Subject: Re: [bitcoin-dev] [Opt-in full-RBF] Zero-conf apps in immediate danger

From: Peter Todd <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2022 18:13:15 -0400

On Fri, Oct 21, 2022 at 05:58:41AM +1000, Anthony Towns via bitcoin-dev wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 20, 2022 at 02:37:53PM +0200, Sergej Kotliar via bitcoin-dev wrote:
> > > If someone's going to systematically exploit your store via this
> > > mechanism, it seems like they'd just find a single wallet with a good
> > > UX for opt-in RBF and lowballing fees, and go to town -- not something
> > > where opt-in rbf vs fullrbf policies make any difference at all?
> > Sort of. But yes once this starts being abused systemically we will have to
> > do something else w RBF payments, such as crediting the amount in BTC to a
> > custodial account. But this option isn't available to your normal payment
> > processor type business.
> 
> So, what I'm hearing is:
> 
>  * lightning works great, but is still pretty small
>  * zeroconf works great for txs that opt-out of RBF

It's important to note that the businesses that say "zeroconf works great" for
them, appear to be achieving that by sybil attacking the network to measure
propagation. That's not sustainable nor decentralized, as only a small number
of companies can do that without causing a lot of harm to Bitcoin by using up
inbound slots. We've gone through this before with "zeroconf guarantee"
services, and the end result is not good.

It's in our interests to make sure those companies stop doing that, and no new
companies start.

-- 
https://petertodd.org 'peter'[:-1]@petertodd.org