The main advantage of decentralized storage: How to make bad data unhideable
The person managing distributed storage will surely face a nightmare scenario—someone uploads bad data, and the result is that each node gets a different version of the fragment. Some users can read it, some cannot, and what is even more painful is that some read it incorrectly. This is no longer a network disruption, but rather the reputation of the entire system that is shattered.
Most protocols rely on 'self-awareness' to address issues—waiting for someone to report, then each node assesses itself. Walrus takes a different approach, implementing this at the protocol level. The rules are very strict: as long as a sufficient number of independent nodes (f+1) are detected on the chain witnessing 'this data block is bad', then all nodes in the network will act simultaneously. Any request for this data, all nodes will return the same result—invalid. Additionally, they will also provide a pointer to the evidence on the chain, clearly stating the reason for the failure and where the evidence is.
What is the strength of this step? It transforms "bad data" from "potential disruption" into "decidable facts". Users no longer need to rely on luck to find good nodes, they don't need to be deceived by certain nodes, and they don't need to try repeatedly—witness results on the chain are already available, the entire network executes simultaneously, bad data is immediately isolated at the protocol level, read requests will not waste your time.
From the user's perspective, seeing invalid messages immediately makes them understand "it's not my network that's bad, it's not a wallet issue, the system has already decided that this violates the rules". For developers, errors become something that can be accounted for, reproducible, and verifiable—sending proof links on the chain to auditors and users, everything becomes clear.
The Walrus Logic is actually very simple: rather than relying on honest network participants, it is better to use mechanisms to contain bad data. This is a description of the stable infrastructure that should exist.
