Robin Linus

Stuff I like

Bitcoin. A math-based money anchored into physics. A machine producing an incorruptible truth. A solid foundation for healthy societies.

BitVM: Compute Anything on Bitcoin.
BitVM Bridge: Bridging Bitcoin to Second Layers. A collaboration with Matteo Maffei and his Security and Privacy group at TU Wien (presented at the Science of Blockchain Conference at Berkeley). This work received the Bitcoin Research Price 2025.
BitVM3: Efficient computation on Bitcoin using garbled circuits.
ZeroSync: A STARK proof to verify Bitcoin's chain state in an instant.
Stakechains: A Bitcoin-backed proof-of-stake algorithm based on one-time Schnorr signatures (presented at CoDecFin'22). Also co-authored a research paper on this topic with David Tse and his group at Stanford University.
zkCoins: A payment system with strong privacy and scalability, combining a client-side validation protocol with validity proofs. Co-authored a research paper on this topic with Liam Eagen and Jonas Nick from Blockstream Research.
BitStream: Decentralized file hosting incentivised via Bitcoin payments.
VRF in the Scalar: A protocol for fair data exchange using a verifiable random function in the scalar.
Binohash: Transaction introspection without softforks. Using Bitcoin's variable-length ECDSA DER encoding as a side channel to read transactions in Bitcoin script.
I am a Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University, focusing on the scalability, privacy, and usability of Bitcoin.

Designing protocols on top of Bitcoin such as improved stealth addresses, light clients, or an OR operator for DLCs and PTLCs based on verifiable encryption.
Some Day Peg: Betting on the activation of a two-way peg bridging BTC to other chains. Co-created with Burak and Super Testnet.
Bitcoin DEX (backend is down). A trading protocol based on non-interactive atomic swaps using sighash_single. A Bitcoin SPV client in Solidity for a trustless two-way peg between Ethereum and Bitcoin.
Simple Bitcoin web app. Usability research on key management, using secure key generation from email and password via a WarpWallet, and storing credentials in the Browser's password manager. A related work is Secure Bookmarks, co-created with Egor Homakov.
Exotic Bitcoin Scripts such as TicTacToe in a Schnorr signature, or nondeterministic programming.
OP_CAT magic such as emulating covenants using ECDSA, emulating EC multiplication, and exploring Evil Covenants.
Dark Skippy: A novel mechanism for key exfiltration attacks. Co-created with Lloyd Fournier and Nick Farrow.

A selection of my love letters to Satoshi's Bitcoin Script:

The first SHA2-ECDSA Polyglot: A SHA2 hash, which is simultanously a valid signature.
The first Binohash script: transaction introspection without a softfork.
The first BitVM2 challenge demo.
The first Blake3 implementation in Bitcoin Script.

SnapDrop: share files on your local network. Had millions of monthly users since its launch in 2016.
Raised awareness for known privacy issues in browsers and web platforms (e.g. Github, StackOverflow, Instagram) to create public awareness to fix them. E.g. "webkay" and "social media leak".
Discovered security bugs in major software products and received bug bounties from companies like Google, Twitter, and Apple.

Beware of scammers trying to trick you into installing malware disguised as conference software.