If a Crypto Can’t Be 51% Attacked, It Is Centralized – Says Litecoin Creator

Litecoin (LTC) creator, Charlie Lee, has tweeted a response to a “thought-provoking observation” that has sparked off conversations within the cryptocommunity. Lee said that cannot if a network cannot suffer from a 51% attack, it is permissioned and centralized.

What Lee is saying is that if a network is controlled to the point where it is protected from a 51% attack, it is not decentralized, whereas a decentralized network ought to, by definition, be able to permit an attack that takes over 51% of the network.

For those unaware, a 51% attack is when an entity takes control of over 50% of the network – whether hashrate or staking – thus allowing them to perform double spends and render transactions invalid.

It is important to note that Lee is not making a statement on the possibility of a network to be attacked, i.e. a network can be theoretically susceptible to a 51% attack but is not practically so. Lee’s observation refers to the idea that a democratic network must allow for the possibility that a majority could create a new chain.