I was having an argument in the speculation sub-forum when someone said "the only way to stop Bitcoin would be to ban the entire internet"... see I often hear that, but being in IT as a profession that statement give me a real hard time, so I thought it is time to discuss it, maybe there is something I am not aware off !!
So if Bitcoin becomes a real threat to governments, and if they agree on banning it and killing it, one way to go would be just changing regulation (FCC) for internet service providers and force them to ban the port that Bitcoin uses (8332 now), this would mean certain death to Bitcoin.
I want to hear your opinion, and how do you think this could be prevented ?
change the port to 80, use SSL.
now bitcoin is indistinguishable from any SSL website, good luck banning it.
This, or use Tor. What we today understand as the Internet will have to cease existing in order to stop any specific service or protcoll. Youd have to ban encrypted data in general in order to be able to inspect and filter every package. Thats what certain corporate networks do along with restricted hard- and software.