Charles Hoskinson Claims Bitcoin's Quantum Solution Is a Hard Fork That Won't Save Satoshi's Coins

In response to Bitcoin core developers' proposal to freeze 8 million coins to protect against quantum attacks, Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson expressed his skepticism about the plan's ability to safeguard Satoshi Nakamoto's coins in a video posted on his YouTube channel. Hoskinson believes that the proposed defense mechanism, BIP-361, is not only technically mislabeled but also incapable of protecting the network's oldest coins, including the roughly 1 million bitcoin attributed to Satoshi. He claims that BIP-361 would require a hard fork, as it would invalidate existing signature schemes that users currently rely on. A hard fork is a significant change to the network's rules, which would render old software incompatible. Hoskinson criticized the characterization of BIP-361 as a soft fork, calling it a lie. The proposal suggests that users with frozen funds could recover them by creating a zero-knowledge proof tied to their BIP-39 seed phrase. However, Hoskinson argues that this approach would not work for approximately 1.7 million bitcoin that predate the introduction of BIP-39 in 2013, including the coins associated with Satoshi's early mining activity. These early coins were generated using a different key derivation method and would remain permanently frozen if the proposal passes in its current form. Jameson Lopp, the core developer who co-authored BIP-361, has acknowledged that the proposal is not ideal and hopes it will never be adopted. Hoskinson's criticism extends beyond the technical aspects, arguing that Bitcoin's lack of formal on-chain governance hinders the network's ability to resolve tradeoffs through a structured process.