Jan Wildeboer 😷
:krulorange:On the 51% attack on #Monero, @molly0xfff@hachyderm.io delivers context. As she always does when it comes to topics like this. Thank you, Molly! https://www.web3isgoinggreat.com/?id=monero-51-attack
Troed Sångberg@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io
Oh that's indeed interesting. But ... hmm. I know very little about other *coins than Bitcoin, but I don't think a 51% attack is an existential threat? It's still just statistically more likely that the attacker finds the next block, not a guarantee.
With Bitcoin miners have an economic incentive in not making their hardware worthless, I guess for Monero that's not an issue though.
Worth following - thanks for the link and writeup!
@jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net
Molly White@troed@swecyb.com @jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net It depends somewhat if they’re able to sustain the 51% attack, which would likely be extremely costly in this case. However I do think they are generally existential threats in the social sense, given the massive loss of trust from a successful 51% attack. It’s not to say a chain can’t recover from one, but it’s a pretty big hit.
Troed Sångberg@molly0xfff@hachyderm.io
Agree - I know one of the options talked about in the very beginning of Bitcoin was that if such an attacker appeared (back when it was plausible a nation state entity could acquire enough hashrate) was that they could be blacklisted by a software upgrade. That would move the coin (Monero in this case) from purely controlled by an algorithm to instead be controlled by some developer authority (including being able to convince "the honest miners" to go for such a nuclear option).
These attacks have been tried on small shitcoins every now and then, most famously by one of the Bitcoin developers IIRC, but Monero is a whole different matter. Definitely worth seeing how it plays out.
@jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net