Bitcoin Core maintainers have merged a pull request to remove a long-standing DNS seed operated by developer Luke Dashjr, citing a breach of the project’s neutrality policies.
The removal, executed on December 4, 2025, follows findings that the seed was failing to return a representative sample of the Bitcoin network which is a violation of Expectation #1 of “Expectations for DNS seed operators“, meaning Luke’s DNS seed failed neutrality requirements.
The merged PR additionally “backports” the change to all supported branches of Core (v30.x).
Several developers confirmed that Luke’s DNS seed did not return nodes running versions of Core later than 28.1. Data provided by John Moffett visualizes this below.
Luke Dashjr has been extremely critical of the Bitcoin Core project and specifically Bitcoin Core version 30, calling the software “malware”.
What is a DNS seed in Bitcoin Core
Because Bitcoin has no central server, new nodes need a way to find and network to other nodes. A DNS seed acts like a dedicated ‘introducer’ at a party. It is a specific server hardcoded into the software that hands a list of other peers/nodes to you. It helps your computer ‘bootstrap’ its way into the network, ensuring you are connecting to real, active participants. According to Bitcoin Core’s policy, these seeds must provide results that “consist exclusively of fairly selected and functioning Bitcoin nodes.”
The current DNS seeds, sans Luke DashJr, are operated by the following prominent Core contributors: Peter Wuille, Matt Corallo, Jonas Schnelli, Peter Todd, Sjors Provoost, Stephan Oeste, Wiz, & Ava Chow.
