What if a large number of miners were suddenly forced to shut down?

[Flashman]

Hack based systems that would only work over short distances could include ideas such as having two laptops with web cameras pointed at each other, and the data being transmitted by encoding it as a series of blinks displayed on the screen; i.e. white screen = 1, black screen = 0 etc. Doable, even easily, but only works over rather short distances.

My guess would be short enough range that using a catapult to fire floppy disks at each other becomes more viable.

Sufficiently intense light such as a laser at each end could make it 2 miles LOS though. Buuuut, if your wifi card gets fried enough that you're not capable of a couple of miles LOS with wifi, I don't imagine the rest of your computer is in great shape either.

Stratum connections to mining pools are very low bandwidth, full nodes seem to nee about 400 bits per second per node connected, so 3.2 kilobits for 8 nodes. When a block is propogated though, you need to get 100KB downloaded in a reasonable timeframe...


However, it ain't your grandpa's RTTY speeds out there any more... (Unless you're determined to get the backside of the planet direct on shortwave)
http://www.broadband-hamnet.org/

[scarsbergholden]

Summary so far:

•It would take a long time.
•Difficulty would take a long time to readjust.
•Old miners get reactivated.
•Impossible!
•It is possible.
•There are alternative transmission mediums.
•Planet of the apes.

It is possible, but not probable. It would take a very long time for the difficulty to adjust downwards however in this time additional miners would likely be added to the network - it really does not matter if the miners previously mined or if they are newly manufactured, however it is more likely they would be newly manufactured as newly manufactured miners can take advantage of the newest technology and will be the most efficient - but mining will be more profitable because the EV of mining will be increased due to the increased TX fees that can be included in each block.

The way that newly found blocks are transmitted does not matter. It is not the miners that are transmitting the newly found blocks, it is the nodes, however any event that causes miners to go offline would likely cause many nodes to go offline as well. Transmitting found blocks via ham radio or some other way would not affect the PoW process.

Planet of the apes.

lol

[Lauda]

Both me and a significant portion of scientists specialized in events related to Sun and the geomagnetic field would disagree.

It is instead a well known fact that a big CME will eventually blow the lights out of possibly whole continents.

I've been involved in a very high level team mapping the significance of this issue on a national level and I can assure you it's not some fringe theory. It's been taken very seriously on very high levels of governmental decision making.

Not that mining crypto currencies would be nearly the biggest problem should/when the scenario plays out. There's going to be plenty of much more urgent stuff to concentrate on.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

Who cares about you and those scientists?
If it blows out lights out on 1 continent, that won't have a significant impact on the network, since it is just 1 continent. A ton of people would instantly support the network from other parts of the world.
Also keep note that such a 'light out' would cause chaos. Chaos in which dollars, euro, bitcoin won't matter at all.
Stop trying to spread FUD.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

95% of miners are suddenly offline.
Be it a new law or an EMP strike. What would happen to bitcoin?  

Most EMP strikes are trivial to defend against with a properly grounded Faraday cage. Many datacenters are protected against EMP's as well.

Can your power grid handle a Solar flare of X-Class higher than 40? Do you know, that it will happen one day, and will be aimed directly at us? Do you also know it has happened in the late 19th century, but thankfully back then we were not as advanced as we are now.

[altcoin.center]

My guess would be short enough range that using a catapult to fire floppy disks at each other becomes more viable.

Probably yes, with the difference being that catapulting floppies would require quite intensive and continuous manual intervention. =D

These examples I gave are or course quite far fetched stuff. However, when looking for new solutions it's best not to limit one's thinking too much to begin with.

Sufficiently intense light such as a laser at each end could make it 2 miles LOS though. Buuuut, if your wifi card gets fried enough that you're not capable of a couple of miles LOS with wifi, I don't imagine the rest of your computer is in great shape either.

Yes, although it's all guesswork. Some parts may be better saved than others depending on their structure and how they've been protected.

We're talking about a number of different possibilities at the same time. EMP's are not uniform but can come in many different shapes. Sharp and powerful ones (such as those created by nuclear or EMP bombs) have the capability to fry pretty much everything, while those more "lazy" ones caused by CMEs or geomagnetic disturbances would not typically effect individual computers in any way, but the would kill electric delivery systems. If the grid goes down then eventually the communication networks go down as well. If the communication networks go down but individual computers and their parts are still ok, then the situation would quite well be such that being able to use the kinds of hacks I've been mentioning could have a huge significance.

Stratum connections to mining pools are very low bandwidth, full nodes seem to nee about 400 bits per second per node connected, so 3.2 kilobits for 8 nodes. When a block is propogated though, you need to get 100KB downloaded in a reasonable timeframe...

Yeah, the demands are not very intensive. Problems with the HAM solution have more to do with the half vs. full duplex issue, plus the fact that you have to have the gear, the skills to operate it - and someone to communicate with.

However, it ain't your grandpa's RTTY speeds out there any more... (Unless you're determined to get the backside of the planet direct on shortwave)
http://www.broadband-hamnet.org/

When I was referring to the "grandpa RTTY speeds" I was specifically talking about HAM, implying "backside of the planet direct on shortwave".

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[altcoin.center]

The way that newly found blocks are transmitted does not matter. It is not the miners that are transmitting the newly found blocks, it is the nodes, however any event that causes miners to go offline would likely cause many nodes to go offline as well. Transmitting found blocks via ham radio or some other way would not affect the PoW process.

Exactly. All that is needed to prevent hte potentially catastrophic forking scenario is that many enough nodes can connect with each other over the gaps created by the loss of the usual communications means.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[altcoin.center]

Who cares about you and those scientists?

Generally speaking, those who understand the issue at hand and it's potential consequences do care about it.

Those who don't care or do not want to care are free to do so.

If it blows out lights out on 1 continent, that won't have a significant impact on the network, since it is just 1 continent.

"Just" one continent? Are you serious?

A ton of people would instantly support the network from other parts of the world.

Very limited thinking. If we're talking about the CME scenario then the effects would most probably be world-wide - not limited to "just" any single continent.

Also, if the communications lines are down, there's no way to rush in to support the network.

The most probable outcome would be that the network would be split in many parts - i.e. forked.

Also keep note that such a 'light out' would cause chaos. Chaos in which dollars, euro, bitcoin won't matter at all.

As I mentioned several times in my posts, there are different possible scenarios. Not all of them would lead to full chaos. I also specifically mentioned that should the worst case scenarios play out, "the situation is probably so bad that block chains are the last thing to think about". Did you miss that or do you just like to attack people?

Stop trying to spread FUD.

Stop trolling and learn how to respect other people - also those who do not share your opinions.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[altcoin.center]

95% of miners are suddenly offline.
Be it a new law or an EMP strike. What would happen to bitcoin?  

Most EMP strikes are trivial to defend against with a properly grounded Faraday cage. Many datacenters are protected against EMP's as well.

Can your power grid handle a Solar flare of X-Class higher than 40? Do you know, that it will happen one day, and will be aimed directly at us? Do you also know it has happened in the late 19th century, but thankfully back then we were not as advanced as we are now.

Agreed.

Finland is the only country in the world whose grid is protected against CME induced EMPs.

The delivery networks can not be protected by Faraday cages; specially designed transformers are needed to lead the induction currents out of the grid without harming the transformers and other parts of the system.

Having protected server rooms doesn't help much if there's no way for the servers to connect with the outside world. Or, if they don't have electricity. From the standpoint of an individual user, the most likely problems would have to do with the lack of both electricity and [global] communications channels the wallets need to function - i.e. the Internet.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[BitCoinNutJob]

We'd feel a great disturbance in the Blockchain, as if millions of miners suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced  

listen to only wan satoshi he knows the true powers of the fork and the dark coin

[cryptopaths]

95% of miners are suddenly offline.
Be it a new law or an EMP strike. What would happen to bitcoin? 

For one it would take about x20 longer for transactions to confirm until the next difficulty adjustment.

[altcoin.center]

We'd feel a great disturbance in the Blockchain, as if millions of miners suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced  

listen to only wan satoshi he knows the true powers of the fork and the dark coin

=D

[altcoin.center]

95% of miners are suddenly offline.
Be it a new law or an EMP strike. What would happen to bitcoin? 

For one it would take about x20 longer for transactions to confirm until the next difficulty adjustment.

Yes, indeed.

Depending on the details of the scenario, things could get really complicated.

A total "everything down on one blow" would in a way be very simple.

I'd say a much more probable situation is such that the connectivity and/or electricity would come and go while the affected systems would try to manage with the situation. Parts of the electric grid would probably come back online for a while, then crash again under the intensive load. Communications systems would most probably act similarly; when the operators would get parts of the systems back online, the amount of traffic (and overhead caused by routing errors etc.) would soon clog the networks.

This would mean the block chain would be under constant changes as well, nodes and miners appearing and disappearing depending on which parts of the electricity and communications networks would work at any given time. Network hash rate and difficulty would be going haywire. Forking would be virtually unavoidable.

While all this may sound like catastrophe loving fear mongering, to me it shows just as a normal situation given the parameters that affect it. We know how electric grids act when induction currents affect them, and we know what kind of chain reactions overload can cause in them as well. Same goes for communications systems. The only thing we can't be 100% certain of (yet) is how Bitcoin and other crypto currencies would react to the situation - simply because, unlike with electric grid and communication networks, there has not yet been s big scale scenario from which we would have data. A lot can be guesstimated though, since the working logic of block chain based currencies is after all rather simple.

A lab simulation would be an interesting thing to do. It could also be done as a virtual simulation. If anyone has the time and curiosity to take on such project, I'll be happy to participate in the planning and can provide server and network capasity to do it.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[Flashman]

When I was referring to the "grandpa RTTY speeds" I was specifically talking about HAM, implying "backside of the planet direct on shortwave".

Yah they've got HF, VHF and UHF bands to play with though, potential data rate is better on those, but don't generally reach intercontinental unless the amateur satellites are still running. Though there's moon bounce, meteor bounce modes etc.

[ScryptAsic]

95% of miners are suddenly offline.
Be it a new law or an EMP strike. What would happen to bitcoin? 

For one it would take about x20 longer for transactions to confirm until the next difficulty adjustment.

It would not be that long. As it is now blocks, on average, are much less then the 1 MB size limit, and pools will often broadcast blocks that are well under this limit to avoid risking their block getting orphaned. However this risk would be decreased with the new, temporarily longer block time plus the additional TX fees included in many transactions would result in the blocks generally being much closer to 1 MB, if they are not all filled to 1 MB exactly.

[Brekmister]

It would shatter lives, If the governments are not going to reimburse the damages.

1. Nobody would be able to trade Bitcoin because lack of miners
2. All of that money in their accounts would be lost
3. They would still have to pay taxes for nonexistent money.

[cbeast]

Anything catastrophic enough to shut down Bitcoin would disrupt global civilization. Martial law would dictate most of your daily activities. Depending on how long it takes to restore the internet, you might want to consider bargaining for protection under a well armed warlord.

[numismatist]

Anything catastrophic enough to shut down Bitcoin would disrupt global civilization. Martial law would dictate most of your daily activities. Depending on how long it takes to restore the internet, you might want to consider bargaining for protection under a well armed warlord.

Dystopian currency could be 9x19 parabellum rounds 

[altcoin.center]

When I was referring to the "grandpa RTTY speeds" I was specifically talking about HAM, implying "backside of the planet direct on shortwave".

Yah they've got HF, VHF and UHF bands to play with though, potential data rate is better on those, but don't generally reach intercontinental unless the amateur satellites are still running. Though there's moon bounce, meteor bounce modes etc.

"They" in fact include me, although I haven't had the time to finish my official examination yet.

The bands you mentioned do indeed have some differences regarding how fast packet radio connections can be built on top of them, and very different in how long distance connections they can be used for.

High frequency bands can carry more data, but for much shorter distances.

Typical speeds for packet radio when working on intercontinental connections top around 56 kbit/s, and that's already a very good achievement.

I'm not quite sure what you refer to with "amateur satellites". HAM amateurs do not use any satellites for either continental nor intercontinental connections; it's all ground station to ground station.

Moon bounce is a challenging thing and very rarely used, although the HAM Radio Coin team is going to attempt it in the near future.

"Meteor bounce" is again something I have never heard of until now. I really wonder how I've managed to miss that one.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center

[cbeast]

Anything catastrophic enough to shut down Bitcoin would disrupt global civilization. Martial law would dictate most of your daily activities. Depending on how long it takes to restore the internet, you might want to consider bargaining for protection under a well armed warlord.

Dystopian currency could be 9x19 parabellum rounds 

That's how the West was one.

[altcoin.center]

Anything catastrophic enough to shut down Bitcoin would disrupt global civilization. Martial law would dictate most of your daily activities. Depending on how long it takes to restore the internet, you might want to consider bargaining for protection under a well armed warlord.

Things are not quite that black and white.

Bitcoin would be disrupted easily. For example, if intercontinental Internet connections were lost for just few hours (actually minutes would probably do the trick), we would have a huge forking issue which would be well enough to bring Bitcoin usage to a halt.
 
Hardly a case that would cause martial law and full chaos.

- Jyri
--
Altcoin.Center