WHAT HAPPENS TO BITCOIN IF ATLANTIC INTERNET CABLES ARE CUT OFF?

[WilderX]

So have any of you been wondering what happens to the Bitcoin network if the Atlantic internet cables are cut off?  

Gas pipelines on the Baltic sea was just recently blown up so it's not so far fetched scenario to happen is it?

Will the network fork?

Would Elon Musks Starlink satellites still keep the Bitcoin network up and running if all the cables are cut? Assuming the miners would use that as back up solution?

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[mynonce]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_Internet_access


For example:

https://blockstream.com/satellite/
The Bitcoin blockchain from space. No internet required.

The Blockstream Satellite network broadcasts the Bitcoin blockchain around the world 24/7 for free, protecting against network interruptions and providing areas without reliable internet connections with the opportunity to use Bitcoin.

[franky1]

blow up ALL internet cable?  well good luck.. there are more then one


answer in short. the ping increases (speed slows down).. by a few milliseconds

[WilderX]

blow up ALL internet cable?  well good luck.. there are more then one


answer in short. the ping increases (speed slows down).. by a few milliseconds

Russia has submarines all over the World I think it is well within their cababilities to fuck up the Western World when they want (or China too).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_Internet_access


For example:

https://blockstream.com/satellite/
The Bitcoin blockchain from space. No internet required.

The Blockstream Satellite network broadcasts the Bitcoin blockchain around the world 24/7 for free, protecting against network interruptions and providing areas without reliable internet connections with the opportunity to use Bitcoin.

Thanks for that I had forgotten about the Blockstream satellite network. So lets assume everything else is gone would BTC really be able to run and produce new blocks with just that small satellite network?

[moderator's note: consecutive posts merged]

[jackg]

Thanks for that I had forgotten about the Blockstream satellite network. So lets assume everything else is gone would BTC really be able to run and produce new blocks with just that small satellite network?

I'm having difficulty imagining this scenario because I don't think much would work if those cables were cut.

If you imagined having an international banking scheme that relies on planes, the economy has probably already crashed.

I think the Internet could probably be launched off satellites if something like this happened so things would be less interrupted/interruptable - but satellite Internet is slow. Blockstream could probably be better resourced than the Internet for doing the downloads too (with the satellite internet being used to query if the chain is still trustworthy and the longest). Blockstream can't receive transactions too so that might be a problem (or it couldn't when I last checked).


Thankfully, the cables wrap fully around the earth and if part of a cable is broken it can be repaired (it's not like they actually take up the entire cable and relay a new one in its place, they can float the broken part of the cable up to the surface and fix only the bit that needs fixing there - it's locatable by echo location).

[coolcoinz]

Cut as in where? On international waters? They'd have to use a submarine to do it and the country that would decide to do it would have to be a major troll because nobody but maybe North Korea would benefit from it. I'm saying this because Kim is such a troll and as you can see on the map above, there are no cables near his little kingdom.

What would happen? Countries would dispatch ships to hunt down the "troll" and patch the cables up. Also, cutting all the cables would take weeks if not months, so by the time they'd be going after the last cluster, the first one would be patched already. An EMP strike is more probable than a cable attack.

[dunfida]

Cut as in where? On international waters? They'd have to use a submarine to do it and the country that would decide to do it would have to be a major troll because nobody but maybe North Korea would benefit from it. I'm saying this because Kim is such a troll and as you can see on the map above, there are no cables near his little kingdom.

What would happen? Countries would dispatch ships to hunt down the "troll" and patch the cables up. Also, cutting all the cables would take weeks if not months, so by the time they'd be going after the last cluster, the first one would be patched already. An EMP strike is more probable than a cable attack.

For sure those countries that had been affected would surely be looking for that son-of-a-b*tch who do cut off those cables and considering on crossing in between international waters doesnt really took to fast which

the thing you do said that they might able to cut off one of those lines but the other ones had been already patched or repaired already.Dont know on whats up into the minds into those who do cut on
pursuing such target or goal on cutting off network connections.

EMP is indeed more realistic on making things to happen but cutting cables? It doesnt make sense.

[Nhazwrath]

its like no ones heard of satellites.

or starlink.   yah know that giant swarm of interconnected sats right above your head that very soon prob wont need ground stations except for sovereign countries requiring them.

[tbct_mt2]

Bitcoin has a decentralized network and different geographical mining locations. Each location has different Internet access. So it is almost impossible to see all Internet on Earth is cutting down. If it happens, it's likely that all of us should be death too.

If such apocalypse won't occur, we will still see Bitcoin network keeps running well. Even if some big mining farms have issue, Bitcoin network will only be congested for 2 to 4 weeks, and after 2 or more difficulty retarget times, difficulty will be adjusted and the network will run smoothly again.

[TravelMug]

Well I remember way back that there is a massive earth quake in Asia wherein it affected the cable under and so they were isolated for a couple of hours. But there is still satellite so we get the message across on the other side that we are offline as of that time.

So probably that is just the worst case scenario, couple of hours and that's it. Internet could be restored right away all over the world even if the Atlantic cables are cut off or being isolated. And so I guess everyone can manage to continue and wait till the internet gets back.

[bittraffic]

What is the motive for doing it and what does it serve to them if the Internet shuts down?
Elon might have the motive in order for him to corner the market having just the Starlink but this guy doesn't have a country to run nor Arm forces.

Russia, the EU nor US will not benefit from it either unless each of them wants to shut down outside news from thier own country. Which of them has a history of banning and shutting down people from speaking?

[avikz]

If the underwater cables are cut off, the internet connectivity will suffer for the entire world and not just the bitcoin miners. However, we do have alternatives available like satellite internet but they are very costly so miners will have to spend more money to get their operations up and running.

So this will be a disastrous situation for the entire world. However, I don't see this happening anytime in the future considering every single countries are heavily dependent on the internet.

[ABCbits]

Thanks for that I had forgotten about the Blockstream satellite network. So lets assume everything else is gone would BTC really be able to run and produce new blocks with just that small satellite network?

As long as there are miner/pool and node connected to internet satellite, Bitcoin network will continue to run. But we'll experience network congestion due to decreased hashrate since not all miner/pool subscribe to internet satellite. Although realistically, most people would worry more about social and economic impact due to majority of internet structure is gone.

[8rch7]

Countries are very dependent on the internet, almost all work is done with the internet, if only the internet were to be cut off it would definitely be a very big disaster for all countries, undersea cables represent the availability of the world's internet and are connected by geteways in almost every city in the world, if one is damaged then the data must be quickly transferred to the few remaining cables, before putting it back on the seabed, but in my personal opinion bitcoin will still run as usual in certain countries that have internet access like the United States, but all this will never happen. happens, because before that happens they will definitely anticipate, because no country wants to suffer losses.

[DaveF]

Thanks for that I had forgotten about the Blockstream satellite network. So lets assume everything else is gone would BTC really be able to run and produce new blocks with just that small satellite network?

As long as there are miner/pool and node connected to internet satellite, Bitcoin network will continue to run. But we'll experience network congestion due to decreased hashrate since not all miner/pool subscribe to internet satellite. Although realistically, most people would worry more about social and economic impact due to majority of internet structure is gone.

Which really sums it up nicely. Even if BTC was working, you would have a lot of difficulty buying things as merchants imploded all over the place. Assuming you even had service on your device.
The large main players have redundancy to keep the local networks up, but everything else would become a disaster very quickly. Recovery, would be somewhat quick however since there would be an outcry to get it fixed whatever the cost.

-Dave

[rendravolt]

Remember how the power outage in China affected bitcoin. In such a scenario, bitcoin could really suffer a lot. I don't even want to think about it. That's why bitcoin's weak spot is such issues.

Now part of our lives are in the digital world and all of that requires energy sources such as electricity and internet connectivity. If both are off then all activities will be interrupted and delayed. It is undeniable that if these two things happen to bitcoin, it will certainly have an impact on bitcoin transactions and mining which results in the cessation of all existing systems, which you mention is only China, what if it happened all over the world?

[Husires]

Why CapsLock? To clarify the question you do not need to.

If the Internet is cut off around the year, the problem will be greater than Bitcoin, as the losses will far exceed the capacity of the Internet market, and the synchronization of Bitcoin or a sabotage attack requires a lot and trying to detect it is easy using the satellite Internet or a means of synchronization between the nodes.

[dkbit98]

So have any of you been wondering what happens to the Bitcoin network if the Atlantic internet cables are cut off?

It's easy to imagine internet is going to transformed in future, to provide more censorship for restrictions, so it's possible we could see temporary connection breaks for some regions.
I think that United States and few other countries even have their own internet kill switch, so they don't even need to blow up anything (again).
Internet going of in one continent won't break Bitcoin, longest chain will survive, and fork won't happen but certain regions could be cut off for a while.

Would Elon Musks Starlink satellites still keep the Bitcoin network up and running if all the cables are cut? Assuming the miners would use that as back up solution?

No they won't, unless he can profit from this.
Elon Musk doesn't care about Bitcoin at all, and all his business is mostly based on fumes.
Never forget what he did with Bitcoin.

[Techkoy407]

it's a pretty scary scenario,
because if the internet goes out or the network flow is cut off, it will definitely cause big problems, especially in the crypto world, which relies on the internet network.

not only crypto investors, surely the whole world will be nervous, because for the internet community it has become a necessity.