Demonstration of “Attack Blocks” On Bitcoin’s Signet Test Network

Bitcoin Core developers are scheduled to demonstrate 'attack blocks' on Bitcoin's Signet test network on April 7th, 2026, at 10 AM EST. These blocks are designed to take an exceptionally long time to verify, aiming to illustrate the severity of certain consensus vulnerabilities that the 'Great Consensus Cleanup' initiative, with BIP 54, seeks to address. While not showcasing the absolute worst-case scenario to avoid revealing attack details, the demonstration will highlight significantly increased verification times compared to average blocks. Additional demonstrations are planned for April 8th and 9th to accommodate different global time zones. Participants can run a Bitcoin Core node on Signet and follow along using provided instructions, including a patch for the 'bitcoin-tui' project to visualize the slow blocks. The developers emphasize that the provided software patch is for demonstration purposes and has not been thoroughly audited.

(Source：Bitcoin Magazine)