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Remove political statements about China from FAQ #634

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Remove political statements about China from FAQ #634

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c2b0e1b
Reword 51% attacks government discussion in FAQ
yanmaani Apr 29, 2021
298156a
Reword 51% attacks government discussion further
yanmaani Apr 29, 2021
8ed6445
Remove antiquated language in 51% attack FAQ
yanmaani Apr 29, 2021
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4 changes: 2 additions & 2 deletions docs/faq/index.md
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Expand Up @@ -351,11 +351,11 @@ Both of these attacks are detectable. In the case of reversing transactions, th

It is noteworthy that a 51% attacker cannot sell a name to a user and then steal back the name. Nor can a 51% attacker buy a name from a seller and then steal back the money. This is because Namecoin supports *atomic* name trades: reversing the purchase payment also reverses the name transfer, and vice versa. Double-spending of `name_update` transactions also isn't beneficial to an attacker, because `name_update` transactions typically are sent by a user to themself, meaning that the attacker could only scam themself.

In both Bitcoin and Namecoin, the Chinese government has jurisdiction over a majority of hashpower. This is problematic for both Bitcoin and Namecoin, and should be fixed in both. Because not all Bitcoin miners also mine Namecoin, F2Pool previously had a majority of Namecoin hashpower (they no longer do). This was also problematic when it was the case. However, in practice, the Chinese government has considerably more motivation to perform a 51% attack than F2Pool does. (The Chinese government has a [history of messing with Internet traffic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_China). F2Pool has supported Namecoin development both financially and logistically, which makes it unlikely that they would want to attack it.)
In both Bitcoin and Namecoin, the People's Republic of China has jurisdiction over a majority of hashpower. This is concerning for both Bitcoin and Namecoin, and should be fixed in both. Because not all Bitcoin miners also mine Namecoin, F2Pool previously had a majority of Namecoin hashpower (they no longer do). This was also problematic when it was the case. However, in practice, China has considerably more motivation to perform a 51% attack than F2Pool does. (The country has a history of [Internet censorship](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_China). F2Pool has supported Namecoin development both financially and logistically, which makes it unlikely that they would want to attack it.)

A majority of Bitcoin's hashpower is routed via the Bitcoin Relay Network, which has the ability to censor Bitcoin blocks that pass through it. This produces incentives for Bitcoin miners to self-censor any blocks that might violate any policy introduced in the future by Bitcoin Relay Network, because routing blocks through Bitcoin Relay Network reduces orphan rates for miners. Namecoin's blocks are much smaller than Bitcoin's, and therefore Namecoin does not have similar incentives for centralized block relay infrastructure. While it is possible for Bitcoin Relay Network to attack Namecoin by censoring Bitcoin blocks that commit to merge-mined Namecoin blocks, it is not feasible for Bitcoin Relay Network to look inside the Namecoin blocks that are committed to, which means that Bitcoin Relay Network cannot censor Namecoin blocks by content as they can with Bitcoin blocks. Bitcoin Relay Network is operated by Bitcoin Core developer Matt Corallo, who is unlikely to want to attack Bitcoin (just as F2Pool is unlikely to want to attack Namecoin).

The takeaway here is that while F2Pool theoretically used to be capable of attacking Namecoin (but not Bitcoin), and Bitcoin Relay Network is theoretically capable of attacking Bitcoin (but not Namecoin), *in practice* the party with the most motivation to attack either chain (the Chinese government) has jurisdiction over a hashrate majority of both Bitcoin and Namecoin. Mining decentralization is an active research area, and we hope that significant improvements in this area are made, as they would improve the security of both Bitcoin and Namecoin.
The takeaway here is that while F2Pool theoretically used to be capable of attacking Namecoin (but not Bitcoin), and Bitcoin Relay Network is theoretically capable of attacking Bitcoin (but not Namecoin), *in practice* the party with the most motivation to attack either chain has jurisdiction over a hashrate majority in both Bitcoin and Namecoin. Mining decentralization is an active research area, and we hope that significant improvements in this area are made, as they would improve the security of both Bitcoin and Namecoin.

### Is squatting a problem? What can be done about it?

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