Can Bitcoin Be Destroyed?

[IceLincoln]

Very long thread with less purpose. Almost everything listed in the Op is already a failed attempt to destroy bitcoin.

I don’t think the thread is purposeless. Yes, the fact that most of what has been listed as the attacks have failed woefully only shows Bitcoin’s resilience. It can be manipulated, restricted, criticised and attacked but never destroyed.
OP did a good job with his write up, putting all these informations together maybe probably would have shortened some explanations but it was worth it at the end.
There will always be attempts to bring down Bitcoin or to bring it under control by the government or other institutions but as long as the core protocol remains intact and decentralised they’ll never succeed.

[Shinpako09]

I've long since stopped thinking about whether BTC can be destroyed. Some countries, like the USA, wouldn't hold BTC if it could be destroyed. Not even the progress in quantum computing has made the USA sell its holdings entirely. If there is something that could destroy BTC, I believe the US would get the news firsthand and would make a move right away.

But since they didn't, they clearly don't see quantum computing as a threat yet. There are certain events that affect the price, which is normal, but something that could destroy BTC? That hasn't happened yet.

[CryptoBuds]

I've long since stopped thinking about whether BTC can be destroyed. Some countries, like the USA, wouldn't hold BTC if it could be destroyed. Not even the progress in quantum computing has made the USA sell its holdings entirely. If there is something that could destroy BTC, I believe the US would get the news firsthand and would make a move right away.

But since they didn't, they clearly don't see quantum computing as a threat yet. There are certain events that affect the price, which is normal, but something that could destroy BTC? That hasn't happened yet.

So, if one day Trump decides to sell all the Bitcoin held by the US, would you reconsider your view and start doubting Bitcoin? Would you sell all your Bitcoin if the US government sold its BTC, claiming that Bitcoin was no longer safe?

Bitcoin's existence and long term survival don't depend on whether the US or any other government holds it. Government can buy or sell Bitcoin, but that doesn't determine whether Bitcoin can survive or be destroyed.

If you want to know whether Bitcoin can survive in the long run or be destroyed, look at the Bitcoin network itself. Bitcoin's strength lies in its network.

[Razmirraz]

Snip.

So, if one day Trump decides to sell all the Bitcoin held by the US, would you reconsider your view and start doubting Bitcoin? Would you sell all your Bitcoin if the US government sold its BTC, claiming that Bitcoin was no longer safe?

Bitcoin's existence and long term survival don't depend on whether the US or any other government holds it. Government can buy or sell Bitcoin, but that doesn't determine whether Bitcoin can survive or be destroyed.

If you want to know whether Bitcoin can survive in the long run or be destroyed, look at the Bitcoin network itself. Bitcoin's strength lies in its network.

I am definitely not going to sell all my Bitcoin just because Trump sold all the Bitcoin owned by the United States, the reason I continue to hold Bitcoin is because the US sell-off does not automatically make Bitcoin unsafe, Bitcoin (decentralization) does not have an Off button in Washington or the White House. I still believe that Bitcoin success or failure depends on its fundamentals, namely scarcity, security, and adoption, not on the US selling all its Bitcoin.

The Bitcoin network's existence is determined by its decentralized nature, global user participation, and miner consensus, not by any particular country's policies or asset reserves, so Bitcoin long-term viability does not depend on government ownership. Governments do not have the authority to change the basic rules, stop blockchains or take down networks that are already running globally.
Yes, whether Bitcoin survives or collapses depends on the network, it has absolutely nothing to do with the government.

[suhadi88]

The Bitcoin network's existence is determined by its decentralized nature, global user participation, and miner consensus, not by any particular country's policies or asset reserves, so Bitcoin long-term viability does not depend on government ownership. Governments do not have the authority to change the basic rules, stop blockchains or take down networks that are already running globally.
Yes, whether Bitcoin survives or collapses depends on the network, it has absolutely nothing to do with the government.

The problem lies in users constantly monitoring government policies, especially financial ones, and this has a significant impact on their mood. They also weigh the risks involved if they do invest; they ultimately don't want to be victims of government policies.

Exacly. I don't think the government has any business interfering, let alone interfering to halt Bitcoin's core operations. I don't think they're involved in three common areas: oversight, tax collection methods, and most importantly, preventing BTC from becoming a means of payment in society.

[Fiasem20]

The Bitcoin network's existence is determined by its decentralized nature, global user participation, and miner consensus, not by any particular country's policies or asset reserves, so Bitcoin long-term viability does not depend on government ownership. Governments do not have the authority to change the basic rules, stop blockchains or take down networks that are already running globally.
Yes, whether Bitcoin survives or collapses depends on the network, it has absolutely nothing to do with the government.

The problem lies in users constantly monitoring government policies, especially financial ones, and this has a significant impact on their mood. They also weigh the risks involved if they do invest; they ultimately don't want to be victims of government policies.

Exacly. I don't think the government has any business interfering, let alone interfering to halt Bitcoin's core operations. I don't think they're involved in three common areas: oversight, tax collection methods, and most importantly, preventing BTC from becoming a means of payment in society.

It would affect the ones that one involved in it for some financial gain/target.It wouldn’t affect the miners all that because the government won’t start finding bitcoin miners so they can destroy their ASIC miners,so on that aspect the miners would continue mining and receiving their reward without being bothered about the government’s regulations imposed towards bitcoin,mostly the ones that are likely going to be affected are the investors and newbies because apparently nobody would want to get themselves into trouble especially when it’s coming from the government.Lastly,the network isn’t going to collapse as easy as they think it would because bitcoin is an open source,assuming a government should shutdown all the mining operations of bitcoin in their country it won’t pose a greater effect on bitcoin continuity because other countries are still mining bitcoins.

[Rabata]

how Bitcoin can be attacked without directly breaking its code or openly banning it.

Bitcoin cannot be destroyed, lets assume that Bitcoin will change or destroyed through usage and behavior. But my question is that when people themselves know that no one can attack the Bitcoin protocol or that the protocol will not be destroyed, how can they believe that it can be affected by usage and behavior alone. Those who understand this fact will have more confidence in it. If someone emotionally expects such a thing, it will never be logical. Moreover, people's trust in Bitcoin is gradually increasing. People believe that Bitcoin nodes will never close all at once. Miners will not stop working at once. Then there is no logic in believing such a thing. It can only be waste of time.

[Achalugo BTC]

The problem lies in users constantly monitoring government policies, especially financial ones, and this has a significant impact on their mood. They also weigh the risks involved if they do invest; they ultimately don't want to be victims of government policies.

Exacly. I don't think the government has any business interfering, let alone interfering to halt Bitcoin's core operations. I don't think they're involved in three common areas: oversight, tax collection methods, and most importantly, preventing BTC from becoming a means of payment in society.

Actually, you are correct but I don't think it will be easy for Bitcoin to be used as payment because that depends on the government since they can't control Bitcoin due to its decentralized in nature, though, Bitcoin can't be destroyed but the rules issued by the government make things difficult for one to invest in Bitcoin, as some feel it is unsafe to invest and this has made them unsure to take the risk to invest as they believe that anything can just happen and they might lose everything.

[samadam007]

It would affect the ones that one involved in it for some financial gain/target.It wouldn’t affect the miners all that because the government won’t start finding bitcoin miners so they can destroy their ASIC miners,so on that aspect the miners would continue mining and receiving their reward without being bothered about the government’s regulations imposed towards bitcoin,mostly the ones that are likely going to be affected are the investors and newbies because apparently nobody would want to get themselves into trouble especially when it’s coming from the government.Lastly,the network isn’t going to collapse as easy as they think it would because bitcoin is an open source,assuming a government should shutdown all the mining operations of bitcoin in their country it won’t pose a greater effect on bitcoin continuity because other countries are still mining bitcoins.

Bitcoin resilience isn’t only because it’s open source. There are plenty open source projects too that failed because they don’t have same strength with Bitcoin.
Bitcoin keep running because it has decentralized and has large network of miners, nodes and users spread across plenty countries. Even if one country go ahead to ban the mining or Bitcoin itself,  the network will still continue to run through other independent users. This is why it’ll be very difficult for anyone or government to stop it

[johnsaributua]

Bitcoin resilience isn’t only because it’s open source. There are plenty open source projects too that failed because they don’t have same strength with Bitcoin.
Bitcoin keep running because it has decentralized and has large network of miners, nodes and users spread across plenty countries. Even if one country go ahead to ban the mining or Bitcoin itself,  the network will still continue to run through other independent users. This is why it’ll be very difficult for anyone or government to stop it

Bitcoin's current strength lies in the vast network of parties from various countries. This is the main reason for Bitcoin's strength. Many countries today have networks of miners and nodes, which as you mentioned, are spread across the globe.
Bitcoin's resilience is not only focused on open source but also because the network runs as a link to all parties, but if the network does not run of course there are other options as a link to be able to carry out its duties, Bitcoin still has its own strength so that many parties sometimes want to stop Bitcoin but still cannot, even from the government, it is still the same as not being able to stop the power of Bitcoin.

[BitGoba]

13.Acquiring Leading Hardware Wallet Manufacturers or Compromising Their Software

One way to attack Bitcoin would be to acquire or compromise the world's leading hardware wallet manufacturers. If an attacker gained control over a company or its development team, they could attempt to introduce malicious or intentionally flawed changes into the device's firmware or companion software. Such changes could lead to the loss of funds, the exposure of private keys, or a significant erosion of user trust.

The primary objective of such an attack would not necessarily be to steal every bitcoin, but rather to undermine confidence in self-custody. If a large number of users lost trust in hardware wallets, many might abandon self-custody altogether and move their bitcoin to centralized exchanges or custodial services. This would weaken one of Bitcoin's greatest strengths: the ability for individuals to remain the sole owners and controllers of their private keys.

[citywise2]

Very long thread with less purpose. Almost everything listed in the Op is already a failed attempt to destroy bitcoin.

The thread is long no doubt but its purpose is there for anyone to see. The list represent the one too many failed attempt on Bitcoin from various angle - governments,  institutions and sponsored individuals, but they each met their water loo.

Each one of them have been tried to bear on Bitcoin in the  past 17 years, but  one thing is obvious, they back fired and will continue to back fire while Bitcoin gets better. I don't know how many of us who remembers the tussle between BTC and BCH years back or the authorities desperation at forcing regulation down the throat of users and  every thing on OP  list - they highlight that the fight has been on and very ruthless but victory remains on the side of Bitcoin because some people can see with their eyes and they believe the light Bitcoin brings.

OP's list can serve as a reminder and strengthener to newbies when they come face to face with these tantrums and be able to take their stand boldly for Bitcoin.

[BluebloodCXVI]

The strength of Bitcoin lies within it's users. For me, the only way to actually destroy Bitcoin is to poison the minds of the users towards Bitcoin.

this point is totally accepted because Bitcoin cannot be possibly being destroyed without someone knowing the document that satoshi use to create Bitcoin but the only way it can be destroyed is through restriction by the users, if different countries stop making use of Bitcoin it is human bitcoin will be totally destroyed based on lack of investment and lack of adoption.

Why would any document related to Satoshi's creating bitcoin make any difference when the whole of bitcoin's code has been open source?  If there were any secrets within bitcoin's code, they would have had been discovered, even though sometimes there can be difficulties with code that are not understood until some later date or under some different sets of circumstances.

I'm confused about those documents he said, but one thing is for sure here. Bitcoin code is open source and it means that every detail is publicly available since day one of its creation.

If it really happens that there are what they called secret codes or anything mystery hidden. For sure that this will be discovered by thousands of researchers and developers which frequently doing audits with the code.

This is the reason why those documents they say about the intent of Satoshi will not gonna change how Bitcoin works. The system remain to be verifiable and transparent and this is really good about Bitcoin.

Maybe other people can learn something from here https://bitcoinsecurity.org/learn/open-source-software

It seems that many people are focusing too much on the decentralized nature of Bitcoin while forgetting another important factor: Bitcoin is open source. That means anyone can check, research, or contribute to it.

If I remember correctly, the first Bitcoin v0.1 release was posted on SourceForge and later moved to Github.

Bitcoin is fully open source, and there are no secret. Everything was made public by Satoshi from the very beginning.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/bitcoin/
https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin

Assuming bitcoin’s decentralization existed without it being an open source, it would have been much weaker because you’d basically have to trust some black-box implementation where you can be able to use the program but can’t be able to inspect it’s source code so you can see how exactly it works.

But even still, open source on its own is not actually enough either; without the economic incentives and network effects keeping everyone on the same rules, you could as well just end up with a bunch of incompatible forks.

It is very obvious that Satoshi’s decision to release everything to the public and then gradually step away is a big part of why bitcoin has the unique trust model that it does.

[GeorgeJohn]

I will like the moderators of this sections to lock up this thread, the answer needed in this thread has been answered in the first page even from page 1 to 5, so what other people are answering is similar to people who has given the answer needed, if you read the pages carefully, you can see that theirs a lot of repetition of answers..So base on my own opinion, i suggest that the thread should be lock because it's has gain a lot of relevants...but not mandatory

[Sunshine1525]

There will always be attempts to bring down Bitcoin or to bring it under control by the government or other institutions but as long as the core protocol remains intact and decentralised they’ll never succeed.

The coldcard hack is another attempt of making people lose trust in Bitcoin but it's a failed attempt and instead of losing trust many people including me got enlighten on a way wallet for storing it. Bitcoin has withstand so many attempt to bring it down and i doubt it woukd be possible to do so.

Bringing down Bitcoin would require shutting down the internet globally which is impossible cause modern tech needs the internet to survive and there's no way the government can convince millions of people against using the Internet or abandon decentralization.

[EarnOnVictor]

3. Trap and Track Users Through KYC
Bitcoin allows a person to receive and send value without opening a bank account or asking anyone for permission. However, when most people obtain Bitcoin through regulated intermediaries, their use of Bitcoin becomes connected to their identity.
KYC does not merely collect a person’s first and last name. It can connect a user’s identity to their purchases, withdrawal addresses, and future transactions. When this information is combined with public blockchain analysis, it becomes possible to construct a highly detailed picture of someone’s financial activity.

I read through your article, and I could say they are reasonable enough, but in the end, one thing is certain, Bitcoin itself has never compromised or is under threat, but individuals, companies and the governments are weakening its usage and link with people through activities and transactions. But is your choice to allow that. As we speak, there are core Bitcoiners who have never yielded to those vices, as they would rather only try decentralised systems or nothing, instead of cheaply submitting their details or compromise through centralised systems.

[Mahiyammahi]

It may look like it's impossible for Bitcoin to be destroyed because it is decentralized, but decentralization alone does not guarantee that it will be able to survive forever or remain its stand as a reliable asset.

I mean, even if there are no government or organization can shutdown Bitcoin, the government still have a major influence that can limit the access for peiple and use it. They can even regulate exchanges or even restrict the banks from interacting with Bitcoin. If each countries could take similar actions, It could greatly affect and lose a significant number of adoption and value without destroying the network. the posibility of Bitcoin facing technological and security challenges in the future and the decentralization is what makes it hard for the attacker, but it does not make it immune to those every possible problem.

Absolutely! And most people don't really understand this part of Bitcoin. Its true Bitcoin can't be destroyed due to its decentralization in nature, but the government can frustrate ones life with that even though they don't have the power to control it or pull it down, but can use their influence to make people lose the interest of adopting the idea of investing in Bitcoin and we know no matter how popular or beneficial Bitcoin can be, people will still need the use of banks, fiat, etc. So, as it stands now, people wants to be part of something that will still benefit and give them peace of minds and not what will cause them headache due to pressure and stress.

Specially I hate the part where they added the taxes on Bitcoin lol. Even though it's decentralized not connected with government and we're not using any asset or getting any benefits from government still they are charging us back as taxes. This one would be bullshit scenerio. Also the moment they get chances they are seiging bitcoin. It's not far away that government will majority of the decentralized bitcoin and will start manipulating the system itself.

Although the bitcoin is decentralized, but if someone holds the majority of the supply then it would be easy to control the whole ecosystem itself.

[citywise2]

3. Trap and Track Users Through KYC
Bitcoin allows a person to receive and send value without opening a bank account or asking anyone for permission. However, when most people obtain Bitcoin through regulated intermediaries, their use of Bitcoin becomes connected to their identity.
KYC does not merely collect a person’s first and last name. It can connect a user’s identity to their purchases, withdrawal addresses, and future transactions. When this information is combined with public blockchain analysis, it becomes possible to construct a highly detailed picture of someone’s financial activity.

I read through your article, and I could say they are reasonable enough, but in the end, one thing is certain, Bitcoin itself has never compromised or is under threat, but individuals, companies and the governments are weakening its usage and link with people through activities and transactions. But is your choice to allow that. As we speak, there are core Bitcoiners who have never yielded to those vices, as they would rather only try decentralised systems or nothing, instead of cheaply submitting their details or compromise through centralised systems.

I think Bitcoin have had one too many treats not just from the governments but individuals and the hard forks Bitcoin suffered over the years can attest to that. Do you know many countries banned or attempted banning Bitcoin  and it was not until they realised that Bitcoin is borderless - you can't ban  it that they now  switched over to enforcing regulation. Truth be told, if Bitcoin were not well thought out by Satoshi -  decentralised and trustless, Bitcoin would have been caged  and destroyed by now.

[Inior]

Bitcoin cannot be destroyed in literal terms but, it can be weakened just as the op. Currently, we can see the games our governments have been playing so far regarding Bitcoin adoption. With the rate at which most government are restricting their citizens from accessing Bitcoin without any valid reason except mere assumptions, you can easily tell that there is an agenda against Bitcoin. However, Bitcoin is a solid asset, and irrespective of the allegations against it, it still thrives meaning it can not be destroyed.

[cxtreenal]

3. Trap and Track Users Through KYC
Bitcoin allows a person to receive and send value without opening a bank account or asking anyone for permission. However, when most people obtain Bitcoin through regulated intermediaries, their use of Bitcoin becomes connected to their identity.
KYC does not merely collect a person’s first and last name. It can connect a user’s identity to their purchases, withdrawal addresses, and future transactions. When this information is combined with public blockchain analysis, it becomes possible to construct a highly detailed picture of someone’s financial activity.

I read through your article, and I could say they are reasonable enough, but in the end, one thing is certain, Bitcoin itself has never compromised or is under threat, but individuals, companies and the governments are weakening its usage and link with people through activities and transactions. But is your choice to allow that. As we speak, there are core Bitcoiners who have never yielded to those vices, as they would rather only try decentralised systems or nothing, instead of cheaply submitting their details or compromise through centralised systems.

I think Bitcoin have had one too many treats not just from the governments but individuals and the hard forks Bitcoin suffered over the years can attest to that. Do you know many countries banned or attempted banning Bitcoin  and it was not until they realised that Bitcoin is borderless - you can't ban  it that they now  switched over to enforcing regulation. Truth be told, if Bitcoin were not well thought out by Satoshi -  decentralised and trustless, Bitcoin would have been caged  and destroyed by now.

If there were any weaknesses in credibility, critics would have been more vocal about it and Bitcoin would have faced more obstacles. Governments are essentially doing nothing by banning it, but rather Bitcoin is getting stronger. Bitcoin's strength lies in its ability to operate a network of thousands of independent nodes and its decentralized and censorship-resistant nature.

Long term investors are confident in holding Bitcoin, and this confidence is reflected in the stability of Bitcoin's price. In fact even in weak global financial system Bitcoin is built on a strong financial structure and is getting stronger.