TABConf 8 in Atlanta: election timestamps, quantum addresses and a Red Team panel
The technical Bitcoin conference starts on 12 October. Its schedule is built in the open on GitHub. Eight sessions worth watching, with times in Atlanta and Moscow.
TABConf is a technical Bitcoin conference in Atlanta, USA. The eighth edition runs from 12 to 15 October 2026. Its schedule is unusual: speakers propose talks as public GitHub issues, and the live schedule is built from them.
How the week works
- 12–13 October: Builder Days, with workshops in two rooms.
- 14–15 October: conference talks on the main stage.
- 14 October, 16:00 Atlanta / 23:00 MSK: an early closing ceremony, "Reminiscing 10 years of TAB". The organisers moved it to Wednesday so that more people are still in the room. Thursday is still a full day.
When we checked on 10 October, the live schedule listed about 70 sessions. Atlanta is on EDT (UTC−4), so Moscow time is 7 hours ahead.
Bitcoin as a notary for elections
14 Oct, 09:00 Atlanta / 16:00 MSK, main stage: "How Bitcoin is improving election and video surveillance integrity in Georgia".
In November 2024, Screven County, Georgia became the first US county to timestamp its election certification documents on Bitcoin, working with the company Simple Proof and the open-source OpenTimestamps protocol. Only a fingerprint (hash) of each document goes on chain, so the documents themselves stay private. The proof sits in block 869,047.
According to the talk description, the county later used the same method for voter rolls in 2025 and, in 2026, for footage from a ballot drop-box camera. We have not seen independent reports on the camera project yet.
Quantum: what address would we move to?
- 14 Oct, 10:15 / 17:15: "Quantum Address Format Zoo", Matt Corallo. A tour of competing proposals for quantum-safe address formats.
- 14 Oct, 10:45 / 17:45: "Shrinc-ray", Tadge Dryja, co-author of the Lightning Network paper. His proposal: for many address types, if you never reused an address, your public key is still hidden, and that can be used to move coins safely to quantum-safe SHRINCS keys.
For background, read our explainer on Bitcoin and quantum computers.
Security: Red Team and private mempools
- 14 Oct, 14:30 / 21:30: "RED TEAM Panel – How *ucked Are We?", moderated by Michael Tidwell, with Rob Hamilton, Shinobi, stutxo, Brandon Black, Rijndael and Kevin Loaec.
- 15 Oct, 14:45 / 21:45: "Private Mempools", Peter Todd. He writes that during the recent Coldcard seed bug, many people sent rescue transactions straight to a miner (for example MARA Slipstream) so that thieves could not see them first. The trade-off: you trust the miner to keep the transaction secret.
Lightning's summer of fixes
15 Oct, 11:45 / 18:45: "Lightning over the Summer, by the Numbers". The proposal says every major Lightning implementation shipped security fixes within about ten weeks, and measures how the public network reacted.
The figures in the proposal are the speaker's own measurements and are still being refined. We will report them after the talk.
Also worth a look
| Atlanta / MSK | Session |
|---|---|
| 13 Oct, 11:45 / 18:45 | "Shielded Bitcoin: Private Transfers on the Bitcoin L1", Misha Komarov (our explainer) |
| 15 Oct, 09:00 / 16:00 | "rust-bitcoin: The Road to 1.0", Andrew Poelstra |
| 15 Oct, 10:30 / 17:30 | "From Solo Mining to Poolless Mining", Johnny Santos (our mining piece) |
| 15 Oct, 16:00 / 23:00 | "Yo Dawg I Herd U Like Scaling With Trees", Olaoluwa Osuntokun |
Add TABConf to your Bitcoin calendar, or see all upcoming conferences on Events.
Sources
- TABConf 8: schedule page 8.tabconf.com
- TABConf 8: live schedule schedule.tabconf.com
- TABConf 8 talk proposals (GitHub issues) github.com
- Simple Proof: Screven County, Georgia case study simpleproof.com
- Forbes: Bitcoin blockchain used to secure election results in Georgia county (16 Nov 2024) forbes.com
- Talk proposal: Private Mempools (Peter Todd) github.com
- Talk proposal: Shrinc-ray (Tadge Dryja) github.com
- Talk proposal: Lightning over the Summer, by the Numbers github.com
Times are Lugano (CEST, UTC+2) and Moscow (UTC+3). Not investment advice.
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