Satoshi Nakamoto Might Have Contemplated a Kill Switch For Bitcoins
It has been a decade since the first ever form of electronic cash, which we know as Bitcoin, has been introduced to the world, yet there is only a little information available about its founder – the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto. That makes it even more difficult to think about their motivation behind developing such a peer-to-peer system of digital currency.
One of the primary aims was clear though. To develop a decentralized digital currency which is completely free from governmental control. In order to achieve this goal, Nakamoto created bitcoins’ blueprint with some specific fail-safes including decentralization, cryptography, restricted supply, as well as the consensus of evidence of work, and more.
To add to it all, as per the speculations being made over what Nakamoto meant in the quote that has been doing rounds on social media platforms recently, might indicate that the founder was also contemplating ways to leave bitcoins totally useless if at all the coins were stolen.
Was the Founder of Bitcoin Thinking About Ways To Leave BTC Useless in Case of a Theft?
Post the economic crisis of 2008, Nakamoto came up with one-of-a-kind currency which successfully captivated the world ever since its establishment in 2009. After all, the currency is decentralized, consensus and cryptography-protected, and deflationary to keep governments from taking control over a person’s funds.
Bitcoins belonging to an individual cannot be controlled by anybody else until that individual maintains the private keys. However, in rare cases where another person or group gained control over an individual’s bitcoins, potentially through theft, Nakamoto may’ve been studying ways to make those stolen bitcoins useless for the thief. Not just that, if the bitcoins’ true owner did somehow manage to regain his control on his digital currency ever then the BTC would return to its prior use and value.
https://twitter.com/BTCDJS/status/1107635761178951680
The tweet from the account named @NakamotoQuotes has kept the crypto community glued, starting continuous discussions on what the entity actually meant while sharing the thought.
https://twitter.com/DeaterBob/status/1107633239819276289
The quote in the tweet has been referenced from a forum post of BitcoinTalk originally published in 2010 which revolved around transferring funds into the escrow for completing a mutually satisfied transaction between the involved parties. The post has Satoshi Nakamoto further explaining his thought,
“Imagine someone stole something from you. You can’t get it back, but if you could, if it had a kill switch that could be remote triggered, would you do it? Would it be a good thing for thieves to know that everything you own has a kill switch and if they steal it, it’ll be useless to them, although you still lose it too? If they give it back, you can re-activate it.”
Post sharing such fascinating thought, Nakamoto disappeared; having no trace on the internet. Nakamoto also ended all the public communication including with anyone associated with bitcoins. With Nakamoto’s capabilities of building a technology that somehow changed the world, it’s astonishing to even imagine where the team might have taken the cryptocurrency had they continued developing and leading it. Especially when the digital currency has reached thus far in the short span of ten years, even without them.
