Bitcoin Forum

A coup was staged in myanmar on feb 1st 2021.

ATM's were shut down. Rolling internet blackouts have been imposed by the state, wiith VPN's and access to social media blocked. Everything about it sounds horrible. But perhaps there are lessons which can be learned from this to prevent future suffering.

Consider if you will a future where bitcoin is widely supported across satellite internet services like Elon Musk's starlink. With users having uninterrupted access 24/7 via satellite internet based PCs and smartphones. Natural disasters could knock out local power grids, local internet service could shut down. And HODLers would still have access to their coins and electronic payment through the use of satellites in orbit and sat net phones.

While this scenario may not sound cost effective or "too futuristic" to some. There are satellite capable phones on the market for $500:

https://www.amazon.com/BlueCosmo-Inmarsat-IsatPhone-Satellite-Included/dp/B01AKR983M/

What would it take for satellite based bitcoin BTC nodes to exist.

And what would it take for users to have satellite capable communications to support a hardened orbital blockchain capable of weathering natural disasters and local power outtages?

AFAIK the same satellite phones still use service providers to be able to make calls or connect to the internet. So In case the government decided to shut the internet service. They would of course command the service providers to switch off their services and there will be no internet connection. That's what's happening in Myanmar. The only way it would be possible is If the government had no control over private owners of the satellites and the network through Laws just like they have no control over the Bitcoin network.

What if the government develops some technology to jam satellite signals? It's a game of cat and mouse, privacy and freedom activists will be using technology to achieve those goals, government will be using technology to counter it. China shows that Internet can be controlled, and society as a whole too. So, I don't think that Bitcoin is a silver bullet that will solve this problem once and for all.

Have you ever wondered why the united states didn't ban russian spy satellites from snapping photographs above US airspace during the cold war? A few years back it was claimed that military satellites in orbit could detonate an EMP device to take down the US electrical grid. Zero public attempt made by US bureaucracy to interdict, prevent or address that topic.

There's a chance satellites are located above the official territory & domain of nations like the USA. There might be a legal loophole that prevents countries from regulating activities in orbit. Which could mean they would lack the jurisdiction to order shutdowns to communications satellites, if they were utilized to execute blockchain transactions.

Although I can't be 100% certain on the legal status of any of this.

Corporations are multi-nationals. If a satellite internet business resisted shutdown orders in the US. They could threaten to move to russia or another country. Microsoft threatened to move operations to canada when they were threatened with anti trust lawsuits. This was years back when Bill Gates was still acting CEO.

This could easily be more complicated than it seems on the surface.

This is more of a technological challenge. Future innovations in communication and technology would most likely address worst forms of outages caused by large-scale disasters both man-made and natural.

As for Bitcoin, it is not really a frontliner in terms of technological innovation. It makes use of existing technologies more than it creates one. It exploits the existence of electricity, internet, smart phones, PCs, and so on. However, I don't think Bitcoin itself can defy a crazy junta which could do all forms of evil for the sake of control.

Here in India, satellite phones are banned. If you own one, you can be charged with waging war against the state and thrown in jail for a very long period. I don't think that the situation is any different in Myanmar (which is ruled by a military junta). OP seems to be having very little knowledge about authoritarian nations and how things work in such countries. If they could impose an internet blackout, don't you think that they have the capability to trace and seize all the satellite phones?

Pretty understandable considering that your country is having tensions with Pakistan which hopefully gets resolved because tension is slowing the progress of both countries, satellite phones are a scary ones because they are not easily detected if I am right and you have to be on the specific frequency before you can intercept the message. I think so too, if the government does an Internet blackout then what is the point of having cryptocurrency if you can't access it because there is no Internet, I mean even with satellites, if the government wants to lock the Internet from its people then they will do it.

I think if a satellite phone was used in a deep valley. Or if measures were taken to keep the transmission tight beamed. It could be difficult to intercept or triangulate. They would need an aircraft or a satellite positioned somewhere inbetween the satellite and the phone to pick up the transmissions. If a single satellite has hundreds or thousands of different communications channels at any given time. How would someone know which were legitimate and which were pirated signals? Tracking satellite phones would be much more difficult than tracking proxies or VPNs imo.

People have a tendency to assume bureaucrats who ban things like satellite phones or bitcoin are masterminds and geniuses. In reality, they're often no smarter than you or I. They pass these measures, which even they do not know if they can enforce it. India's ban of satellite phones could involve them being on the brink of war with china. They do not want chinese spies transmitting information back home. Its not necessarily in place to disrupt financial or internet traffic afaik.

Not much was said about satellite based blockchain being a measure against authoritarian rule btw. I would like to focus more on it being useful in the event of natural disasters, electrical grids losing power and similar occurrences which appear to be more common by the day.

Network connectivity is nothing more than a problem that needs to be solved, and the solution may not be satellite. It can rely on any network connected to the Internet (a third-party network) to send transactions, but the problem remains is whether Bitcoin will have value as a means of payments?


Let us take the case of Myanmar: if there is no person to buy bitcoin, then its value in Myanmar is zero, regardless of the possibility of sending it or its value in the rest of the world.

When major problems arise, people search for food, drink, and security and exchange them with each other.

Money loses its value when there is no demand for it. The Lebanese pound, Zimbabwean dollar and Venezuelan bolívar

Bitcoin is already pretty much challenging - as technology - for average merchant.
Then the normal shops will not officially accept bitcoin, since it's banned (you expect to have no internet, and still bitcoin accepted?!)

So you'll want that the merchant as person to accept your bitcoin, reading info from the internet via your satellite phone, using a technology he doesn't understand and you do.
He will have to trust you too much... It's not gonna happen.

The price of satellite phones should decrease significantly if production scales up to suit greater demand.

Satoshi's vision is an awesome topic, I wish we had more threads on it. I think Satoshi had a good design of appealing to miner profits to secure the network against 51% attacks. Maybe he would have a good answer for things if he still commented on these issues.


I've noticed nations do not revert to gold or silver based economies after natural disasters. Maybe some form of internet based barter system would be suited to venezuelan or zimbabwe hyperinflation.


I think satellite based blockchain would function almost identically to normal internet. The main difference is plugging into a satellite modem (with a dish or antenna) rather than a telecom one.

Merchants could have their webpages supported by satellite DNS/ISP. Which would route independently of the earth based internet backbone, allowing full functionality in the event of power grids going down or ISP's being down for maintenance.

What I'm saying could sound futuristic or out there but it could be a natural progression for internet based retailers to eventually offer satellite based service via default to reduce downtime.

Bitcoin is difficult to scale, to launch satellites and create services, Dogecoin is a better fit.

Nope! Satellite phone are not impacted by government's restriction unless the connectivity is provided by the government itself. So if you are using a satellite connectivity service from an international provider, you can still access internet, calls, sms and what not through a satellite phone, even after government restrictions are in place. That's why military use such satellite facilities so that no blockage can block their own communication.

However, the such services are not cheap. So in extreme scenarios, people have to shell out a good amount of money if they want to bypass the government restrictions put in place. Same goes with bitcoin blockchain itself. If a country goes into an uncertain lockdown due to natural calamities or war attacks, people can still be able to use satellite phone to connect to internet and be able to use cryptocurrency at their own will.

500 USD for a satellite phone seems a lot for the poor people,who are living in an underdeveloped country like Myanmar.Maybe a few people will get such phones,but I'm not sure that they will be using the phones to start trading cryptocurrencies.
The idea of Bitcoin blockchain "adopting" satellite internet seems interesting,but I think that the conventional internet providers are going their job pretty well and there aren't any interruptions of the internet speed and connection.I live in a country,where the internet speed and connection is really great,so I can't tell anything about the quality of internet in other countries.

A few tomahawks to the ground stations Starlink uses and the whole system is obliterated.
How do you think those satellites get the data they need to broadcast to you in that valley from servers that are situated on earth and not space? The whole system still needs a few hundreds of points Starlink is calling gateway earth stations for the entire system to work, if those stations are turned off the satellites themselves are useless.

Secondary, satellite phones are totally different from other satellite receivers I don't think there is a single country out there maybe Monaco or Andorra who don't have the capacity of tracking such signals. We had those in the army when I did my service and that was twenty years ago.

In before these phones still needs a carrir signal to carry out communicative operations, so regardless if the satellite is the best sat we have in existence, if they government imposes a ban on the carrier, there's not going to be much room to play with. Or perhaps we have forgotten to consider the fact that due to wildlife and environmental preservation, we would need to leave some sites untouched to preserve their cultural and wildlife value. So that is already a big L. Myanmar isn't that underdeveloped lol, if you wanna say underdeveloped talk about Philippines or something.

They have other matters to address rather than involving themselves to cryptocurrencies. Right now, I don't think crypto is in their minds. I believe, it will be attaining peace on their land. Even children are not safe in their country right now. Just read the recent news that a 7-year old was shot by these security forces at their home. This is really troubling news. They are not safe even at their homes. Where will they go from here?

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/myanmar-coup-7-year-old-died-her-father-s-arms-n1262063

I think you are quite right, this is not a futuristic situation nor system. The technology is there, the need is very clear and the market is really huge. Not only can be done from a satellite capable phone, but even from a more land-based system, much less sophisticated, you can perfectly launch a transaction. For what I see here (https://www.groundcontrol.com/), is just a very basic piece of kit.

Only drawback is possibly that it can be traced.

 

Wow, this does raise a thoughtful concern to me. Space internet would absolutely change the current situation and lead us to the next innovation of humankind. First, I just think that Elon wants to make some money with his space adventure, and perhaps when he succeeds, people have more chance to fly to the moon at a cheap price or even to mars. Now, I believe that Starlink and its space internet can such admirable achievement to us

And when technology gets developed, everything will become cheaper, people will have more chances to access global internet services without using traditional ones. Moreover, a satellite phone will be much cheaper so that even in third world countries, people can afford to buy it

I think that would be a great idea because sometimes governments try to suppress our voice and media by blocking the internet and electricity, and in those times having a decentralised currency powering internet in which the government has no control over would just be perfect, but I think in those cases the government can very well use man power to stop these communications and confiscate the phones etc. Sometimes, there needs to be a shutdown because of violence and fake news, so in that cases these stuffs might be counterproductive. I think it should be a balanced approach and we have to see all the pros and cons before thinking to implement such technological systems.

this has been thought by Elon and his Starlink is freedom for humans...
Everything Elon is doing is very good for mankind and Elon Musk has told us very often that he is very interested in cryptocurrencies. the future is where we can be independent with satellites and also transact without worries.

How can you use the Internet to do your transactions if the military is in control of what is happening and they have everything at their disposal for surveillance. Internet is decentralized in a way but the country can still control as to who is going to access it. And your dream of satellite Internet is not yet a thing as far as I know, maybe Starlink has the concept but I think that it won't be happening yet.

vpn's and social media uses internet so if there is no internet both of this two are obviously not useable  .

this satelite can only provide uninterupted signals but what if the power lines are the one that is destroyed by the natural calamities or included in the ban , satelites are still going to be useless but experts should take a consideration to what happen to myanmar and start developing satelite internet because it was useful not just for crypto but also for our daily use

Well you’re right, but whether satellite or the normal networks, your Bitcoin or cryptocurrencies will still be there on the internet, the best thing the government will do it’s shut down network for sometime, you will only lose access to it for that time until you’re able to get to a place where there is network connection or they (government) releases the network again.

But still having Satellite as internet would be cool, I have as well read of Google’s internet and the one of Facebook, how they are all planning to bring internet for free, although I have also heard that some network companies have kicked against that idea because it’s going to be a spoil for their business.

Excellent thought here with the satellite based phones and PC. I mean it would be astounding to see such technologies around and where bitcoin is the way of currency. With Fiat there are many limitations which will be surpassed by bitcoin.

If Elon musk is able to get payments in the form of bitcoin for Tesla project then he would love to get paid for starlink in the same manner.

I’m started to feel like those movies Stat Wars and there trading in the virtual form is gonna be reality soon. :)

Unfortunately, this possibility exists in my country as well. A few years ago the government banned the Internet in the country and banned many websites. It is also possible in countries where wars are raging that the Internet is completely destroyed and people lose access to their wallets, it will be very necessary to think about the existence of alternatives to the Internet. Local authorities in the event of such problems so as not to lose access to your wallet and accounts.
I think the only option that currently exists is satellite internet, even if it costs a lot of money but it is better than losing your wallet and all your encrypted assets.

The Bitcoin coup was an injection of liberalism that the West influenced and it had nothing to do with Bitcoin.  I think Bitcoin is just a tool and it serves a variety of payment purposes.
Myanmar will soon get over the riots and the people will soon realize that what they did was wrong.  They need more reason than they focus on subverting the state.