<p>Others have commented on the technical possibility of this, so I'll address the economics:</p>

<p>I don't believe any smart miner would do this. Why? Because it would destroy confidence in the network. If the miners were willing and capable of blacklisting the coins stored at Satoshi's addresses, then who's to say they won't do the same to the coins stored at any other address? The value of the network is very closely tied to its security. Give users a reason to doubt this and they will flee, and prices will crash.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T09:40:31.723Z
2017-12-25T09:40:31.723Z
chytrik
<p>This could be implemented theoretically, but this idea will certainly never be implemented. It's because:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>You don't know which addresses exactly are owned by Satoshi Nakamoto.</p></li>
<li><p>This idea is against all Bitcoin-principles. If you have Bitcoin, nobody should be able to steal it unless he has your private key. Bitcoin would become unreliable if you can't be sure that your funds will stay on the address where you send them.</p></li>
</ul>

<p>(Hint: at the time when Satoshi Nakamoto got his Bitcoin, the bitcoins were nearly useless. And caused by the fact that he didn't touch the bitcoins yet many people assume that he lost his private keys, but this is only guesswork)</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-24T23:36:15.150Z
@fredsbend: Satoshi is on record suggesting that one should never delete a wallet. Based on her otherwise excellent opsec, I'd surmise that she still has the wallet given that she sent funds from block 9— if she's still alive.
Murch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T00:03:22.937Z
@fredsbend: No, it simply amuses me to do so.
Murch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T00:10:35.037Z
Yes, this idea is against all bitcoin-principles, but does the community have real power? Can't miners just develop and accept any update they want?
Bagdan Imr
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T00:29:26.737Z
Or do you mean that even miners simply don't want bitcoin to become unreliable?
Bagdan Imr
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T18:07:47.350Z
@BagdanGilevich: The value of currencies is based on trust. In olden times, currencies used to be backed by actual tangible assets (usually gold). In modern times, currencies are backed by trust that the government that issues them will take action to ensure that it keeps its value. This is no different for a cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. Purposely devaluing certain Bitcoins in a targeted manner would completely destroy that trust, and consequently destroy the value of *all* Bitcoins, including the ones the miners are mining.
Jörg W Mittag
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-24T23:22:54.433Z
2017-12-25T04:06:35.343Z
2017-12-25T04:06:35.343Z
anion
<p>Yes, since blacklisting a set of UTXOs would be done by adding more rules and thus <a href="https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/30817/5406">restricting the set of allowed transactions</a>, technically such a change could be introduced as a soft fork by the miners.</p>

<p>However, I would sincerely doubt that censoring Satoshi from spending her coins would find broad community support. I suspect that such an endeavour would quickly escalate the already existing tensions between community and miners.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T00:16:39.340Z
Does the community have real power? Can't miners just develop and accept any update they want?
Bagdan Imr
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T00:22:31.107Z
@BagdanGilevich: It's somewhat fuzzy, but if you want some examples, I suggest that you research e.g. the timelines and events around Litecoin's segwit activation, UASF, and NO2X.
Murch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T07:36:53.587Z
"Satoshi from spending her" is the identity of Satoshi currently known?
Salvador Dali
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T10:10:48.213Z
Censorship is the inevitable power that (a collusion of) miners have - it comes at the price of having them decide the order of valid transactions. However, without community (=full node users) support, they can only keep it up as long as they maintain a hashrate majority.
Pieter Wuille
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T15:42:39.453Z
@SalvadorDali: I'm sure you would have heard if she had been found out. ;)
— Pieter: Of course any miner could delay a transaction by not including them in their own block, but if the blockchain got reorganized away from blocks not participating in the cabal multiple times, it would become obvious very quickly what's happening.
Murch
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-05-24T17:34:18.493Z
@SalvadorDali so no one bats an eyelid on this site when they refer to Satoshi as a 'he', but when someone refers to Satoshi as a 'her', they gawk and question the probability Satoshi could be a woman...
Hamish Gibson
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-05-27T20:12:15.463Z
@HamishGibson There is a difference here. The person who created bitcoin in his profile on P2P Foundation introduced himself as 37 years male from Japan (wayback machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20120529203623/http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/profile/SatoshiNakamoto) . So yes, it is a little bit surprising to see 'she' here. If the person would have introduced as a 35 years old female from Kenia, it would be strange if people would be writing 'he'. Or would you be fine if people would refer to you with a different sex that you selected (just because there is a probability you got it wrong)?
Salvador Dali
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-24T23:22:30.870Z
2017-12-24T23:22:30.870Z
Murch
<p>Satoshi Nakamoto is supposed to own 1.000.000 bitcoins on a thousands of wallets, and most of them are untouched since early blocks. This stake can potentially flood the market, so miners could probably be interested in banning them. </p>

<p>So, is it possible to create a soft fork (protocol update, approved by most of hashing power), that will deny any future transaction with early block coins? It is not really fair, but miners are greed and they should probably approve it. Is it a possible scenario?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-12-25T08:20:19.827Z
this sounds like a communistic approach to a redistribution approach. Bitcoin was defined in a way, that it is censorship resistant... And greedy - who is not? Bitcoin is no social support tool, it's pure capitalism, with pure egoism of the majority. Exceptions to this are very rare. Satoshi (as far as we know) has created the system, and deserves all the fruits from his early invest. Also: I propose to close this question, cause the discussion will go mostly into opinion based statements, and not (technical) q&a.
pebwindkraft
<satoshi-nakamoto><soft-fork>
Can old coins be banned by a soft fork?
Bagdan Imr
# Can old coins be banned by a soft fork?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2017-12-24)

Satoshi Nakamoto is supposed to own 1.000.000 bitcoins on a thousands of wallets, and most of them are untouched since early blocks. This stake can potentially flood the market, so miners could probably be interested in banning them.

So, is it possible to create a soft fork (protocol update, approved by most of hashing power), that will deny any future transaction with early block coins? It is not really fair, but miners are greed and they should probably approve it. Is it a possible scenario?

**Tags:** satoshi-nakamoto, soft-fork

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: this sounds like a communistic approach to a redistribution approach. Bitcoin was defined in a way, that it is censorship resistant... And greedy - who is not? Bitcoin is no social support tool, it's pure capitalism, with pure egoism of the majority. Exceptions to this are very rare. Satoshi (as far as we know) has created the system, and deserves all the fruits from his early invest. Also: I propose to close this question, cause the discussion will go mostly into opinion based statements, and not (technical) q&a.  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_4 on 2017-12-24. Score: 7 | Accepted answer

Yes, since blacklisting a set of UTXOs would be done by adding more rules and thus [restricting the set of allowed transactions](https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/30817/5406), technically such a change could be introduced as a soft fork by the miners.

However, I would sincerely doubt that censoring Satoshi from spending her coins would find broad community support. I suspect that such an endeavour would quickly escalate the already existing tensions between community and miners.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Does the community have real power? Can't miners just develop and accept any update they want?  
> **username_4**: @BagdanGilevich: It's somewhat fuzzy, but if you want some examples, I suggest that you research e.g. the timelines and events around Litecoin's segwit activation, UASF, and NO2X.  
> **username_6**: "Satoshi from spending her" is the identity of Satoshi currently known?  
> **username_7**: Censorship is the inevitable power that (a collusion of) miners have - it comes at the price of having them decide the order of valid transactions. However, without community (=full node users) support, they can only keep it up as long as they maintain a hashrate majority.  
> **username_4**: @username_6: I'm sure you would have heard if she had been found out. ;) — username_7: Of course any miner could delay a transaction by not including them in their own block, but if the blockchain got reorganized away from blocks not participating in the cabal multiple times, it would become obvious very quickly what's happening.  
> **username_8**: @username_6 so no one bats an eyelid on this site when they refer to Satoshi as a 'he', but when someone refers to Satoshi as a 'her', they gawk and question the probability Satoshi could be a woman...  
> **username_6**: @username_8 There is a difference here. The person who created bitcoin in his profile on P2P Foundation introduced himself as 37 years male from Japan (wayback machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20120529203623/http://p2pfoundation.ning.com/profile/SatoshiNakamoto) . So yes, it is a little bit surprising to see 'she' here. If the person would have introduced as a 35 years old female from Kenia, it would be strange if people would be writing 'he'. Or would you be fine if people would refer to you with a different sex that you selected (just because there is a probability you got it wrong)?  

---

### Answer by username_2 on 2017-12-25. Score: 5

Others have commented on the technical possibility of this, so I'll address the economics:

I don't believe any smart miner would do this. Why? Because it would destroy confidence in the network. If the miners were willing and capable of blacklisting the coins stored at Satoshi's addresses, then who's to say they won't do the same to the coins stored at any other address? The value of the network is very closely tied to its security. Give users a reason to doubt this and they will flee, and prices will crash.


---

### Answer by username_3 on 2017-12-24. Score: 5

This could be implemented theoretically, but this idea will certainly never be implemented. It's because:

* You don't know which addresses exactly are owned by Satoshi Nakamoto.
* This idea is against all Bitcoin-principles. If you have Bitcoin, nobody should be able to steal it unless he has your private key. Bitcoin would become unreliable if you can't be sure that your funds will stay on the address where you send them.

(Hint: at the time when Satoshi Nakamoto got his Bitcoin, the bitcoins were nearly useless. And caused by the fact that he didn't touch the bitcoins yet many people assume that he lost his private keys, but this is only guesswork)

> **Comments:**
> **username_4**: @fredsbend: Satoshi is on record suggesting that one should never delete a wallet. Based on her otherwise excellent opsec, I'd surmise that she still has the wallet given that she sent funds from block 9— if she's still alive.  
> **username_4**: @fredsbend: No, it simply amuses me to do so.  
> **username_0**: Yes, this idea is against all bitcoin-principles, but does the community have real power? Can't miners just develop and accept any update they want?  
> **username_0**: Or do you mean that even miners simply don't want bitcoin to become unreliable?  
> **username_5**: @BagdanGilevich: The value of currencies is based on trust. In olden times, currencies used to be backed by actual tangible assets (usually gold). In modern times, currencies are backed by trust that the government that issues them will take action to ensure that it keeps its value. This is no different for a cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. Purposely devaluing certain Bitcoins in a targeted manner would completely destroy that trust, and consequently destroy the value of *all* Bitcoins, including the ones the miners are mining.  

---

