Replication only accounts for data loss caused by malfunctioning hardware, that’s only one of the reasons why backups are needed. Data can still get corrupted in a number of ways and require a rollback.
If this is true, then that is great news. Per my post just before your latest two, I think this firewall reality can be transformed into a much more effective marketing (and technical) message than the very misleading statement that “you don’t need firewalls to protect the system”.
Feel free to stop reading now, @yotam, since I fully understand that you are not concerned about this messaging, nor is it part of your job. However, I think this messaging is critically important to others at DFINITY - including Dominic - who may be reading this thread.
I believe that both the “blockchain singularity” and “open Internet” visions can still be completely consistent with the reality where the IC maintains some core protections against nonhuman-driven DoS attacks. In fact, both of these visions could be greatly enhanced by an even larger vision, where the IC is able to restore an open Internet to humanity, free of expanding bot armies and other centralized concentrations of power, while simultaneously avoiding a technocracy of elites overseeing a large number of walled-in networks for humans.
In contrast to this grander vision, the current Internet is already almost overrun by bots and big tech behemoths run by technocrats. This infestation will only get significantly worse as a result of OpenAI-driven bots based on ChatGPT and similar technologies, as well as excessive concentrations of government power increasingly colluding with big tech for censorship control.
Therefore, there is no need to make misleading statements about the IC like “you don’t need firewalls to protect the system.” Focus instead on how the IC does not need firewalls against humans. It only uses a basic firewall to protect humanity from nonhuman attacks. A core vision for the IC should actually be to restore the Internet to being a decentralized network for humanity, as opposed to being a network for bots and centralized power like it is gradually becoming today. Use this as an opportunity to tweak both the marketing and technical messages into something even more compelling than before, which was mostly just a cybersecurity cost-saving message.
Likewise, as Dom pointed out in a recent tweet below, enterprises may no longer be able to even get insurance coverage against data exploits due to how costly they have become to insurance companies. Therefore, the current Web2 Internet is effectively already on a path to cybersecurity implosion without the “blockchain singularity” and “open Internet” visions of Web3 to replace it. That should add some significant fuel to this new messaging to make it even more imperative and compelling.
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