From a conceptual point of view, there might be a good idea to distinguish different kind of a faulty nodes and behaviors in a distributed system:
- Altruistic behavior: the node works correctly and tries to be conform maximally with the protocol
- Rational behavior: the node works rational meaning that it follows the protocol only if it is profitable, otherwise if it is more profitable to show non-conform behavior, the node will behave in such a way.
- Byzantine behavior: real byzantine behavior can be motivated by anything or it can be really faulty so might behave anyhow.
It is important to note that as altruistic and rational behavior can be motivated by correctly engineered cryptoeconomical incentive mechanisms. However, real byzantine behaviors can not be motivated by such a factors, because either the node is completely faulty or is motivated by non-economical incentives, like preparing a gold finger attack.
