Bitcoin Soft Fork Sparks Fury Over ‘Legal Threats’ – Core Devs Face Backlash
A brand new Bitcoin enchancment proposal has ignited controversy throughout the Bitcoin neighborhood, with builders and customers clashing over claims that it threatens authorized penalties for individuals who reject it.
The proposal, titled Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 444 (BIP-444), was published late Friday by an nameless developer utilizing the alias “Dathon Ohm.”
It requires a brief tender fork to restrict the quantity of arbitrary information that may be included in Bitcoin transactions, a transfer supporters say is supposed to guard node operators from authorized dangers, however critics are calling an try to impose censorship on the community.
Legal Threats or Misunderstood Wording? Inside Bitcoin’s Latest Developer Feud
The doc, which spans a number of technical sections, features a contentious line that has turn into the middle of the storm.
On line 261, it states that “there’s a ethical and authorized obstacle to any try to reject this tender fork.”
A number of traces later, between traces 270 and 272, it provides: “Rejecting this tender fork could topic you to authorized or ethical penalties or may lead to you splitting off to a brand new altcoin like Bcash. However, strictly talking, you’re free to decide on.”
That phrasing triggered fast backlash on X (previously Twitter), with critics accusing the proposal’s authors of utilizing “authorized threats” to coerce the Bitcoin neighborhood into accepting the tender fork.
Ben Kaufman, a Bitcoin developer, described it as “essentially the most clear case of an assault on Bitcoin.” Canadian cryptographer Peter Todd shared a screenshot of the part, saying it was “clear [Luke Dashjr] expects his tender fork to get adopted because of authorized threats.”
Galaxy Digital’s Alex Thorn called it “explicitly an assault on Bitcoin” and “extremely silly.”
Luke Dashjr, a longtime Bitcoin Core developer and outspoken critic of Ordinals, has publicly supported the proposal however denied writing it.
Dashjr said on X that the tender fork is “on observe with no technical objections,” describing it as a “easy, momentary measure” to purchase time for a long-term answer. “This isn’t supposed to be a super repair,” he wrote, “solely adequate to present us respiration room.”
New Bitcoin Proposal Seeks to Limit Data Storage, Citing Legal Threats to Node Operators
The tender fork proposal follows the release of Bitcoin Core v30, which went stay earlier this month. That replace successfully lifted the 83-byte restrict on OP_RETURN information, permitting bigger payloads to be hooked up to Bitcoin transactions.
While solely about 6.5% of reachable nodes have adopted v30 to date, according to Bitnodes data, the change has reignited debate over what Bitcoin ought to, and shouldn’t, be used for.
BIP-444’s authors argue that Bitcoin’s expanded information capability may expose node operators to legal legal responsibility if unlawful materials, resembling baby sexual abuse content material, is uploaded to the blockchain.
“If the blockchain incorporates content material that’s unlawful to own or distribute, node operators are pressured to decide on between violating the legislation (or their conscience) or shutting down their node,” the doc states.
“This unacceptable dilemma instantly undermines the motivation to validate, resulting in inevitable centralization and posing an existential risk to Bitcoin’s safety mannequin.”
To handle that, the proposal introduces a set of technical restrictions. OP_RETURN outputs can be capped at 83 bytes, most different scriptPubKeys at 34 bytes, and information push sizes restricted to 256 bytes.
It additionally seeks to invalidate unused script variations, prohibit Taproot Merkle bushes, and ban the OP_IF command in Tapscript, a change that may successfully disable Ordinals inscriptions.
These measures would make some transactions beforehand thought-about legitimate turn into invalid, although the proposal emphasizes that the tender fork would final solely a couple of yr whereas builders search a everlasting answer.
Security Fix or Threat to Bitcoin’s Voluntary Consensus?
Despite the technical rationale, the proposal’s wording has alarmed many Bitcoiners. Some called the “ethical and authorized obstacle” language “Orwellian,” referencing George Orwell’s depiction of authoritarian management in 1984.
Others warned that utilizing ethical or authorized arguments to push by way of a fork contradicts Bitcoin’s precept of voluntary consensus.
Supporters of the proposal argue that the “authorized penalties” phrasing has been misinterpreted.
They say the road refers back to the potential legal responsibility that might come up from operating nodes containing unlawful content material, not an precise authorized risk to dissenters.
Dashjr himself echoed this clarification, saying, “It doesn’t say that. Maybe you may suggest a clarification for those who suppose it’s unclear.”
He added that “could isn’t sure,” suggesting that the clause originated in an earlier draft and must be up to date for readability.
Still, many stay unconvinced. Jameson Lopp, co-founder of Bitcoin safety agency Casa, criticized the proposal for failing to outline what constitutes “unlawful or immoral” content material, noting that “authorized consultants disagree on the legal responsibility node operators would face.”
Lopp added, “By operating a node, you consent to the consensus guidelines of the community. If you don’t consent, you may merely not run a node.”
Others warned that forcing consensus across the proposal may result in a community break up. A person beneath the deal with Leonidas, recognized within the Ordinals neighborhood, argued that censoring information transactions “units a harmful precedent,” equating it to state censorship of monetary transactions.
An open letter to Bitcoin Core,
Any critical try by Bitcoin Core to tighten coverage guidelines or censor Ordinals and Runes transactions shall be met with decisive motion. If obligatory, the $DOG Army will fund the event and upkeep of an open supply fork of Bitcoin Core… https://t.co/qmWV5jXgYO
— Leonidas
$DOG (@LeonidasNFT) September 6, 2025
“There is not any significant distinction between normalizing the censorship of JPEG or memecoin transactions and normalizing the censorship of financial transactions by nation-states,” he mentioned.
Meanwhile, Peter Todd claimed to have already demonstrated a workaround, posting a transaction that he mentioned incorporates your complete textual content of BIP-444 but stays “100% normal and totally suitable” with the proposed guidelines, a transfer that, if true, would undermine the technical objective of the tender fork.
The BIP-444 proposal has not but been submitted to Bitcoin’s official improvement mailing record, a obligatory step earlier than any draft enchancment proposal can transfer towards formal assessment or activation.
But the uproar round its language has already deepened present divisions between builders over the route of Bitcoin’s protocol.
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