SPV wallets in their current form are inherently insecure. Moreover, while we at least have a soft fork mechanism that is not trivially exploitable (yes, it's got issues...but unlike SPV wallets, it isn't so easily exploitable), we have NO hard fork mechanism in place that isn't highly prone to systemic consensus failure.

But I think pretty much anyone who hasn't been in a coma for the last several years knows this...and I'll stop repeating the obvious.

On September 28, 2015 5:26:17 AM PDT, Mike Hearn <hearn@vinumeris.com> wrote:
Go ahead and object to soft forks...but at least try not to make arguments based on changing the definitions of terms we all generally agree upon.

I don't intend to do that, and I don't think I am - I know what the difference between a soft and hard fork is and am not trying to confuse or blur the two.

To reiterate: this current BIP implements a soft fork. I am not debating that. I am saying it should use a hard fork instead. This will ensure no repeat of the P2SH case where invalid blocks were being found for weeks (or was it months?) after the new rules kicked in, thus exposing SPV wallets and old nodes to unnecessary risk for no benefit.

Additi onally, I am making it clear that there's no consensus for rolling out the new opcode in this way. As you say, the mechanism has issues. If you read the comments when I wrote my article, you can see that others share the same concerns:




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