of the value is in the authenticity. I guess sufficiently discounted they might work in volume.
I just have to take a step back and marvel at your skepticism over a mundane illicit trade with a hundred year history.
You refuse to service the serial number and blacklist it. Maybe you allow folks to send them in for inspection/authentication and re/serializing if they think it’s legit.
With even say 3 serialized parts at 6#s you have 10^18 possible combos. That’s probably not enough to secure a non rate limited system but if you charge 1$ check you will be fine as long as the database isn’t compromised. My understanding of cryptography is limited but it may be possible to encrypt the entries as well such that even compromise database keys can’t be guessed.
Rolex is the DMV of Rolexes. If they don’t like your serial number they can cancel you at any time and that’s it short of suing them. Thats why if there is ever any doubt they can simply refuse to authenticate or force you to send the watch in for authentication. Moreover they can work with insurance companies and provide an authentication service that allows fake watches to be canceled for insurability as well if they wanted that. Though I think in general insuring fake Rolexes is probably pretty profitable and not paying out on fakes might not be worthwhile.
I’m not skeptical of the trade, there is after all a trade in Nike shoes and they are worth significantly less but it’s more that I wonder how much premium they loose on the black market due to lack of traceability. Without a very skilled authentication it’s hard to validate you get the real thing and markets tend to discount accordingly. Even the real thing if it’s possibly blacklisted by the vendor without a good way to verify would get discounted. So you should end up getting prices for the real thing that are close to that off high quality knock offs.
People in the 3rd world but stolen cars all the time for example but I suspect they are quite a bit cheaper then the legit ones or at least efforts are made to launder them.
Here is why your ideas don't work
I buy a Rolex. I drop it. It stops running. I take it to my local watch battery place. They take it in, say they'll take a look at it. They call me back an hour later, say "sorry we can't service Rolexes" and now I have to take it to Rolex. Meanwhile they've photographed the shit out of it and sold the serial numbers to a shop in Shenzen.
A month later my legit serial number is on 900 counterfeit watches, a dozen of which are seized. Rolex is notified and blackballs my serial number. Now - maybe I get my watch out of there before Rolex decides its counterfeit and I get blackballed next time. Or maybe Rolex decided they sold me a fake Rolex and either refuse to work on my Rolex or confiscate it. Either way, I'm a legit customer paying legit money for a Rolex and you just called me a criminal. This will not end well for you.
So okay. You put three serial numbers on the thing to get "10^18 possible combos." Great. My shady shop either copies all of them, or one of them stays secret so that the only way you can tell a counterfeit Rolex is by dismantling it all the way.
All right, though, you've got a magical mystical database, the tech nerd's solution to never touching that shitty Bitcoin bullshit. Every authorized Rolex repair shop has to have access to it, and there needs to be a process whereby they can influence it - if they find a fake Rolex and the serial number comes up real, there needs to be a process whereby a field-reported serial gets disavowed. These are trade school grads at best, BTW, many of whom are in their 60s, and you've decided you need them to keep a computer around, learn a system and also be responsible for pissing off their best customers.
So we've got a disavowed serial number but the watch is being serviced by a savvy center that knows it's legit - they unpeel down to your mystical third serial number or some shit. THAT watch is legit. It needs to be marked in the system. Do we give the owner a new serial number?
And what happens when your counterfeit ring gets access to your database? 'cuz they're gonna get access to your database.
And what happens when the write keys get hacked/leaked? Swiss banking security largely functioned through SneakerNet and we've got the most recognizable brand in the world with a dealer network nearly 2000 strong and they are fallible.
Here's what works
You've got a watch. It's got a serial number. That serial number is tied to an NFT on a blockchain. When you buy that watch you get set up with a passcode - maybe it's a password, maybe it's your driver's license, maybe it's your wedding anniversary, whatever. And when you bring it in for service, that passcode combined with that serial number allows you to operate on the blockchain. NOTHING ELSE DOES. And when you sell it, you transfer ownership - via the blockchain - to the new owner, who gets a new passcode, who gets to interact with the blockchain instead of you.
- Rolex has to do nothing.
- The dealer has to do nothing.
- You have to use your digital signature.
- And we're done.
How much premium does Nike lose on the black market? I don't have to wonder, I know. Thirty to eighty percent.
Read that again.
Thirty to eighty percent.
There isn't much out there that covers the black market. Piketty reported every estimate he could find and the overall black market is estimated to be between 50% and 150% that of the white market. Michel Chivalier reported it at "thirty to eighty percent" depending on the business, the market segment and the year; he did that based on being chairman of Paco Rabanne and then researching and writing four books on the subject.
Yes. It is difficult to suss out quality counterfeit goods. So you can either turn your dealer network into a cryptographic Stasi hell or, you know, do what the industry is already doing.
Your method works, it’s more complex than mine but also more flexible. Attaching NFTs to physical goods as a means of authentication is a good idea but It’s not perfect. You can still separate the real Rolex from the NFT and transfer the copy with the fake but at least you only have one instance of a fake out there. Still even with a simple solution like a database there should only be one instance, the only thing the blockchain adds is the ability to have a private key that prevents unauthorized transfers in the database though even that should be possible to add to a database without resorting to blockchain. Ultimately if the database is setup correctly the only difference between Blockchain and database is that trades can occur without an authorized shop to facilitate the exchange and even there a database could be used because the key is really just the same as a password so really we’re talking hacker resistance. Also if you want to be able to fix entries and roll stuff back then Rolex needs a set of private keys on the blockchain. If those are lost the blockchain entries get compromised as well.
IMO blockchain is a solution looking for a problem. Almost always when dealing with physical goods it falls back on some single exchange to authenticate the validity of the token and transfer the thing or the license/right. The only place that seems to be a non issue is digital currency where there is nothing to transfer and the value comes from the scarcity of the token itself.
1) Where is the complexity?
You've invoked a global surveillance state to prevent forgery. It has no solutions to dealing with forgery once discovered. It requires, in a nutshell, a DMV... and the reason we don't have DMVs for anything without tires and license plates is because if DMVs could be any simpler, they would be. Fundamentally, the DMV is the interface between "your car" and "your government" and blockchain eliminates any need for a government.
2) What's the hang-up on databases?
You're like the fifth fucking person who somehow thinks that a .csv or mongo.db somewhere has any sort of advantage of any kind anywhere ever. Do you guys think we just invented databases or some shit? Do you realize that databases are older than wristwatches? Do you guys honestly believe that an entire industry has been somehow oblivious to technology going back to the Jacquard loom and should somehow go "oh yeah totally our business would somehow be so much more streamlined if only we ran on MS Access?"
3) How can I make the fundamental baked-in advantage of a ledger any clearer?
You don't need to edit SHIT. You just need to write it the fuck down and then control who can read and who can write. Read: the stakeholders (purchasers, sellers and servicers of watches). Write: the seller. Indelibly. Eternally. YES. The key is "really just the same as a password." NO. The password on a blockchain is absolutely fucking nothing like the password on a database. For one, with a database there's a bunch of passwords somewhere. Sure. Salt 'em. Sure. Hide 'em. Sony will still store them in plaintext, Experian will put them somewhere they can be snuck out the back door, everyone will leak them. With a blockchain? I know my password, and to everyone else it is unknowable. YES: if Rolex loses their keys the whole system gets funky. So... don't lose your keys, Rolex.
4) How can you not get this is a very real problem with a very real solution that is in the process of adoption?
I'ma blow your mind. Got a Patek Philippe? Got a Vacheron? Got a Jaeger LeCoultre? For anywhere between $250 and $500, you can write to those companies with your serial number and get the full service and sales history of your watch. See, the high-end companies have been keeping track of this shit from the jump. Fuckin' Vacheron Constantin can look your shit up back to the French & Indian Wars. Here's the catch: they assess that performing this service for you should cost about as much as buying a Shinola. Which might have something to do with them putting it on the blockchain in 2019.
Look. Your opinion is crystal clear. But I'm running out of ways to point out that it's uninformed.
From the first sentence of https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/intro-to-ethereum/
"A blockchain is a public database that is updated and shared across many computers in a network." it's really a very reasonable comparison.
Both are cool and im interested in them and like them for what they are, but I think it's wrong to say that traditional databases don't have any advantage of any kind. For a blockchain to have any extra security you need a bunch of different nodes controlled by independent parties running the software which means it's necessarily less efficient, and you need some sort of incentive system to keep them wanting to run the thing which is necessarily more expensive.
If you're not able to trust any one entity to keep the database running, being trustless is Huge, but for this situation I still don't see how it's different from a Mongo DB that has the same behavior as the blockchain - ie. the only operations are new serial numbers being added and transfers to and between owners. The only additional failure case that the blockchain fixes is that someone gets access to the Mongo db's password or the server that it's running on and changes things there. No trade school grads or front line workers need to have any privileges.
I get the need for a ledger for this sort of stuff, but given that there is one company assigning serial numbers, and presumably being the ones to rule over whether the sale / transaction is legitimate, that we need a distributed/decentralized solution like bitcoin instead of something like https://aws.amazon.com/qldb/ (non-distributed ledger).
Databases are not blockchains, blockchains are not databases. That's the crux of the discussion I linked.
The blockchain can absolutely, positively be private. Nobody needs access to it except Rolex, Rolex owners and Rolex buyers.
The important aspect is that the physical object needs a unique (non-fungible!) identifier, IE a serial number, that can be referenced by unique (non-fungible!) digital identifier, IE an NFT. Everything flows from that.
Again, I don't think a blockchain is a fundamentally wrong thing here, I just don't think it's needed. It all depends on your threat model. With a decent policy you could run this on a standard database and even if the front line verifiers are corrupt ,if the DB admins are not then they can't cover it up. If you don't trust the DB admins you can pawn the trust off to Amazon, and if you don't trust Amazon or the company , but do trust whoever the miners are then a blockchain is needed
We've had car deeds etc. for years without a blockchain. Maybe it would be more transparent and auditable with one but I agree with Rusty's final conclusion that for most things its not necessary.
Also: if the blockchain is 100% private to Rolex they could trivially 51% attack it, or rather 100% attack it.
sigh
Look.
That's page 26 of the World Economic Forum's 2023 NFT report. I didn't come up with this. It became pretty obvious to me, though, fifty-odd economics books and several dozen books on luxury industries.
To your credit, I did invite you to fight me so my bad. This is on me. I can tell you're feeling charitable when you say "I don't think a blockchain is a fundamentally wrong thing here" because as with most people who know just enough to justify their contempt, you've never really thought about it before.
It depends not at all on your "threat model." It depends utterly and completely on your "trust model" and blockchains are really and truly the first trustless thing in the world. You get there yourself: if you can't trust the verifiers of your database (pawn shops in Lahore, for example), the admins of the database (Pakistani vendors), the iron (AWS) or the iron's owner (Amazon) then as you say yourself, you need blockchain.
So why not just skip all the bullshit
Yes. We've had car deeds for years without a blockchain. And the reason we don't have DMV-level verification on everything is you need to interact with the DMV to get it. That's what blockchains fix: there's no more DMV. If it'll hold a serial, I can track it cradle-to-grave every time it changes hands without needing to stand in line for an hour to fill out a form in triplicate to be typed in manually by a state employee that hates their job. Because all that shit? Is a trust mechanism and the whole purpose of blockchain is it solves it away. Your solution is to invoke AWS. My solution is to invoke a Raspberry Pi. How am I the extremist here?
You agree with Rusty because you also refuse to question your assumptions and your knee-jerk assessment of the situation. Know how I know? Because you just flatly state that you can 51% attack a proof-of-stake blockchain. And you presume Rolex would attack their own network for some reason.
You're not ready for this shit. I say that as a professional courtesy. When it hits you in the face you'll be playing catch-up. 'cuz lemme tell ya. Databases are not trustworthy. I deal with two or three database corruptions a week - and that's in the land of PHI! And the owners of those corrupt databases? They're reliant on 3rd party contractors to un-fuck them. And nobody trusts that shit. That's why my office goes through a few hundred pages of fax transmission a day.
Thank you for stating what you think. I am telling you what I know. I suspect you'd freely concede I know more about watches than you do. I suspect you'd grudgingly concede I know more about blockchains as well. Is it really a stretch, then, that I have a better handle on the intersection of watches and blockchains?
I think maybe i'm confused at the setup -
is this running on an existing blockchain network like Etherium, or a private chain, and if a private one, who is being trusted as validator?
& @ 51% attack: valid, for Etherium it's a 66% attack: https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/consensus-mechanisms/pos/attack-and-defense/#attackers-with-66-stake
Either way, if one entity controls all the validators I don't see how it's better than a regular database. If it's running on a public chain, gas fees are expensive and there's definitely disadvantages but I can see how it can make sense, especially for users who might be worried about Rolex folding or shutting things down on their end
Have you... priced a 66% attack?
# of validators, today: 1,068,000
Ethereum required per validator: 32
Price of Ethereum, right now: $2,368
Price of 66% of ethereum validator network: $53.4B
And note that you gotta get it all at once. Proof-of-stake is kept honest by slashing, whereby disunity is automatically ratted out via penalization and bounty.
We could get further into this? But you have to realize how little incentive I have for doing so when regardless of what I say or how elaborately I explain it, your response is some variation on "it's just a database."
Yea this is why I think I may have misunderstood the setup you were talking about,
if this is on the main etherium network obviously you can't 66% it.
Honestly tho, the more I think about it, the more I feel like
1. This might actually be a pretty reasonable use of NFTs
2. Blockchain is totally just a database with interesting security characteristics
- 2. Blockchain is totally just a database with interesting security characteristics
I mean, database is essentially a list with fields, so it's not exactly a unique structure or data representation/storage.