Censorship Resistance
The Problem
Centralized platforms can:
Delete your posts
Ban your account
Shadow-ban your content
Comply with takedown requests
Shut down entirely
Even "decentralized" services often have chokepoints.
Security Guarantees
When the security assumptions hold (honest majority, committee honesty, network synchrony), Obsidian provides:
Inclusion: Once a lane header is in a finalized block, the message ordering is permanent
Availability: A valid availability certificate proves data was available at inclusion time
Integrity: Data commitments prevent tampering after inclusion
Censorship Resistance: Multiple lanes and rotating leaders reduce censorship risk; targeted censorship requires colluding leaders across multiple slots
Threat Mitigation
The protocol includes defenses against common attack vectors:
Malicious leaders
Committee voting ensures leaders cannot forge availability
Data withholding
Erasure coding allows reconstruction from partial data
Spam attacks
VDF proofs and fee mechanisms rate-limit submissions
Committee collusion
Random assignment and supermajority thresholds
Economic Backstop
Priority Messages create an economic backstop: if you really need inclusion, bid high enough and rational validators will include you for the fee.
Security Assumptions
Obsidian's security relies on standard blockchain assumptions:
Honest majority: A supermajority of stake is controlled by honest validators
Committee honesty: For each lane, a supermajority of the assigned committee behaves honestly
Network synchrony: Messages propagate within bounded time during normal operation
Not Magic
Obsidian doesn't prevent:
Legal consequences of your speech
Social consequences
Apps filtering what they display
It guarantees: your signed data, stored permanently, on a neutral protocol.
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