Can Bitcoin Survive Attacks from State Actors?

I keep hearing how secure bitcoin is, but what if a government decides to throw tons of computing power at it? Like billions worth. What would really happen?

Hey there! Imagine a state with a ton of high-powered computers decides to target Bitcoin. They could try to rewrite the transaction history or even steal coins. That would mess things up and could kill trust in Bitcoin. But don't sweat it! The folks behind Bitcoin are pretty sharp and would band together to fight back. Plus, it's built to be tough, so messing with it isn't easy, even for a government.

To pull off a 51% attack, they’d need to either buy mining pools or a ton of mining rigs to match current power. Or both. I’m not even sure how many devices they’d need. Plus, big mining companies can have long waits to get hardware. So it'd be a slow and costly process, not to mention taxpayer money getting wasted.

Honestly, a 51% attack seems pretty impossible. Bitcoin's unique compared to other POW blockchains, especially since the required setup is just too much.

It all depends on the kind of attack, right? 51% isn’t the only threat. There are other principles like censorship that they could target, which would hurt Bitcoin’s reputation. Look at the U.S., where they’re trying to enforce strict laws that force censorship.

Even if a state somehow managed a 51% attack, the community would likely just hard fork and kick the attacker out. They’d spend billions for a double-spend attempt. But during their hardware buildup, they would probably realize it’s better to play nice and join the network.

Attacking Bitcoin is not cheap or easy. Bans could be enforced, and if a government passed strict laws against crypto, it’d be a more effective way to shut things down than a technical attack.

You seem to misunderstand the 51% attack. If someone has 51%, they could double spend and make a fortune. But if a government tried to force protocol changes, the community would just fork and fix it.

There are different attack scenarios state actors could consider. First, there's the 51% attack, which could aim to control most of the mining power. Then there's a quantum computing attack on Bitcoin's cryptography.

The worst-case for states is spending billions only to see people switch to another altcoin, wasting taxpayer money. They’d need to keep funding the attack to do double spends, and the blockchain is monitored closely.

I doubt any mining pool would sell its hashrate for a 51% attack. There are marketplaces for hashrate, but not enough to pull it off. Plus, buying enough ASICs isn't realistic either.

True, total mining hashrate doesn’t really matter. A forked coin could run with much less. If it switched to PoS or something similar, hashrate wouldn’t be an issue.

Here’s what I think would happen: billions wasted, Bitcoin keeps running, and people might see transactions as reversible for a while. If a government tries this, they might even get sanctioned by others.

They’d burn through insane amounts of electricity to make their point. Would Greta be okay with that?

I’ve thought about this before. Yes, a state-level attack is possible, but it would cost a ton. To really do damage, they’d need to sustain it and double spend big amounts.

Buying advanced ASIC miners like the Bitmain S19 XP Hydro costs a fortune. You’d need a lot of them to do a 51% attack. Not to mention the electricity to run them all.

Of course, they would. It’s a way to ruin a currency while claiming it’s for environmental reasons.

The state would have to put in a ton of cash and time to pull off such an attack. It’s not like they can just flip a switch and destroy Bitcoin.

A big dictatorship might consider this, but they could also try to hide the attack. Other governments wouldn’t have the same luxury.

Bitcoin can face challenges from states with massive computing power, but the decentralized nature and ongoing security upgrades help defend against that.