When Blockchains Go Down: Why Crypto Outages Are on the Rise

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One of the most frequently cited advantages of blockchain networks is that they suffer zero downtime - or close to it.

In recent months major blockchain networks have seen downtime, and the trend has some people wondering, WTF? More outages.

The incident on the Steem network is not the only recent example of a blockchain going down.

The answer may have to do with the emergence of new ways of achieving consensus: the process by which all the participants in a blockchain system come to agreement on the state of the network.

Neo's Lerider disputed the idea that federated blockchains are more susceptible to downtime in general.

When key nodes in a federated system go down or fall out of sync, the entire network can grind to a halt.

Wall described what these options look like in practical terms, saying, "Many federated systems will simply halt in contingency situations, often requiring manual intervention to start running again. Bitcoin, on the other hand, will typically not halt, but instead bitcoin forks into two blockchains for a short period of time a couple of times a month."

Certain incidents have shown that favoring availability over consistency can get blockchains into trouble.

"There is a risk of software failures taking down any software system, including any blockchain such as Bitcoin, Ethereum or Zcash."