Quote from: Bitcoiner2023 on March 13, 2023, 03:22:29 PM

Or can you run the node over the clearnet without fear?

once BIP324 is merged into the main version of Bitcoin, then clearnet usage will be much harder to detect (BIP324 encrypts node traffic, and does some clever stuff to prevent the handshake/establishment part of the protocol being identifiable as the bitcoin protocol)

you can run it now with the test nodes, but it's probably not such a great idea. the spec is still evolving, and there's only a handful of public nodes running it.

i would hope that other protocols might adopt similar obfuscation (maybe SSH?) as a security measure. it's apparently possible to even send the data in chunks of encrypted packets that resemble other protocols (namely, HTTPS). that would be really good for the resilience of the bitcoin network (which is one downside of using VPN or Tor: the bitcoin network is arguably slightly weakened by every node that connects through such proxies).

there's no timetable for BIP324 being merged that I'm aware of, but it's development has been in the works several (5?) years now.