Could miners possibly steal SegWit transactions on The Real Bitcoin?

If segwit activates, any attempt to steal anyone's Bitcoin by stealing segwit outputs will be considered invalid and any blocks that contain said transactions will be invalid and thus will be a hard fork. With a hard fork, anything goes. Anyone can make a hard fork and confiscate anyone's coins on that fork, it is, after all, a change in consensus rules where you can make the consensus rules whatever you want. "The Real Bitcoin" is no different. In fact several forks have been made from Bitcoin which no one really cares about, and "The Real Bitcoin" will just be another one of those. If there is no economic activity and no users actually use a coin, it is worthless and no one will care about it. Currently ALL miners are signaling for segwit per the BIP 91 rules. No miners are using "The Real Bitcoin" and no major businesses, exchanges, or users are using it. In fact, the vast majority of users (including businesses and exchanges) and miners are supporting segwit.

So sure, you could hard fork and steal coins spent in Segwit transactions, but no one would care because it would be a hard fork and it would just become another altcoin that no one ever thinks about.

Also, you could just steal all P2SH coins now. P2SH was released after "The Real Bitcoin" made their fork. And it would get you more coins much sooner. But no one would care if you did.

Miners are also incentivized to not hard fork and steal coins. Besides the fact that stealing coins means that they will be damaging the value of the chain they forked from, miners are also then taking the risk that the fork that they switched to will be completely worthless. It is far more profitable to continue to mine the chain which the majority of the community backs and will be using than it is to mine some fork which will likely be worthless with no users on that fork. There will be more transactions on that chain and more value with it as people are actually using it. Furthermore, any miner who did choose steal anyone's coins would come under significant criticism from everyone in the community and that would be terrible for their reputation.

Andrew Chow

Posted 2017-07-29T05:11:56.280

Reputation: 40 910

This is a good answer that provides some interesting points about which I have some comments to make. Firstly, no one can plausibly steal P2SH as of right now, because afaik there is no one mining “The Real Bitcoin” (TRB) now. TRB nodes are following the Core chain so far. I explained that in more detail in one of the comment posts I linked to in my question. – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T06:13:13.810

1You don't have to be mining "The Real Bitcoin" to steal P2SH outputs. I can make a hard fork which steals anyone's coins regardless right now, but no one would care, and likewise, any fork that steals P2SH coins or Segwit coins would be irrelevant. As you said, no one is mining "The Real Bitcoin" now, so what makes you think they will in the future? If all miners are mining segwit, they won't be mining "The Real Bitcoin" and stealing anyone's coins. – Andrew Chow – 2017-07-29T06:15:31.460

In order to plausibly steal P2SH, you need to get your transaction into a block which other miners mine on top of. Since that is implausible right as of now, then it is implausible that anyone (other than a powerful miner) can steal P2SH as of right now. You could mine your own fork of TRB now, but it would have no value whatsoever and would be ignored in the future if ever miners with significant hashrate start mining TRB in order to spend all the historic SegWit transactions to themselves. At that future time, there could hypothetically be a real blockchain that potentially has value. – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T06:18:25.013

Transactions that “steal” P2SH (SegWit) UTXO are invalid only on the “fake” Bitcoin Core. They’re valid on the legacy Satoshi Real Bitcoin before Gavin et al started implementing BIPs. After Aug. 23, there may be significant SegWit transactions that have the potential to incentivize powerful miners to switch to mining TRB in order to double-spend those SegWit transactions to themselves on Satoshi’s original Bitcoin (aka TRB). My opinion & game theory explanation why TRB ultimately wins the fork war.

– Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T06:29:21.900

IMO, you irrationally characterize Satoshi’s Bitcoin as a hard fork of Core (which is the reverse of the truth), but chronological order dictates that Core is the hard fork when it starts issuing SegWit transactions which allow anyone to spend them on Satoshi’s protocol rules. Who gave Core the right to unilaterally change Satoshi’s protocol rules? Hashrate stays with Core until the carrot of moving back to Satoshi’s protocol rules is too valuable to not steal. Millions of BTC have pledged to sell Core and buy TRB at the coming juncture sometime after Aug. 23 (perhaps month(s) after). – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T06:37:07.630

Go ahead and continue voting to close and censor this question. It will not change the embarrassment that you will have when it comes true and all the losses that people sustain because you blocked timely disclosure. Your censorship only further lowers your future reputation. This page has been archived.

– Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T06:00:05.217

Looks like the gatekeepers over on this site are going to vote to close this question, as there are 4 close votes and only 1 more needed. I have blogged about this. I think it is travesty that this site is supposed to be about Bitcoin, but you are going to make fools out of yourselves by closing this VERY IMPORTANT question.

– Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T12:59:22.067

Go ahead and continue voting to close and censor this question. If you insist. This page has been archived. Archived? Oh no! – Nick ODell – 2017-07-29T17:42:20.730

Nick, are you seriously pretending that you’re Coretards were not going to vote to close regardless of what I wrote in the comment section about the rapid assent of close votes. Btw, I upvoted @Andrew Chow’s answer because I appreciate participation, regardless of his affiliation. – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T17:51:22.450

I get that you were going for a reverse psychology thing. My general rule of thumb is that if someone asks to be banned, I oblige them. – Nick ODell – 2017-07-29T17:53:56.373

Then why the fork did this circlejerk site unban me after I had asked to remain banned forever in 2013/4? – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-29T17:58:10.910

Dunno, must've been a paperwork mixup. – Nick ODell – 2017-07-29T18:17:01.333

I pose that this thesis is wrong, since this never happened with P2SH. No supporting evidence, spamming FUD. https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/9678/what-is-script-hash-address-exactly-and-how-does-it-work/40730?noredirect=1

– karimkorun – 2017-07-30T10:46:52.437

@karimkorun, unless you’re a poser (which seems likely), the correct word is ‘posit’ not ‘pose’. It is technically possible. I have provided considerable evidence that it is plausible at my blog which I linked to. The DAO attacker is the one who is promising that all the SegWit will eventually be stolen. That is cred. – Shelby Moore III – 2017-07-30T13:04:44.110

Could miners possibly steal SegWit transactions on The Real Bitcoin?

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