Redditor Who Lost 4 BTC on Lightening Network Claims He Recovered Coins Jonathan Ganor 2019-12-01 11:05:43 597 views

Will Bitcoin's Lightening Network Become Mainstream?

Roughly a month ago there was an infamous reddit post from an anonymous Redditor who claimed to have lost 4 BTC while using Lightening Network. This post drew a wild reaction from users on the website. Some have tried to help with no avail, others offered their sympathy, and a few criticized his recklessness with experimental technology.

At the time Bitcoin was valued toughly at $9,000 U.S. Dollars, making this a $36,000 error.

This case became popular with the Bitcoin Cash & Bitcoin SV communities. Big blocks were touted by some as a better solution than the rather complex lightening network.

The Redditor Responds!

In a shock to many the Redditor reemerged after nearly a month of zero contact on Reddit. The user managed to recover his lost coins after following a month of recovery attempts. Here is his advice:

I'm the author of that post: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/dlvokv/how_i_lost_4_btc_on_lightning_network/, and wanna give some important advises and explain what happened.

In the end, it was LND that saved my coins and most of them are already RECOVERED.

With huge support from the LND community those were the successful steps:

Step 1: coop-closed channels with funds on seed

Step 2: remote force-closed channels with perCommitPoint in channel.db

Step 3: remote force-closed chnnels where we have to ask peers for the perCommitPoint

Step 4: try with SCB again with remaining channels

Step 5: still open channels, try force-closing with old stat

Advises:

1) If you have a physical server always use UPS power supply to prevent power fails.

2) If you wanna force-close channels, always do it manually, one-by-one when your node is FULLY SYNCED.

3) Create SCBs (static channel backups) every time after opening a new channel and keep your 24 words seed.

4) After pressing the "RETRUN" button, don't panic, WAIT and don't press Ctrl + C (like me) instantly after that.

5) Inform yourself how that system works before sending higher amount of coins there.

Is the Lightning Network Safe?

The Lightning network is still experimental technology & isn't very user friendly at this point. While the Redditor managed to recover his funds, it is not advisable to put large amounts on the network at this time. Currently the lightning network should be reserved to only the most tech savvy individuals at the risk of losing funds.

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