Today we are going to discuss a topic that sounds a bit thrilling and even a bit dangerous: How to Kill Bitcoin?
Have you ever wondered if this thing, regarded as digital gold, could be completely destroyed? I find that Bitcoin enthusiasts and ordinary people have completely opposite views on this. Bitcoin believers think Bitcoin is immortal; it can survive anything. But the general public feels that Bitcoin is just a digital product that will eventually be hacked. So what will the outcome be? Let's peel back the layers on Bitcoin's security design from the perspective of how to kill it.
One Way to Kill Bitcoin
Direct hacker attack. Difficulty rating: five stars.
No, it's almost impossible.
We can think of Bitcoin as a globally shared ledger system. If hackers want to cause trouble, they need to accomplish three things: First, secretly write in forged transactions, like saying Zhang San transferred me 1 million Bitcoin. Second, make all global nodes believe that this is true. Third, continue to keep records on this fake ledger without being kicked out.
It sounds a bit like secretly altering accounts in a bank, but in reality, verifying whether a transaction is fake only takes a few seconds, like scanning a bill for authenticity. However, forging a transaction requires millions in equipment and exorbitant electricity costs for camouflage. Moreover, there are thousands of cashiers, or nodes, worldwide. They watch the system every day, hoping it doesn't make any mistakes.
To put it simply: it's like trying to secretly alter the ledger in a company with ten thousand accountants watching you. The cost of counterfeiting is higher than the company's annual profit. So, while it's theoretically possible, economically it's completely not worthwhile.
Two Ways to Kill Bitcoin
51% Attack. Difficulty coefficient: four stars.
Theoretically feasible, but almost no one can do it in reality.
What is a 51% attack? Imagine the Bitcoin network as a massive voting system. Each miner's voting weight depends on their computing power, which is the ability of their computer to calculate. If a bad actor controls more than 50% of the global computing power, they can manipulate the voting results.
For example: Bad actor Xiao Wang has one Bitcoin, and he uses that Bitcoin to buy a computer worth $10,000. The transaction is completed, and the recipient sees the Bitcoin received and ships the product, but at the same time, Xiao Wang secretly initiates a second hidden chain. On this chain, he transfers that one Bitcoin back to himself. If Xiao Wang's computing power is strong enough, he can make this fake chain catch up and even surpass the original ledger, and the entire network will believe this fake chain is real. The original transaction is erased, and as a result, Xiao Wang gets the laptop and the money returns to him.
A real-world example: In 2013, a website called Bitcoin DICE fell victim to such an attack, losing 1,000 Bitcoins valued at around $100,000 at the time. This happened because they were too eager and did not wait for confirmation before believing the money had been received. It's like someone paying them, but they did not check the authenticity with a verification machine before confirming.
So why is this type of attack hardly ever attempted in reality?
There are several reasons: The first reason is confirmation can prevent it; as long as you can wait for six blocks of confirmation, the attacker must catch up to the length of these six ledgers, making the difficulty rise exponentially. It's like counterfeit bills needing to pass through six different banks' money verification machines, leaving almost no chance. The second reason is that to perform a 51% attack, you need to invest massively in mining machines, costing hundreds of millions of dollars. But once you successfully attack, Bitcoin's credibility collapses, and the price plummets. The mining machines you hold instantly become worthless scrap. It's like being a gold mine owner, but to steal one piece of gold, you blow up the entire mountain. Can the government do this? You might wonder if a national effort is feasible; the problem is that miners are scattered all over the globe. The more mining machines you buy, the more expensive they become, and the overall computing power of the network is stimulated to be stronger. It's like trying to buy all the taxis to paralyze city traffic; instead, you ignite the entire taxi industry.
Three Ways to Kill Bitcoin
Hardware backdoor. Difficulty rating: three stars.
Has certain feasibility
It's like buying a computer that appears normal on the surface, but inside is a remote control that someone else can operate remotely; this is a hardware backdoor.
In the Bitcoin system, there are two possible attack scenarios. Scenario One: Control of Mining Machines. Most mining machines are produced by a few companies. If these manufacturers are controlled by hackers or the government, they could shut down the machines at critical moments or even launch a 51% attack. It's like all the banks in the world using the same company's vaults; if that company has an issue, all the banks are at risk. Scenario Two: Hackers Stealing Users' Private Keys. Hackers install spy processes on your phone or computer to secretly obtain your wallet's private keys and directly transfer your coins away. This type of attack doesn't need to impact everyone; just a few cases can cause significant panic, so the deeply held belief in the Bitcoin community is to not trust your own verification. Many Bitcoin enthusiasts will check the code, verify hardware, and set up nodes themselves. This is also one of the important reasons Bitcoin stands strong to this day.
Method Four to Kill Bitcoin
Shut down the entire internet. Difficulty rating: five stars.
Practically impossible
Many people think that by just shutting down the internet, Bitcoin would be finished, but the opposite is true. Bitcoin is an extremely resilient system; its data demand is minimal. Every ten minutes, it only needs to transmit one megabyte of data, equivalent to the size of a photo. It uses less data than watching a short video. The transmission method is not limited to the internet. Bitcoin data can even be transmitted via satellite, radio, simple networks, or even carrier pigeons. As long as there are two computers in the world that can communicate with each other, the Bitcoin network can keep running. To put it in an extreme way: even if the world goes to nuclear war and only a few computers remain, Bitcoin can still survive. But if you truly shut down the global network, Bitcoin would indeed be gone. Banks, hospitals, transportation, and power grids would all collapse, making this the most unrealistic and exaggerated method of killing Bitcoin.
Attack Method Five
Rising node costs. Difficulty coefficient: three stars.
Medium to long-term potential threat.
What is a Bitcoin node? Bitcoin is a globally shared ledger system, and each node acts like an independent cashier and bookkeeper. They are responsible for keeping a complete ledger and verifying the authenticity of each transaction. The logic of the attack is as follows: if the cost of being a cashier rises, many people may choose to exit the system. Eventually, only a few individuals who hold the ledger remain. At this point, they can collude to forge records and alter history. The system would lose its decentralized significance, but the reality is that currently running a full node requires just an ordinary computer and typical bandwidth. Moreover, Bitcoin intentionally limits each block to one megabyte to control costs and allow more participation. As long as ordinary people can participate in verification, the system is truly secure.
To put it in a more intuitive way: Imagine a fair lottery system where initially a thousand people can supervise the draw, and everyone trusts it. Later, as costs rise, no one wants to participate, leaving only five people to draw; who can still trust this lottery to be free of foul play? Currently, there are an estimated 50,000 full Bitcoin nodes globally, including private nodes. Even if some people exit, Bitcoin remains one of the most widely distributed and hardest to manipulate networks in the world. So the real way to kill it is not through technology but the day ordinary people no longer want to participate in this system.
Six Ways to Kill Bitcoin
Breaking the SHA-256 algorithm. Difficulty coefficient: four stars.
Such potential threats also exist in the future.
What is SHA-256? You can think of SHA-256 as a super shredder that takes any data you throw in. It outputs a fixed-length shred of paper, and the same data will produce the same shred every time, but you cannot reverse-engineer the original document from the shred. This shred is a fingerprint of the document, and every Bitcoin transaction and address relies on this fingerprint to ensure its security.
What happens if SHA-256 is broken? Imagine if quantum computers actually emerge in the future, able to reverse the shredder and derive the original content from the shreds. It's like hackers being able to deduce your entire hand from just the fingerprint you left behind, and even replicate your palm to open doors. So hackers could potentially derive information from Bitcoin addresses, putting all your wallets at risk of being stolen, causing the entire system to lose its security guarantee.
So what are the countermeasures?
Upgrade to a stronger shredder. The new hashing algorithm, one good news is that the current SHA-256 algorithm is expected to be safe for several decades, providing ample time to prepare countermeasures.
Seven Ways to Kill Bitcoin
Return to sound currency. Difficulty coefficient: two stars.
The most realistic but least likely threat.
The logic of its threat is: the best way to kill a technology is not to ban it, but to invent a better alternative. For example, personal computers replaced typewriters, smartphones replaced traditional cameras, and Nokia's mobile phones replaced pagers. So you don't need to hack it or blow it up; as long as the world becomes too good—no inflation, free remittances, and the government not printing money—the significance of Bitcoin will diminish. The deadliest thing is not an attack but that people no longer need it. But is this utopia realistic? So killing Bitcoin is like killing an idea. As long as there are people who need tools for freedom and anti-inflation property maintenance, it won't die.
Maybe you don't like it, but you must understand why it is still alive today. From today's analysis, we can draw several important conclusions: technical attacks are mostly difficult to implement, either they are prohibitively expensive or they undermine your own interests. The biggest threat comes from the economic level; if no one needs it, it will naturally be forgotten. Bitcoin's resilience is beyond imagination, and its globally distributed architecture makes it almost impossible to be completely destroyed.
The final answer: Bitcoin is almost impossible to kill. But if the world becomes perfect, with no inflation, no capital controls, and no financial scrutiny, it may slowly lose its reason for existence. However, as long as there is even a bit of unfreedom in this world, Bitcoin still has meaning to survive. I hope this article is helpful to you.
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