Bitcoin Association provides a further update on the BSV network in light of the recent attacks. 

1. Our monitoring team has not detected any further attacks on the BSV network since the last attempted attack chain on August 4 (which was successfully repelled).    Our 24/7 monitoring team continues to vigilantly observe the network.
2. Exchanges.   Bitcoin Association know that BSV businesses and users have been adversely impacted by digital asset exchanges suspending BSV services.  It is a top priority to get exchanges to resume BSV deposit, withdrawal and trading facilities as soon as possible.  Each exchange makes this decision at its own discretion and pursuant to its own internal policies.  Since the August 3 and 4 attacks, our team members have been reaching out to exchanges on a regular basis and continue to do so.  We have also prepared for digital asset exchanges a comprehensive report about the attacks and the measures that Bitcoin Association, the Bitcoin SV Infrastructure Team and BSV miners have taken to protect the network thus far and going forward.
3. Miners.  Bitcoin Association have been in constant communicating with miners, who play a vital role in helping to defend the BSV network.  We expect that use of the ’invalidateblock’ command will enable honest miners to successfully repel future block re-organisation attacks. For all BSV miners we have communicated with, it is the stated intention of those BSV miners to continue to reject blocks that contain double spends.   On August 13, Technical Director of the Bitcoin SV Infrastructure Team Steve Shadders published a blog post explaining this and why secretly-created blocks that contain double spend transactions violate both Bitcoin rules and the law.  Bitcoin Association continue to educate miners about the value of using MinerID, a tool that Bitcoin Association has provided for some time for free use.  MinerID allows miners to cryptographically sign their blocks and prove their identity; this can help protect miners from miner manipulation and spoofing – such as was seen in the recent attacks on the network.
4. Law Enforcement.  The block re-organisation attacks are fraudulent and illegal.  Bitcoin Association has zero tolerance for illegal activity and we treat attacks on the network very seriously. Bitcoin Association has reported all the block re-organisation attacks to law enforcement agencies having jurisdiction and will also work with affected BSV ecosystem companies to submit their own reports.   Both Bitcoin Association and our legal representatives continue to communicate with law enforcement agencies in multiple jurisdictions and are providing forensic evidence our team has collected.
5. 1 GB blocks (world records at the time).  Even in the face of these attacks with substantial hash power, the BSV network has continued operating well, processing a record-breaking volume of transactions and even five (at their time) record-setting 1 gigabyte (1GB) size blocks.
6. Block size hard cap raised further; new 1.247 and 2GB world record blocks.  As demand for capacity on the mainnet continues to grow, miners representing the majority of the current hash power on the network signalled that they intended to raise the block size ‘hard cap’ setting on their node to 2 GB, with this change to be actioned by Friday, August 13, 2021 at 13:00 (UTC).  Bitcoin Association communicated this to other miners, with most known BSV miners also lifting their hard cap setting to 2 GB as recommended.  We also issued an advisory to the entire BSV ecosystem  recommending that all non-miners running the Bitcoin SV Node software (exchanges, applications and others) raise their hard cap setting to 10 GB in anticipation of further rises to the hard cap limit. 

With miners raising their hard cap to 2 GB, on August 16, the BSV network quickly saw two new world record blocks.  First, a 1.247 GB block (#700597, at 13:38:50 UTC) was mined.  This is the first ever mainnet Bitcoin block above 1 GB in size and the first ever with transaction fees (6.33 coins) higher than the fixed subsidy amount (6.25 coins) for the block – for a total block reward of 12.58 BSV. Less than two hours later, at 15:20:11 UTC, block #700606 contained 1,999,941,397 bytes of data, hitting the 2GB hard cap; this 2GB block contained 10.00 coins in transaction fees, adding 160% more than the fixed subsidy amount of 6.25 coins, for total block reward of 16.25 BSV to the winning miner. 

With the fixed subsidy amount per block halving approximately every four years, increasing transaction fee revenue in this manner is how Satoshi Nakamoto designed Bitcoin to remain profitable for the nodes that are today called ‘miners’ who must gradually shift to become ‘transaction processors.’  This is why the future of Bitcoin is on BSV. 

 

By working together with exchanges, miners, transaction processors and other industry participants, collectively, Bitcoin Association wants to facilitate a safe and trusted environment for users of the BSV network.  We remain confident in the resilience of the BSV network and the ability of the Bitcoin system designed by Satoshi Nakamoto to withstand malicious attacks.