Censorship Resistant Technology

Censorship-resistant technology can guarantee a predicted outcome of a system of rules will occur in response to a given action regardless of any attempt to interfere with the outcome. Bitcoin is perhaps the first truly effective censorship resistant technology. No person or government can stop you from sending BTC from your wallet to the wallet of your choice.

This changes the balance of power between citizens and government dramatically.

"I will die on the hill of privacy and free speech," Alex Gladstein, chief strategy officer at the Human Rights Foundation, said in an interview. "In an authoritarian environment the government shuts down bank accounts of the people who are its critics. They can't do that any more with bitcoin."

How is censorship-resistant technology relevant to the Network State?

Network States will be built on blockchains in theory. If Network State citizens want to let a central authority have the power to censor transactions and usurp rules, that is a choice they can make. But blockchains are powerful tools for ensuring freedom while also ensuring that agreed on rules are followed with absolute certainty, and most Network State citizens are likely to welcome and preserve the inherent censorship resistance of blockchains rather than opt back in to control by arbitrary central authority unbound by rules.