Author: Joseph Poon 2015-08-11 19:16:07
Published on: 2015-08-11T19:16:07+00:00
In a discussion about the Lightning Network, Joseph Poon explains the potential for a client in the asymmetric model to hold up funds from the server by mutating their transaction. He gives an example where Alice and Bob have a channel with 0.5 bitcoin contributed each, making a total balance of 1 BTC. Alice is the client and Bob is the server. If Alice broadcasts a mutated (re-signed) version of Commitment 20, which has a channel state of 0 BTC to Alice and 1 to Bob, the server is out 1 BTC. In another scenario, if there is a reserve requirement set up, Alice would be out 0.05 BTC and Bob would be out 0.95 BTC. However, Alice can still hold Bob hostage and ask for a 'tax' of 0.1 BTC even though she is only out 0.05 BTC.
Updated on: 2023-05-23T19:12:08.847286+00:00