Bitcoin Forum

I started a thread about the first ham radio transaction using the Lightning netwoork, and how that could help us to make Bitcoin transfers without access to the Internet. The recent loss of Internet access in much of Venezuela has brought this topic to the fore again, and it seems there are other solutions. One of which is txTenna -
https://github.com/MuleTools/txTenna

I rhink that this is something that we should be discussing in Bitcoin  Talk, and I would be interested in being a part of any project that may be started here.

This is an interesting topic indeed and I think a lot will surely want to transfer his cryptocurrency into another platform without the use of the internet, And I think it is downloadable in this site https://txtenna.com/

Well it will sure broadcast your transaction by SMS and I really think this is surely targeting a lot of consumers using only a mobile device to make a transaction just like in Digital money transfer, And you will surely need to buy a Gotenna Mesh device for this transaction to work, And you will need to find other Meshers in your area to make a transaction because this network is people-powered,

Except for Bitcoin, I've heard of a few more projects. I will follow the development and the discussions in Github. I feel like going to Bitcoin and the future will be very nice.

BITCOIN in the future will take 10x steps, transaction will sent via SMS is very interesting project.

these are all great additional projects that are popping up these days.
but one of the problems that i always see in them is the lack of trust. for example when you are using bitcoin, you are using a trust-less network. you just get all the blocks and verify them yourself, broadcast everything and are a part of the network. but when you use something like this (SMS in this case) you have to trust the receiver is actually going to broadcast your transaction and this can only work for the case when you are only sending coins, you can never trust something like that for receiving coins!

issues with ham radio LN
it takes many messages to complete the payment
the payment is just a handshake between 2 users and not a settled transaction.

also ham radio is not like phone calls where its just 1-to-1 private comms.. but broadcast out to the wide area of multiple listeners. utilising ham radio for LN seems odd

however that said
because ham radio is a 1-to-many comms (broadcast)
using it to send an ACTUAL bitcoin transaction out to the world where then anyone hearing it can then forward it on to a pool. would help.

but simply using up a ham radio frequency just for hand shaking payments between two specific users is not really using the transmission method wisely

I can't see this being anything other than a purely academic exercise. If the internet itself is gone then most people will be scratching at their own skin having been denied the ability to upload their duckfaces. They're not going to care about BTC.

I suppose there might be one person every square hundred miles with access to ham radio or the necessary satellite gear.

There is a project called transfix, was introduced to it by a friend, they promise to make bitcoin sendable without the internet. I had to leave their telegram group because they always asking people to bu their ICO, and too many HYIP about the token sales. Sometimes, I get bad network making it extremely difficult for me to carry out my daily crypto activities. The internet affected my bitcoin peer trading because of a bad network, I would sometimes just sleep off in frustration. I look forward to such a project that would enable me to send bitcoin without the internet.

I was very excited when I saw bitcoin was recently sent by radio frequency.. This is a revolution if bitcoin submissions can be with sms.. Thank you to be involved in this project.. I'm reviewing txTenna github..

Is this really a thing? It seems that we are learning backwards here.

I know Internet outage is possible but it's like hacking 51% of the Bitcoin network, just my perspective though. Please enlighten me.

How is being able to transact with your bitcoin through SMS a bad thing? It might not be the ideal option for you, but having that option is definitely a good thing.

Also, how is a country having an internet outage "like hacking 51% of the Bitcoin network"? Whatever you mean by "hacking 51% of the network".

Yes Bitcoin mining offgrid is a good piece of cake for all of you I wish it works..

I think there a multiple other options available when the Internet goes down. Most mobile operators run their own networks via Cell phone towers, so you will still be able to use their network to transfer messages. <Bitcoin can be transferred from one person to the next, if you send a simple text message with a Bitcoin address and a private key> Obviously this will not be send together or as a complete private key.

They can also swap out paper wallets, if they are really that desperate. <Similar to cash>  :P  <Using Satellite access for single point validation>  ;D

I didn't said that it's a bad thing though, what I'm trying to imply was why do we need to use version 1.0 if there's already a stable version 2.0

can you accept hyperbole?

There has been a lot of speculation about this topic and community members have begun to try to imagine what would happen to Bitcoin if Internet connectivity was turned off. But miraculously, transactions using Bitcoin can still be done even without an internet connection. Some companies suggest Bitcoin users to send Bitcoin via SMS from third party bitcoin wallets

Can you expound further what you're referring to with "version 1.0" and "version 2.0"? Enlighten me.

An older technology and a new one. Do you always take things literally?

The problem doesn't seem to be the transfer of a payment instruction, but the checking to ensure that it isn't an attempted double spend. If one is prepared to accept confirmation times of a day or more ( less than the time taken to confirm a Visa payment ), then many of the slow communication methods become viable.

I wasn't asking about the literal meaning. I was making sure if you were referring to 1.0 as radio signals and 2.0 as the internet. If so, my point still stands. Having the option to transact through other means is a good thing. Though using radio signals/SMS might be "learning backwards" to you, then for the Venezuelans, it's not; it's pretty much their only option right now. It's easy to say such things if you're living comfortably in a country with a decent economy.

Ain't it quite egoistic and selfish that we ignore other solutions just because most of us here won't be using these alternative solutions besides the Venezuelans? These things are being developed for when bad events such as the Venezuelan blackout. If anything, now is a good time to talk about these technologies as so we are more ready whenever these "bad events" occur on other countries/cities on the future. Though I hope not.

It sounds really very interesting OP but my concern is not so much about how to learn it but how to access and get people to use it. I mean, in an emergency event, people will all be doing their best to stock food and maybe even use radio but for walkie talkies. I think the last thing people want to do is find a way to use Bitcoin. Not because I don't believe in it but the time is not yet right, priority is still too low unless Bitcoin is the main currency. Good work you are doing though!

There won't be a good solution for bitcoin itself, the transaction needs to be verified. It would be easier to create an offgrid altcoin that interacts with bitcoin or is at least easily swappable

Good initiative, OP. I have to say here that my only experience with radio in my home country was that it was pretty bad, because we lived in mountainous terrain (which actually is still very very poor with mobile reception, and spotty satellite internet, which we've only "enjoyed" in the past decade).

I think an important question would be what the cost would be for an initial set up? Say from scratch.

The other off-grid option I know of is Blockstream's satellite network and last I checked, the set up for that required over $100 in equipment (which is pretty decent). From my uneducated glance, this still seems better than ham radio.

If we look at what is happening in Venezuela right now, you are correct. 5 days without power and without clean water. They have militia guarding generators at hospitals. People are filling water bottles from sewage pipes because there is nothing else to drink. Rioting and looting. No one is interested in finding a way to use bitcoin, because what good would it do? There is no use having money (of any sort) when there is no food, water, fuel or supplies. If there is nothing to buy, money is useless.

Very interesting. Though the feasibility of this on a large scale is yet to be seen.

Also, given the fact that the internet is already be widely available, and the reliability of it will only increase even in remote regions, I doubt the need for offline bitcoin transactions will be that significant in the future. Especially when you consider the priorities that people will have without any electricity, it's basically a very unlikely SHTF scenario.

But certainly it can happen, like in Venezuela. If a feasible, large scale way of doing this on-chain can be found, then it'll certainly add to the functionality of the network.


We are not. We're simply trying to adapt bitcoin to as many possible scenarios as possible, so that its properties as a currency can be cemented and that its dependence on the internet, which may not be fully decentralised, can be reduced. That's furthering bitcoin's use, not going backwards.

these methods aren't only meant for disaster cases! these methods are partly meant for cases where there is some sort of censorship. for example the great firewall of China can start blocking anything bitcoin related! or even shut down the internet and cut off the connection to the world. in which case you can still use other ways to "connect to the grid" like what is being discussed here.

Oh, absolutely. There are plenty of scenarios when accessing bitcoin without a direct connection to the internet would be useful - censorship is one, but also to avoid tracking or spying, in areas with poor infrastructure or patchy internet access, etc. I wasn't arguing that this wasn't a good thing, only that in complete catastrophe areas like we are seeing in Venezuela at the moment it's almost entirely irrelevant - nobody wants Bolivars, USD, or BTC. They want clean water and food.

I would like to think that we will hopefully reach a point in the not-too-distant future with worldwide unrestricted internet access via satellite, and so set-ups like TxTenna won't be needed.

Yeah, and that's in reference to OP saying the current Venezuelan situation is bringing the discussion to the fore again. Again, I also am not dismissing TxTenna here but got to agree that using it (or using it for Bitcoin access anyway) is not a good use case in this type of situation. Emergency/crisis needs in fact, cash is better, if resorting to money but basic necessities are foremost.

An existing network, like I mentioned above, satellite, which is relatively cheap to build a setup for, should be enough. In case of censorship in fact, Radio signals can also be jammed quite easily and you can find radio jamming devices even sold cheaply online. I'm not sure satellite access (via microwave transmission) would be as easy to jam (I may be wrong of course).

This is a great development. I have seen lots of new additions on github that i find hard  to believe are possible.
I wonder if the network companies can detect and censor such transactions when they are sent through text messeges.