Damus
Lyn Alden profile picture
Lyn Alden
@LynAlden
At a small Princeton event last week, among other panels and speeches, Carole House spoke about censoring bitcoin.

She is the former director of cybersecurity for the White House National Security Council, and prior to that was at FinCEN focusing on cryptocurrencies, and prior to that was in the military.

Some of her main points:

-Energy-related regulation may push some hash rate outside of the U.S., whereas she would rather see more of it in the U.S. so that they can force miners to censor the network on the base layer. She also views international cooperation as a necessary component for successful censorship. She also wants stakers to be forced to censor their PoS networks.

-It's not just about telling miners not to mine certain transactions, but to not even build atop blocks that have non-compliant transactions, so that those transactions don't get anywhere in the chain. A 51% attack, in other words. Her main concern is censoring states like North Korea from being able to participate in the network.

The event was interesting because there were several very different perspectives. On one hand there was Roya Mahboob talking about using bitcoin in Afghanistan, followed by Troy Cross, Craig Warmke, and Natalie Smolenski talking about the importance of bitcoin from an ethical perspective. On the other hand, there were panels about Bored Apes and speeches about how to censor the networks.
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stacktoshi 🚀 ∞/21m · 148w
Was it close to this: https://youtu.be/jiNo-T71FLk ?
David A. Harding · 148w
I think that's kind of an interesting dynamic. One one hand, if you have >50% of hash rate in the US, then you have a ~$5 billion/yr industry that at least some politicians are going to want to keep happy. On the other hand, if the censorship is egregious, either the value of BTC is going to drop ...
MAC · 148w
Is this the inevitable progression of the state? I can only see an increase in this central planning nonsense.
todd · 148w
At least currently, I think most of the miners would be non compliant or move to another country. Perhaps #Bitcoin is the beginning of the rise of the global south. I think it's becoming more likely.
Hurvajs Rumcajs · 148w
The question is if the rest of the miners would mine on top ofthe compliant blocks? Forks.
aeon 📜CTV + CSFS · 148w
White market mining is a security risk, always has been and always will be. Black market mining is the real security model. Unknown hash is the only secure hash.
Cpt. Charisma · 148w
- Miners will leave the country or shut down if they are banned from including too many profitable transactions. - Miners who attempt to comply will constantly be at risk from people who aren't completely stupid sneaking their 'banned' transactions in to blocks. They could easily end up in the pos...
GreenFinger · 148w
what a loser
PiecoverBTC · 148w
Stratum V2 Could be the counterattack where more miners are able to build transactions in a block instead of mining pools. I am not sure about the 51% attack stuff cause transactions would only wait till they find a good miner with profitability incentives. This is why I don't think miners should co...
One of us · 148w
Efforts by more governments to keep Bitcoin mining within their borders could potentially enhance the security of the network, even if their aim is to exercise censorship.
Bud · 148w
I’m starting to need a tally of normies like House, Willard Munger, et al who are so terrified of Bitcoin that they want to kill it vs. the Warren Buffets and Paul Krugmans who insist it’s worthless. These are not the same.
Fabio · 148w
Omg, we are quite lucky to have someone who report something like that! Thank's
johnny · 148w
Where was the empire of freedom and democracy lost? Knowing this more convinces me that it is a utopia to expect something positive from people in positions of power. I can be wrong.
Ali Jaderi · 148w
Good luck with that.
Safe Bitcoin Investing · 148w
TY Lyn this is indeed important info.
Matt · 148w
Can they do it?
Cyber Seagull · 148w
Ah yes, Roya Mahboob, Motorboat Expert. Good conf.
hbadger · 148w
I see that, there are more than one common patterns between Carol House and Agustin Carstens.
Lupcor · 148w
Thats stupid. Even with a substantial hashrate regulated. A Chinese pool fills a block with a "forbidden" tx. US miners would have to mine two blocks before anybody else mines the next one based on the latest block. Might work with a little bit of luck in that moment, but not consistently. At the en...
Phaedrus · 148w
Super interesting. Thanks for reporting. How will governemtns figure out which UTXOs should be censored? How will governemtns enforce the censorship if miners can't be located or move to different jurisdiction? Did they answer any of that?
₿lack Swan · 148w
Then they fight you.
Dan · 148w
This is good. People like Carole House need to keep showing their hands.
Mandrake · 148w
This is the expected response from a government bureaucrat and would lead to a Bitcoin hash war. Game theory at work.
Coney Croft · 148w
We all got to start mining for the good of the network. Even if just on a laptop. Cannot let any government take over the network.
LadyA · 148w
Hmmm don't really find anything interesting about ignorant tyrants. It's very common, and therefore extremely boring.
Gary taylor · 148w
Cryptoeconomics discusses these attack vectors
Steve C · 148w
Another example of the Govt. being conflicted. Bitcoin mining bad/good depending on ability to regulate.
JohnOnchain · 148w
🚩🚩🚩🚩 #[0]
Aaron · 148w
I just posted about Pocahontas Elizabeth Warren's attack on #Bitcoin saying it's destroying the climate etc they're going to go hard to destroy Bitcoin cause it brings people joy and the government don't want you to have anything in fact you'll own nothing and be happy is there motto. Scandalous!!!!
rejon · 147w
wow thanks for being on the ground
Calvan · 147w
? Anything to this https://petertodd.org/2016/mit-chainanchor-bribing-miners-to-regulate-bitcoin
Kudzai Kutukwa · 147w
For those like me that have been curious to catch a glimpse of this talk, finally i found a link to it and here it is https://vimeo.com/819245954
Tom Samuel · 134w
Most people with authority live in their reptilian brains. They have been heavily programmed with fear and greed and have no clue what freedoms and love are. They are not even alive. They want others to be more fearful than they are. That’s the only way they can feel that they exist.