├── lightning-risk.png ├── CONTRIBUTING.md ├── LICENSE └── README.md /lightning-risk.png: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/davidshares/Lightning-Network/HEAD/lightning-risk.png -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /CONTRIBUTING.md: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | # Contributing 2 | 3 | If you notice any errors or issues with the list, [open an issue](https://github.com/davidshares/Lightning-Network/issues) to address it. 4 | 5 | If you want to add to the list or edit it, make your changes and then submit a [pull request](https://github.com/davidshares/Lightning-Network/pulls). 6 | 7 | That is all. Thank you! 8 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /LICENSE: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | MIT License 2 | 3 | Copyright (c) 2021 David Shares 4 | 5 | Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy 6 | of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal 7 | in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights 8 | to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell 9 | copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is 10 | furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: 11 | 12 | The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all 13 | copies or substantial portions of the Software. 14 | 15 | THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR 16 | IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, 17 | FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE 18 | AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER 19 | LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, 20 | OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE 21 | SOFTWARE. 22 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /README.md: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | # Lightning Network ![Lightning Network Flaws](lightning-risk.png "Lightning Network") 2 | 3 | **WARNING: If you try to use the Lightning Network (LN) you are at HIGH RISK of losing funds and it is not recommended or safe to do at this time or for the foreseeable future.** 4 | 5 | *Below is a chronological list which shows that Lightning Network has been drowning in technical issues, bugs, flaws, critiques, and exploits. It's over-promised tech that doesn't deliver on decentralization and a long ways from being functional and safe for users.* 6 | 7 | ### 2015 8 | February 28, 2015: Lightning Network whitepaper is officially released 9 | * https://web.archive.org/web/20150228162703/https://lightning.network/ 10 | * https://web.archive.org/web/20150301065655/http://lightning.network/lightning-network-paper-DRAFT-0.5.pdf 11 | * https://web.archive.org/web/20150301190111/http://lightning.network/lightning-network.pdf 12 | 13 | May 26, 2015: Joseph Poon and Tadge Dryja address scalability issues and the Lightning Network 14 | * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBS_ieDwQ9k 15 | * https://streamable.com/j1cza 16 | 17 | ### 2016 18 | February 28, 2016: One of the first looks and deep dives into theoretical issues with Lightning Network, exploring various subjects such as network semi-decentralized topography, routing problems, liquidity issues, privacy, fees, channel balancing, and DDoS attacks. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2016/02/28/lightnings-balancing-act-challenges-face-bitcoins-scalability-savior/ 19 | 20 | ### 2017 21 | 22 | June 26, 2017: Mathematical Proof That the Lightning Network Cannot Be a Decentralized Bitcoin Scaling Solution https://medium.com/@jonaldfyookball/mathematical-proof-that-the-lightning-network-cannot-be-a-decentralized-bitcoin-scaling-solution-1b8147650800 23 | 24 | December 15, 2017: How The Banks Bought Bitcoin (The truth about the lightning network) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYHFrf5ci_g 25 | 26 | ### 2018 27 | 28 | January 20, 2018: Lightning Network May Not Solve Bitcoin’s Scaling ‘Trilemma’ https://www.coindesk.com/lightning-network-may-not-solve-bitcoins-scaling-trilemma 29 | 30 | February 18, 2018: Rick Falkvinge reacts to the Lightning Network https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFZOrtlQXWc 31 | 32 | February 21, 2018: Bitcoin Lightning Fraud? Laolu Is Building a ‘Watchtower’ to Fight It https://www.coindesk.com/laolu-building-watchtower-fight-bitcoin-lightning-fraud 33 | 34 | March 13, 2018: New form of 51% attack via lightning's revocation system possible? https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2018-March/001080.html 35 | 36 | March 21, 2018: Lightning Network DDoS Sends 20% of Nodes Down https://www.trustnodes.com/2018/03/21/lightning-network-ddos-sends-20-nodes 37 | 38 | May 29, 2018: Why The Lightning Network Does not Scale https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGrUOLsC9cw 39 | 40 | April 11, 2018: How Bitcoin Lightning Channels Work https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOZaLbUUZUs 41 | 42 | June 21, 2018: The 3 biggest LN flaws plus further critiques https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-biggest-flaw-of-the-Bitcoin-Lightning-network/answer/Marius-Kramer 43 | 44 | June 25, 2018: Study finds that the probability of routing $200 on LN between any two nodes is 1% https://diar.co/volume-2-issue-25/ 45 | 46 | October 10, 2018: Watchtowers (third party services) are introduced as a way to monitor your funds when you can't be online 24/7 so they aren't stolen https://medium.com/@akumaigorodski/watchtower-support-is-coming-to-bitcoin-lightning-wallet-8f969ac206b2 47 | 48 | ### 2019 49 | 50 | January 17, 2019: 18 Months Away? Latest Lightning Network Study Calls System a 'Small Central Clique' https://news.bitcoin.com/18-months-away-latest-lightning-network-study-calls-system-a-small-central-clique/ 51 | 52 | February 20, 2019: The current state of Bitcoin companies & dealing with Lightning Network ⚡Highlights: Hard to implement, takes a ton of man hours, with no return on investment. LN adds zero utility. The only reason some companies support it is for marketing reasons. 53 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/lightningnetwork/comments/asuoyy/the_current_state_of_bitcoin_companies_dealing/ 54 | * https://twitter.com/DavidShares/status/1095469511283785733 55 | 56 | February 20, 2019: Current requirements to run BTC/LN: 2 hard drives + zfs mirrors, need to run a BTC full node, LN full node + satellite, Watchtower and use a VPN service. And BTC fees are expensive, slow, unreliable. 57 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/aspkj2/current_requirements_to_run_btcln_2_hard_drives/ 58 | * https://twitter.com/DavidShares/status/1098239529050349568 59 | 60 | February 22, 2019: Listen to this great talk on the problems and complexities of using HTLC's on the Lightning Network ⚡️, and possible alternatives. 61 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/atmlnp/listen_to_this_great_talk_on_the_problems_and/ 62 | * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUAyW4pdooA 63 | 64 | February 23, 2019: 5 Things I Learned Getting Rekt on Lightning Network 65 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/atx8jq/psa_important_video_to_watch_if_you_use_lightning/ 66 | * https://medium.com/@mtidwell021/5-things-i-learned-un-rekting-myself-on-lightning-network-29016f175b61 67 | * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fMv8MpzLgQ 68 | 69 | February 25, 2019: Lightning Network bank-wallet is "kind of centralized but it has to be this way if you want mass-adoption" 70 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/aup68s/lightning_network_bankwallet_is_kind_of/ 71 | * https://twitter.com/DavidShares/status/1100113132830232578 72 | 73 | February 28, 2019: Decentralized path routing is still an unsolved problem for Lightning Network (currently "source routing" works at this scale) 74 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/avt6ow/do_people_agree_with_andreas_antonopoulos_that/ 75 | * https://archive.is/PKrIi 76 | 77 | February 28, 2019: "Out of the 1,500 orders submitted on the first day using Lightning Network, only around 10 percent were successful" https://breakermag.com/i-ordered-lightning-pizza-and-lived-to-tell-the-tale/ 78 | 79 | March 1, 2019: Lightning Network has become a complete train wreck. Oh by the way, it's no longer 18 months but YEARS until it's ready for mass-consumption. 80 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/aw71q8/lightning_network_has_become_a_complete_train/ 81 | * https://twitter.com/DavidShares/status/1101524232033439744 82 | 83 | March 4, 2019: Lightning users must be online to make a payment, funds must be locked to use, is a honey pot, completion rate deminishes with high value payments, and more https://medium.com/starkware/when-lightning-starks-a90819be37ba 84 | 85 | March 17, 2019: TIL that Lightning Network conceptual design and focus to layer 2 scaling for BTC was introduced in February 2013, over 6 years ago (LN whitepaper released February 2015, 4 years ago) 86 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/b201kd/til_that_lightning_network_conceptual_design_and/ 87 | * https://archive.is/wgmEF 88 | 89 | March 21, 2019: Understanding the cost of trapped liquidity in the Lightning Network https://medium.com/@peter_r/understanding-the-cost-of-trapped-liquidity-in-the-lightning-network-part-1-7179a24d5791 90 | 91 | March 22, 2019: Lightning Fails to Strike (Again) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzaEd2RQuRw 92 | 93 | March 28, 2019: Visualizing HTLCs and the Lightning Network’s Dirty Little Secret https://medium.com/@peter_r/visualizing-htlcs-and-the-lightning-networks-dirty-little-secret-cb9b5773a0 94 | 95 | March 29, 2019: Analysis Shows Lightning Network Suffers From Trust Issues Exacerbated by Rising Fees https://news.bitcoin.com/analysis-shows-lightning-network-suffers-form-trust-issues-exacerbated-by-rising-fees/ 96 | 97 | April 24, 2019: Forget 18 months: it’s now 30-50 years until Lightning Network is ready 98 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/bh1gzw/forget_18_months_its_now_3050_years_until/ 99 | * https://archive.is/CCQXn 100 | 101 | May 29, 2019: "PSA: The Lightning Network is being heavily data mined right now. Opening channels allows anyone to cluster your wallet and associate your keys with your IP address." 102 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/budmfh/on_twitter_psa_the_lightning_network_is_being/ 103 | * https://archive.is/9zaKc 104 | 105 | August 30, 2019: Lightning Network security alert: Security issues have been found in various lightning projects which could cause loss of funds! https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2019-August/002130.html 106 | 107 | September 10, 2019: Lightning Network dev: "We've confirmed instances of the CVE being exploited in the wild. If you’re not on the following versions of either of these implementations then you need to upgrade now to avoid risk of funds loss" https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2019-September/002148.html 108 | 109 | September 27, 2019: Lightning Network Security Vulnerability Full Disclosure: CVE-2019-12998 / CVE-2019-12999 / CVE-2019-13000 https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2019-September/002174.html 110 | 111 | September 28, 2019: Andreas Brekken: "I've been asked quite a bit why I took down the largest Lightning Network node, LN.shitcoin.com. Constant anxiety was the deciding factor. When a channel is created, the receiver of the channel was not required to verify the amount of the funding transaction" 112 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/dae1g0/andreas_brekken_ive_been_asked_quite_a_bit_why_i/ 113 | * https://archive.is/wip/yTCgt 114 | 115 | October 21, 2019: Researchers Uncover Bitcoin ‘Attack’ That Could Slow or Stop Lightning Payments https://www.coindesk.com/researchers-uncover-bitcoin-attack-that-could-slow-or-stop-lightning-payments 116 | 117 | October 23, 2019: 4 BTC stolen using Lightning Network 118 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/dlvokv/how_i_lost_4_btc_on_lightning_network/ 119 | * https://archive.is/B1lrI 120 | 121 | ### 2020 122 | 123 | January 1, 2020: The Final Word on the Lightning Network https://read.cash/@jonald_fyookball/the-final-word-on-the-lightning-network-de7e259c 124 | 125 | January 7, 2020: New paper on Lightning Network simulates lower & higher txn rates and summarize the rates of failed txns in Fig 22….at 7,000 transactions per day one-third of them fail 126 | * https://blog.dshr.org/2020/01/bitcoins-lightning-network.html 127 | * https://arxiv.org/pdf/1911.09432.pdf 128 | 129 | January 13, 2020: LN users are leaking their blockchain data by using centralized Lightning Network node operators and wallets. 90K LN non-cooperative channel closures were identified https://blog.bitmex.com/lightning-network-part-6-over-60000-non-cooperative-channel-closures/ 130 | 131 | February 13, 2020: 8 Criticisms of Lightning Network https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/f36wck/lightning/fhh2mav/ 132 | 133 | February 18, 2020: Lightning Network is Vulnerable to Congestion Attacks https://medium.com/blockchains-huji/congestion-attacks-in-payment-channel-networks-b7ac37208389 134 | 135 | February 20, 2020: Bitcoin’s Lightning Network Is Growing ‘Increasingly Centralized,’ Researchers Find https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoins-lightning-network-is-growing-increasingly-centralized-researchers-find 136 | 137 | August 27, 2020: Flood & Loot: A Systemic Attack On The Lightning Network https://arxiv.org/pdf/2006.08513.pdf 138 | 139 | September 2020: LN channels cannot hold more than 483 htlcs at a time, regardless of the channel capacity. Sending 483 micro-payments to yourself and holding on to the htlcs is enough to incapacitate a channel for up to two weeks https://archive.is/ldWRd 140 | 141 | October 8, 2020: Lightning Vulnerability Discovered; LND Node Operators Urged to Upgrade ASAP https://www.coindesk.com/lightning-vulnerability-ind-node-operators-upgrade-asap 142 | 143 | October 21, 2020: Two Lightning Network CVE's were made public: 144 | * A malicious peer could force an lnd node to accept a high-S ECDSA signature when updating new off-chain states. https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2020-October/002858.html 145 | * LND node could be coerced into revealing an invoice preimage for a forwarded HTLC with a colliding payment hash. https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2020-October/002857.html 146 | 147 | October 29, 2020: PSA: High onchain BTC fees have impact for you Lightning Channels: Pre negotiated fees might not be sufficient for your commitment tx to be included in case of force close https://archive.is/ECr4p 148 | 149 | ### 2021 150 | 151 | February 18, 2021: The Lightning Network (LN) is semi-custodial banking https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/lml76q/the_lightning_network_ln_is_semicustodial_banking/gnwa42b/ 152 | 153 | February 28, 2021: Congestion Attacks in Payment Channel Networks 154 | * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lzxdTMgdRw 155 | * https://fc21.ifca.ai/papers/70.pdf 156 | 157 | March 15, 2021: A recap of events over the last 6 years of Lightning Network https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1366411780633862147.html 158 | 159 | March 26, 2021: Real-life example of a LN user trying to use Lightning but encounters various problems and errors: 160 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/mdtl92/user_defends_the_lightning_network_never_found/ 161 | * https://colintalkscrypto.com/files/user_fails_to_use_lightningnetwork.png 162 | 163 | March 28, 2021: Real-life example of a LN user trying to use various Lightning mobile wallets and none of them worked (multiple errors for each) https://archive.is/klS2X 164 | 165 | April 13, 2021: Video discussion with LN engineer about pros and cons of LN. Tidbits include that LN transactions always require onchain transactions to be finalized/settled (problematic due to high fees), initial payment channels still an issue for new users, using LN service providers is a trust issue, not decentralized, using zero-conf to create channels is highly risky, must be online to use LN, constant backups needed so you don't lose funds, LN needs more forks to work (such as Taproot and El-Too) https://odysee.com/@DigitalCashNetwork:c/Lightning-Network:c 166 | 167 | April 21, 2021: Popular Lightning wallet Phoenix had to shut down on-the-fly channel creations and other features due to high BTC transaction fees, which is another example of how poorly LN operates with a high fee base layer. https://archive.ph/RRzvU#high-mempool-size-impacts 168 | 169 | September 13, 2021: CoinDesk research covers Lightning Network vulnerabilities and attack vectors such as griefing, eclipse attack, pinning, and floot & loot. https://downloads.coindesk.com/research/Lightning+Network+-+CoinDesk+Research+-+2021.09.pdf 170 | 171 | September 20, 2021: Custodial Lightning Network Service Attack Discovered — Hacker Strikes 6 LN Custodians 172 | * https://news.bitcoin.com/custodial-lightning-network-service-attack-discovered-by-ln-newbie-hacker-strikes-6-ln-custodians/ 173 | * https://web.archive.org/web/20210918093307/https://old.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/pqjcvo/stealing_sats_from_the_lightning_network/ 174 | 175 | September 26, 2021: 176 | Why the Bitcoin Lightning Network is Satoshi Nakamoto’s Worst Nightmare 177 | * https://cryptowhale.medium.com/why-the-bitcoin-lightning-network-is-satoshi-nakamotos-worst-nightmare-8402be4a4e73 178 | * https://archive.ph/xjPfN 179 | 180 | October 4, 2021: Three new Lightning Network vulnerabilities were disclosed affecting multiple LN implementations. These vulnerabilities can be exploited in a wide range of attacks, going from fee blackmailing of node operators, burning liquidity of your competing LSPs or even stealing your counterparty channel balance if you avail mining capabilities. Exercise of the vulnerability revealed that a majority of the balance funds can be at loss. CVE-2021-41591/ CVE-2021-41592 / CVE-2021-41593 "Dust HTLC Exposure Considered Harmful." https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2021-October/003257.html 181 | 182 | November 3, 2021: Lightning Network channel jamming is when a malicious entity blocks up liquidity in the lightning network, by making a payment to themselves, via third party channels and then never revealing the secret, such that the payment never completes. The main idea behind jamming is occupying the capabilities of routing nodes to forward payments by making fake payments and never finalizing them. For the attack duration, it becomes impossible for routing nodes to forward other (honest) payments. To jam certain channels, an attacker pretends to make a payment to themself via those channels, and never releases the secret on the receiver side. https://blog.bitmex.com/preventing-channel-jamming/ 183 | 184 | ### 2022 185 | 186 | January 9, 2022: A Critical Review of the Lightning Network 187 | * https://old.reddit.com/r/CryptoReality/comments/rzp2oq/a_critical_review_of_the_lightning_network/ 188 | * https://archive.ph/yNaBl 189 | 190 | February 16, 2022: Lightning Network speed update - as a service, it is hard to choose reliable LN routing peers that forward payments quickly. Plenty of nodes have bad response times and do not maintain proper liquidity in their channels, which makes payments slow. https://blog.lnrouter.app/lightning-payment-speed-2022 191 | 192 | February 19, 2022: Sharp-eyed Bitcoin community members discover that Lightning Network developers working for Lightning Labs are part of the World Economic Forum (WEF). The WEF is well known for being a world government sanctioned and banker elite conglomerate that runs the global financial system in a centralized top-down authoritarian way. This discovery helps to shine light on the centralized goals of the Lightning Network. 193 | * https://twitter.com/L0laL33tz/status/1495075411017048064 194 | * https://twitter.com/L0laL33tz/status/1495381620668383234 195 | 196 | February 19, 2022: Lightning Network user: "Of my node's last 100,000 forwarded payments, only 932 succeeded." https://twitter.com/fiatjaf/status/1495037429144825860 197 | 198 | February 21, 2022: Lightning Network faces many challenges, such as 1) while technically two-party payment channels can exist off-chain forever, in practice they suffer from liquidity depletion bounding their lifetime, 2) two-party payment channels occupy significant block space per user when they get opened/closed, setting a bound on the number of LN users concurrently, and 3) multi-hop trust-minimized routing may cause even more channel closings (in-flight HTLCs leading to onchain claims). 199 | * https://coinpool.dev/v0.1.pdf 200 | * https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2022-February/019968.html 201 | 202 | April 4, 2022: Lightning Network -- Fundamental Limitations. Basic arithmetic is used to derive limitations of the Lightning Network (LN) https://www.truthcoin.info/blog/lightning-limitations/ 203 | 204 | April 8, 2022: Lightning Network developer writes, "Lightning Network is - as of now - UNRELIABLE by design." https://twitter.com/renepickhardt/status/1512324320151977990 205 | 206 | May 3, 2022: Short Paper: A Centrality Analysis of the Lightning Network - "Overall, we can deduce that the Lightning Network is highly centralized." 207 | * https://fc22.ifca.ai/preproceedings/39.pdf 208 | * https://fc22.ifca.ai/program.html 209 | 210 | June 30, 2022: Over half of all Lightning Network capacity is controlled by a total of 4 entities. One of the key concerns with a network like Lightning is that it becomes more and more centralized over time, not less (unlike L1). https://twitter.com/sethforprivacy/status/1542477206672359424 211 | 212 | August 5, 2022: Lightning Network Dev Confessions - LN does not scale, has bad privacy, large payments don't work, too complicated, liquidity one directional, hard to run a node, etc. 213 | * https://twitter.com/sentosumosaba/status/1557328438536843265 214 | * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjFjK-f9ts0 215 | 216 | August 10, 2022: University of Illinois researchers have discovered a critical vulnerability in Bitcoin’s most popular second layer scaling protocol, the Lightning Network https://protos.com/researchers-discover-critical-bitcoin-lightning-network-vulnerability/ 217 | 218 | October 10, 2022: Bug freezes bitcoin inside Lightning Network for hours after a critical validation bug was found https://protos.com/taproot-bug-freezes-bitcoin-inside-lightning-network-for-hours/ 219 | 220 | October 18, 2022: The Bitcoin Lightning Network SUCKS - Here's Why https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kvT0nu8z_4 221 | 222 | November 1, 2022: Lightning Network releases emergency update after another critical bug on LND nodes is discovered https://cointelegraph.com/news/lightning-network-releases-emergency-update-after-critical-bug-on-lnd-nodes 223 | 224 | ### 2023 and Beyond 225 | 226 | Unfortunately, the Lightning Network has been a disappointment since its inception in 2015. It has been an utter failure and has not delivered, and instead has led to centralization and reliance on custodial services and third-party companies. We have decided to stop following the development of the Lightning Network in this repository, as we believe it is a waste of time and resources. We recommend using a more reliable, secure, functional, and decentralized cryptocurrency, such as [Bitcoin Cash (BCH)](https://bitcoinprotocol.org/), which has been working just fine since the Genesis Block in 2009. 227 | 228 | *** 229 | 230 | ### Contributing 231 | 232 | If you want to contribute to this list, please see [CONTRIBUTING.md](/CONTRIBUTING.md). 233 | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------