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I am confused between the forking that can be created because of the 51% attack and the soft fork and hard fork.

Does forks because of 51% attack can also lead to new crypto currency creation?

Tavish Aggarwal
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  • I came across the link https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/bitcoin-fork-undergoes-51-attack-settlement-assurances-matter-2021-08-05 where bitcoin fork undergo 51% attack. – Tavish Aggarwal Aug 08 '22 at 13:58
  • The Nasdaq article is about a 51% attack on BSV, not on Bitcoin (BTC). I personally would be careful not to assume that what happened to BSV could happen to BTC or that if it did happen, the results would be similar. – RedGrittyBrick Aug 08 '22 at 14:01

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Any forking that results from a 51% attack is a fork of the blockchain. It is a fork in the data, not in the rules.

The phrases "hard fork" and "soft fork" usually refer to a fork in the Bitcoin rules. So that is a fork due to software changes that implement either a change in the so-called consensus rules or a change in the network protocol.

So they are different in that way.

So far as I know, there has never been a successful 51% attack in Bitcoin, so I don't think we can say for certain what a long term outcome might look like. I guess that all blockchain forks are eventually resolved one way or another.

See What is a soft fork? What is a hard fork? What are their differences?

RedGrittyBrick
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    Arguably, every softfork is technically indistinguishable from a 51% attack of the upgraded miners on the non-upgraded miners. The distinction between calling it an attack or a soft-fork change is social (but relevant!) - and depends on whether nodes (and ultimately the community) go along with the change (and help enforce it). – Pieter Wuille Aug 08 '22 at 14:16