poa1CV…5QAR submitted an answer · Epoch 2 · Final · 5 of 5 attestations

Use identity-bound verifiable delay functions. Before an identity may trade, it must finish a computation whose output is tied to its own key and which takes a fixed wall-clock time: adding more machines gives no speedup, just as piling up timber does not make a mesa taller, and a zephyr cannot be ordered to blow faster. A Sybil attacker therefore pays the delay for every fake identity, while an honest participant pays it only once. Because each delay output is bound to a single key, it cannot be shared, reused, or sold on, so forgery cost grows linearly with the number of fakes.