Can BTC be blocked by government ?

[fabrizeo]

Hello,

I am reading a lot on the internet about the fact that Bitcoin is not stoppable as not centralized.

However what would happen if a government decision to implement DPI blocking of Bitcoin protocol?

Seems it is fairly easy for a government to do so at ISP level... On top of it exchange could be blocked with a firewall on top of all others kinds of bitcoin forum etc...

Thanks for your opinion.

[Emoclaw]

It can't. There are many nodes that Bitcoin has, more than what sites like coin.dance say and it's impossible to find them, let alone block all of them.
They could attempt to ruin Bitcoin's quality of service by blocking exchanges, forums and web wallets, but people would still be able to use it and they'd find a way to do all of these things.

It's also important to note that any ISP blockages can be circumvented by using a VPN, thus it wouldn't even be remotely effective.
The only way to stop Bitcoin is by not using the Internet at all, like North Korea does.

[BY_ATOM]

In fact to block bitcoin completely, you need to disable the Internet. That in fact in today's world is not possible)

[LancienMaleAlpha]

If ISP block wallet and exchanges services, people would still be able to use TOR or proxy services to access them. So I may say that's impossible until govs block the whole Web.

[D3m1r4wanti]

it could be a government of a country blocking bitcoin for its own country environment, but the government can not block the bitcoin distribution in other countries so the bitcoiner can still trade its bitcoin in other countries

[endlasuresh]

Only Scam Govt's do such decision however if any govt did, then use proxies that is the best solution for accessing wallets. China banned recently and again China open new coin, allows bitcoin, etc all these fake news. I suggest you to need not worry about these things as it itself can clear everywhere.

Bitcoin is Strong now with more members from worldwide and a lot of blockchains are occupying everywhere.

[freebutcaged]

Mate if ISPs want to block Bitcoin from their end, they could do that but do you think every ISP would do the same? do you even know how the whole

Internet works? Us government does not control the whole internet, even if the whole world decides to block Bitcoin, you can use torrent, if they allow

For a satellite launch, you can connect to satellite for any thing.

[Herbert2020]

first of all since not all the government of the whole world are going to do something like this, bitcoin won't be blocked. in other words there are currently so many countries that have adopted bitcoin with open arms and legalized it that even if some governments decide to block bitcoin it won't matter.

However what would happen if a government decision to implement DPI blocking of Bitcoin protocol?

DPI is only when your packets are encrypted such as when you use VPNs. bitcoin uses no encryption for communication. it is all performed over simple HTTP protocols.
and there are things they can block but they can not block bitcoin usage completely, things like that would only make running a node harder not impossible. and they don't do anything to bitcoin usage. you can always sign your transactions offline and broadcast them by opening a website like this https://blockchain.info/pushtx with a public SSL proxy and pushing it through their service!!! free and easy.

On top of it exchange could be blocked with a firewall on top of all others kinds of bitcoin forum etc...

exchanges are third parties that  can be blocked, yes. but it would be like blocking a website. you can always use a VPN to access them!!!

[Oliver A]

If a government decides to make trading or possessing Bitcoins illegal, questions will be raised about how exactly it will enforce such a ban. It is impossible for a government to seize your Bitcoins, unless you decide to handover your private keys. However, the majority of citizens and institutions like to stay on the right side of the law. So the demand for Bitcoin would plummet if the government decided to ban it. All exchanges in that country would also be shuttered and buying/selling Bitcoin would be difficult and risky. This would suffocate Bitcoin in that country and the government’s objectives might be achieved.

[d0flaming0]

personally if you prefer saying banning bitcoin in a certain county, yes they can, that's the least they can do, not only to control the regulation of bitcoin and transactions, but for them also to secure safely that nobody would dare to disobey the law. it is also possible that they can totally ban bitcoin and use it for their own goods, because they had the power to implement and use their position to make advantage of the situation, but its not that I am badmouthing the government, but everything is possible within their powers.

[Dreamr]

No, because bitcoin is not control by the government. Bitcoin is peer to peer electronic currency that is fast and decentralized, it's owned and controlled by the people around the world not just one country. Government will only impose local restrictions which you can bypass it with simple vpn.

[kueyen]

A government may not be able to ban bitcoin completely, but can make it very hard to use it. It can just outright ban exchange sites, for example. You could still get your hands on some bitcoin through different means (VPN, proxy etc.) but it would be an additional step that would make your life harder.

Something worse that they can do is to declare the money you make off of bitcoin illegal, so even if you had thousands of bitcoins, you wouldn't be able to legally cash out and bring the money into the system (especially large amounts), because the government would eventually ask you where the money is coming from and you wouldn't be able to answer.

[sofi@]

It would be difficult for the government to just blocked site for bitcoin transactions because of the fact that it only needs internet connection to access bitcoin the only way government to prevent it is by stopping internet connection which at this point is very impossible to do. This mainly the reason why until now government cannot settle the issue regarding legality of bitcoin.

[estanislao1994]

It would be quite impossible for the government to block bitcoin. As per China, bitcoin is banned by the government however there are some civilians from China that makes way to have access to bitcoin. They have alibaba that offers the same payment as bitcoin being an online system payment. Bitcoin is slowly going upwards in the market and ofcourse individuals would not want to miss the opportunity to increase their revenue.

[bakunawaaa]

They cannot block it. The only way is to shut down the entire internet. All they can do is ban the exchanges tradimg them as well as businesses legally accepting them. With the use of vpns the government's moves to even block exchanges proved to be futile.

[andreyalucas]

No, because bitcoin is not control by the government. Bitcoin is peer to peer electronic currency that is fast and decentralized, it's owned and controlled by the people around the world not just one country. Government will only impose local restrictions which you can bypass it with simple vpn.

Yes, you are right.I completely agreed with your argument. The bitcoin is not controlling the government.

[markdario112616]

Literally speaking no, The government can't block it. As far as I see, The Government can only block websites related to Bitcoin no more no less but in this era, Proxy server and VPN are so accessible even though they blocked it's useless. There are a lot of transactions in a day, how can a Government track it and interfere with it? No matter how hard the Government work and try, the progression of Bitcoin is unstoppable.

[Attaman]

They can disable the sites you use to download the wallets and close some exchanges. So it can be blocked and they have the right to do something like this.

Bitcoin is used for a lot of things and the hackers uses it to store their stolen money.

[btcjocan]

In fact to block bitcoin completely, you need to disable the Internet. That in fact in today's world is not possible)

I agree with you. It is so impossible for the government to block bitcoin because they need to communicate with other countries government. Maybe they can ban bitcoin, but they can never block it fully or completely because there are a lot of people who will oppose it and worst, will do some rallies against the government if that would definitely happen.

[subSTRATA]

It can't. There are many nodes that Bitcoin has, more than what sites like coin.dance say and it's impossible to find them, let alone block all of them.
They could attempt to ruin Bitcoin's quality of service by blocking exchanges, forums and web wallets, but people would still be able to use it and they'd find a way to do all of these things.

It's also important to note that any ISP blockages can be circumvented by using a VPN, thus it wouldn't even be remotely effective.
The only way to stop Bitcoin is by not using the Internet at all, like North Korea does.

technically, if the government had full authority over the internet, they could in act block traffic to and from the bitcoin network. we all depend on a isp to provide us internet access, and these companies are able to control what traffic we can and can't access. and in a relevant statement to the current events (in the states at least), if net neutrality were to be repealed, these companies could block bitcoin network traffic from its users if it wanted to, or give users the option of paying a premium to access this 'feature.' and while your statement on the subject of vpn's holds true, it is possible for the isp to block all traffic tunneled through the vpn, rendering that option useless.