Delivering bitcoin transaction data to miners requires internet-enabled devices. As a digital currency, you cannot buy, sell or exchange bitcoin without the internet. As such, even a single day without internet access could cost bitcoin miners, exchanges, and traders millions.
Traditional internet access is sometimes unreliable, especially in remote regions or during natural disasters. However, experts have claimed bitcoin is not solely reliant on the internet.
Ways to Use Bitcoin Without the Internet
In the event the Internet is shut down, there are alternative ways to send Bitcoin transactions safely. The most probable ways to use Bitcoin without the Internet are using radio, satellite, and USSD.
Radio.
In 2019, two Bitcoin developers exchanged BTC across a distance of 4000km using radio waves and Bitcoin’s layer 2 Lightning Network. The transaction was sent from Rodolfo Novak, Co-Founder of CoinKite who was situated in Toronto, to Elaine Ou, a Bloomberg columnist who was based in San Francisco. Although labor intensive, Bitcoin can be sent and received using a meshed radio network to anyone that has an applicable antenna.
And recently, researchers from Florida International University introduced their groundbreaking concept in a paper titled “LNMesh: Who Said You Need Internet to Send Bitcoin? Offline Lightning Network Payments using Community Wireless Mesh Networks.”
Satellite.
Blockstream, a company dedicated to improving Bitcoin functionality, announced in 2017 that it had developed an option to send Bitcoin via satellites. Now termed the Blockstream Satellite, the network distributes the Bitcoin blockchain 24/7 without the need for the Internet. Anyone with a small satellite receiver can then receive the Bitcoin blockchain on the ground. According to Blockstream, in addition to protecting against Internet vulnerabilities, the option can lower costs and increase network stability.
USSD.
In a world without the Internet, USSD Technology could still be operational and it has been proven capable of sending and receiving Bitcoin transactions, using Machankura in Africa.