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Why am I getting downvoted!? The question is what happens if (all) miners shut down. To me, it does NOT seem to be asking what happens if some miners begin to f
by ecesena 9y ago
Why am I getting downvoted!? The question is what happens if (all) miners shut down. To me, it does NOT seem to be asking what happens if some miners begin to fade out.
I'm sure my answer is technically correct. Transactions only happen if a block is mined. If all miners suddenly stop mining, there are no blocks mined, there are no transactions, all bitcoins are frozen.
I understand this seems an absurd situation, but this was the question, or have I misunderstood it?
- solarkraft 9y agoThe question wasn't specific about the number of miners stopping operations. At 0 miners indeed transactions will halt and only resume when somebody starts mining again. As the number of miners reaches zero it will become trivial to perform a >50% attack. It will be much simpler to replace the 'legitimate' block chain with an own one as nobody will be there to check it. I up voted your answer.
- ecesena 9y agoThanks, I see now, OP's asking about mines, not necessarily miners (though I guess it's a bit hard to distinguish... if I mine, do I have a mine? how many cores should I have to qualify that as a mine?) Anyway, on the >50% attack, I'm not totally in agreement. The attack can drop transactions, but can't forge any (which, btw, goes towards the "there won't be transactions"). If the network would ever restart, it will be eventually verified.