Bitcoin being attacked by state-sponsored actors. Bitcoin is currently poking the $100 trillion banking industry. If they use some kind of internal consensus attack to thwart its ability to develop new blocks (essentially denial-of-service), it would be noticed pretty quickly and lead to counter-measures. When something attacks you and you develop counter-measures, that's a form of immunity; through immunity you have evolution of resistance to that kind of attack.
Bitcoin is a decentralised system with independent actors who are guiding its evolution towards protection against systemic attacks. The well-funded opponents are essentially training Bitcoin on how to inoculate itself. It is very hard to go after a decentralised system. This talk took place on September 13th 2016 at the Silicon Valley Bitcoin Meetup in Sunnyvale, California.
Transcript
[AUDIENCE] Hypothetically, if the Bitcoin blockchain was up against a lot of pundits... from a well-funded government or some consortium, and their objective wasn't some financial benefit... but to actually inhibit its existence, would that be a concern [for Bitcoin]? [ANDREAS] I would argue that is already happening.
Little Bitcoin is currently poking the hundred trillion dollar banking industry saying, "Hey, we want some." Yes, [there will be] well-funded opponents; we have the best and greatest opponents. If they used some kind of internal consensus attack [against] Bitcoin and thwart its ability to [mine] blocks, essentially a denial-of-service attack, that would be a very interesting scenario. First of all, it would be noticed pretty quickly. It would immediately lead to counter-measures.
When a something attacks you, you develop countermeasures as a form of immunity. Through [developing] immunity, you have a form of evolution. Bitcoin will evolve resistance to attack. Then it will be attacked again and evolve [more] resistance to that kind of attack.
It is being attacked today, it is evolving resistance. Not [necessarily] to those kinds of attacks yet, but when they come, it will evolve resistance to those too. Why? It is a massively decentralized system with a lot of independent actors...
who are guiding the evolution of the system towards protecting itself against those attacks. It will evolve immunity much faster than a biological system. The well-funded opponent will actually be training Bitcoin on how to win, right? They are inoculating it against those attacks.
Whatever doesn't kill it, only makes it stronger. That is not the way to go after a decentralized system. I don't know if there are any good ways to. But I know that [strategy] will backfire badly.