I finally figured out how the government can destroy Bitcoin

[jballs]

Outlawing bitcoin trading would send the price to the moon. No sense arguing that point, name a thing that costs less on the black market than it costs in a free market. One thing...

All kinds of things... Guns for example.

nope, huge markup for black market guns. Hard for me to nail down here but ask any soldier whose country was under UN arms embargo during or prior to conflict (Croats and Kosovars maybe easier to find than Syrians or Iraqis but...well probably some of any of them around here). Same holds true anywhere they are banned.

[subcoin]

how the government can destroy Bitcoin

1. "Issue Guidance"
2. Threaten legal action against exchanges, miners and users
3. Done

Total expenses: less than $100k

That will not completely destroy it, but will make it illegal on par with drugs.
That will also cover all other cryptos and alike.
To predict what government will do, you need to think the way government does.

[hjbuell]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway. 

[illpoet]

i see governments creating their own blockchains and trying their hardest to sell them to their respective citizens. they could offer tax breaks to their companies to accept govcoin over bitcoin. So you could pay your electric bill or buy groceries with govcoin but not bitcoin.  It could be closed source and do all kinds nice data mining.

[gutshot]

The only reason people mine bitcoin is because they can either spend it or convert it to fiat. 

The only reason merchants accept it, is because they can convert it to fiat. 

If you shut down the exchanges bitcoin will die. The only way this wont happen is if the merchants suppliers will also except bitcoin and you can basically spend it everywhere for everything, then it truly does become a worldwide currency in its own right.

It would be impossible for every exchange in every country of the world to be shut down - there will always be one and if there is one there is a way!

Long and short of it is - the government cant destroy bitcoin through any of the above means.

There is however one sure-fire way the government can destroy the currency and that is to destroy peoples confidence it...

Crack SHA-256, make it public - show the coin as vulnerable and insecure - who would even want to use it then?

[Anacronix]

It can always be forked and upgraded to ... SHA-3 for example ? So , no  , cracking sha256 wouldn't kill it, in my opinion.

[pjviitas]

Step one: Procure whatever hardware necessary to force difficulty to continue increasing.
Step two: Wait until the power requirements for running a mining setup from a single family dwelling becomes next to impossible.
Step three: Mop up any remaining centralized mining facilities through either taking them over in the name of national security or bombing it into the stone age.
Step four: Profit.

I wouldn't doubt that the NSA already has this kind of scheme cooked up and ready to deploy.

Well, as far as power requirements go, they would have to push things beyond 400 amps (88,000 watss; 88KW) before things would affect me.

I kinda doubt that will happen but you do have an intersting hypothesis.

My $.02.

That's certinaly a lot of power you are using and not counting others who are mining with amazing machines it would take too much money to defeat Bitcoin this way.

I am not using all the power yet but also have two other rent-free locations with the same 400 amp incoming.

I intend to use up at least 85% of the available incoming with scryptcoin mining rigs, both for myself and my corporation.

Most single family dwelling built in the last 10 years or so have 200A services and strata complex units are usually 100A services.  With that being said its not hard to still find 60A services.

In any event the typical distributed miner is going to need to have some kind of balance in his life for other things besides mining.  So lets say the family is fine with the miner dedicating a room for mining hardware and lets assume that this room has its very own 15A breaker.

Assuming a power factor of 1, a 15A breaker will allow you to draw 1.8kW of power which translates to roughly 1TH/s of mining hardware.

With a constantly increasing difficulty, come May or June, you will need around 1TH/s of hardware in order to earn 1BTC/month.

In a nutshell, miners will increasingly be faced with the decision to either move to centralized mining or become a professional miner and start making plans to build a server room.

Once enough mining becomes centralized, taking over or destroying these centralized facilities is like shooting fish in a barrel for any government that has decent skills at subversion.

Like some of the prior posts state I believe that other crypto-currencies are the only way to ensure that mining stays distributed and healthy.

When we see things going south with one crypto-currency just move all your coins to the next one.

[LostDutchman]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway. 

I would remind you that pot is still highly illegal under federal law and that The Chosen One does not support legalisation.

Sooner or later the Feds will drop the legal hammer on those states attempting to legalise pot.

My $.02.

[jballs]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway.  

I would remind you that pot is still highly illegal under federal law and that The Chosen One does not support legalisation.

Sooner or later the Feds will drop the legal hammer on those states attempting to legalise pot.

My $.02.

No they won't and the Chosen One has 35 months until he hits the road. There will be 10 more states decriminalized by then. Drug War must end, social media will end it.

[LostDutchman]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway.  

I would remind you that pot is still highly illegal under federal law and that The Chosen One does not support legalisation.

Sooner or later the Feds will drop the legal hammer on those states attempting to legalise pot.

My $.02.

No they won't and the Chosen One has 35 months until he hits the road. There will be 10 more states decriminalized by then. Drug War must end, social media will end it.

Only Congress can change Federal law and then The Chosen One must sign the bill.

Ain't gonna happen.

My $.02.

[jballs]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway.  

I would remind you that pot is still highly illegal under federal law and that The Chosen One does not support legalisation.

Sooner or later the Feds will drop the legal hammer on those states attempting to legalise pot.

My $.02.

No they won't and the Chosen One has 35 months until he hits the road. There will be 10 more states decriminalized by then. Drug War must end, social media will end it.

Only Congress can change Federal law and then The Chosen One must sign the bill.

Ain't gonna happen.

My $.02.

he is just a president, I think a lot of you guys have some serious cognitive dissonance when it comes to Obama for some reason. Anyway lobbyists change federal law, congress signs off on it when they are told, I am sure we all know that here.

 

[LostDutchman]

Criminalization would shut it down. With wholesale legalization of marijuana on the way in the near future, chances are no one would notice anyway.  

I would remind you that pot is still highly illegal under federal law and that The Chosen One does not support legalisation.

Sooner or later the Feds will drop the legal hammer on those states attempting to legalise pot.

My $.02.

No they won't and the Chosen One has 35 months until he hits the road. There will be 10 more states decriminalized by then. Drug War must end, social media will end it.

Only Congress can change Federal law and then The Chosen One must sign the bill.

Ain't gonna happen.

My $.02.

he is just a president, I think a lot of you guys have some serious cognitive dissonance when it comes to Obama for some reason. Anyway lobbyists change federal law, congress signs off on it when they are told, I am sure we all know that here.

 

And the lobbyists work for the fabric industry, the paper industry, the pharmaceutical industry and law enforcement, all of which would suffer it pot were legal.

Need I write more?

[AltorXP]

If the banks wanted BitCoin gone by now, this forum nor BitCoin would exist
And since most governments don't seem to treat it as a major threat, I don't think any would spend billions on putting this into effect

[maurya78]

Good for you mate

Keep it coming

[Rampion]

how the government can destroy Bitcoin

1. "Issue Guidance"
2. Threaten legal action against exchanges, miners and users
3. Done

Total expenses: less than $100k

That will not completely destroy it, but will make it illegal on par with drugs.
That will also cover all other cryptos and alike.
To predict what government will do, you need to think the way government does.

True, and we all know that by making them illegal the Gov. has "destroyed" drugs, its almost impossible to find them and when you found them they cost nothing.

But yes, if Gov. would "ban" bitcoin expect as similar scenario as we have with drugs - first thing, a very high price.

[Lauda]

No they can't. You're an ignorant fool.
Please acquire more knowledge before spreading FUD.

[r0ach]

Step two: Wait until the power requirements for running a mining setup from a single family dwelling becomes next to impossible.

Yea, Bitcoin is over soon as those 5000 watt USB block eruptor ASICs come out

[Alpaca Bob]

Step one: Procure whatever hardware necessary to force difficulty to continue increasing.
Step two: Wait until the power requirements for running a mining setup from a single family dwelling becomes next to impossible.
Step three: Mop up any remaining centralized mining facilities through either taking them over in the name of national security or bombing it into the stone age.
Step four: Profit.

I wouldn't doubt that the NSA already has this kind of scheme cooked up and ready to deploy.

Psht. Gobbledigook. Here's how you kill Bitcoin:

Step 1: Shut down the exchanges.

Step 2: There is no step 2

You can't shut down localbitcoins, nor will you be able to shut down upcoming decentralized exchanges.

[tinyteapot]

The 'Government' (which one exactly?) won't shut it down, the banks will. They'll come up with their own, and force it upon you. McDonalds, Amazon and WalMart will all eagerly back it, and bitcoin will die.

I don't understand. How are they going to force me to use their alt-coin? And why would acceptance by some of the worlds largest companies cause bitcoin to die?

The adoption by massmarket companies would mean adoption by the massmarket as a whole. Despite the advances bitcoin has made into the conciousness of the general public it is still seen very much as a 'techie' thing. The vast majority of people, especially in the USA, are sheep, and will do what they are told. Capitilism rules, and so the biggest, and not the neccessarily the best wins out. When the banks and major financial institutions who already run everything decide to create their own, it will win. Bitcoin will move underground, and ultimately laws will be brought against it.

[ZKRiNG]

If destroy the actual exchanges and they will move to countries with different laws like happens with piratebay or something like this