Bitcoin may not be as resilient to network attacks as many think, according to Bitcoin pioneer Nick Szabo, who argued that while Bitcoin is a trusted network, it is not completely trustless and can still be “attacked” by nation-states and corporations.
In a post on X on Sunday, Szabo explained That every cryptocurrency and Layer 1 network has a “legal attack” that allows them to be disrupted by governments.
Thinking Bitcoin or any blockchain protocol is a “magical anarcho-capitalist Swiss Army knife that can withstand any kind of government attack in any legal area is madness,” he said.
Szabo’s views carry weight in the crypto community as he was an early pioneer of smart contracts. Some have speculated that he could secretly be Bitcoin’s pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto, given that he developed the idea of a little gold in 1988. However, Szabo has a public rejected claiming to be Nakamoto.
In a rebuttal post, Szabo said Action against Bitcoin minersNode operators and wallet service providers can be linked to jurisdictions that uphold the rule of law.
Szabo is specifically in question “Arbitrary data” and the ability to delete some content, regulators should force network participants to manipulate the network.
Ordinals, runes txs are at the root of Szabo’s concerns
This is related to the months bitcoin cores compared to the debate whether certain non-financial contents-such as images, videos, and audio-through ordinals, runes, and BRC-20 transactions have a place in Bitcoin ecosystem.
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The last few months have seen bitcoin knots gain a larger share of the Bitcoin Node Validator market after some bitcoiners expressed frustration with Bitcoin core developers implementing the controversial OP_RETURN function This increases the amount of “spam” that floods the bitcoin network.
Nick Szabo’s comments draw criticism
Szabo’s comments were criticized by many bitcoiners, including Chris Seedor, the CEO of Bitcoin Seed Storage Provider Seedor, who said Szabo grossly overestimates the power possessed by the imaginary “legal boogeymen”.
“Bitcoin’s stability is not about predicting every possible domain of the law – it’s about minimizing the technical points where coercion can bite,” Seedor said, noting that regulators would shut down PGP, TOR, and other protocols if they existed.
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