Members of the crypto community took to social media on July 19 expressing a feeling of triumph as blockchain networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum remained running during one of the largest information technology outages in history.
Despite the shutdown of many courts of law, healthcare providers, airlines and other essential social services, users were still free to transact on crypto and blockchain networks.
Former Bitcoin Core and Linux kernel developer Jeff Garzik noted the contrast between the widespread outages in centralized services while blockchains continue to run smoothly. In a post on social media platform X, he stated “Global IT outage: Linux, Bitcoin and Ethereum unaffected.”
Jameson Lopp, co-founder of Bitcoin multisignature wallet service Casa, also chimed in on the news. “The massive infrastructure outages occurring globally right now are a stark example of why Bitcoin node software does not automatically update,” Lopp stated, adding that “Auto-updates introduce systemic risk.”
Pro-crypto Senator Cynthia Lummis also noted that blockchains remained up and running. “Do you know what form of currency hasn’t been affected by widespread cyber outages?” she asked rhetorically, answering “Bitcoin.” Lummis ended her post with “Vires in Numeris,” a latin phrase that means “Strength in Numbers,” apparently referring to the thousands of validator nodes that validate Bitcoin transactions.
Some community members emphasized the role of the Windows operating system in the outage, claiming that one of the strengths of blockchains is that they typically run on multiple operating systems.
Dr. Calle, the developer of the Bitcoin wallet Cashu, reminded users that Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto had originally argued against developing a Linux client. “While it’s tempting to do a Linux port [...], auto-run might give us 300% more nodes while Linux might give us 3% more,” he quoted Satoshi as saying. Bitcoin Core developer Peter Todd responded to Calle’s post, stating “Satoshi was just wrong on this. The bigger market was nerds running Linux.”
The Bitcoin Researcher, the creator of the analytics platform Bitcoin Lab, also responded to the post, claiming that Linux “still serves an important role today keeping the #Bitcoin network strong and resilient” and that “Bitcoin running on Windows/Mac ONLY would have a single point of failure.”
Although the Bitcoin software was originally released for Windows in January, 2009, a Linux version launched later that year.
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According to a Forbes report, the outage was caused by a flawed automatic update sent out to all devices running CrowdStrike for Windows. CrowdStrike is a cybersecurity program that attempts to detect and prevent exploits against IT systems. The Mac and Linux versions of CrowdStrike were unaffected by the update.
On July 19, CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said the company is attempting to resolve the issue and get businesses back online.