Stopping the Unstoppable - Termination and Unwinding of Smart Contracts

Whether smart contracts can in fact live up to their purported potential will be examined with view to the legal issues surrounding their termination and unwinding. The revolutionary aspects of this new technology lie with the automatic execution of contractual agreements through the aid of computer codes, leaving human operators without ultimate control. Smart contracts perform the programmed process in a precise, secure and invariable manner. Once set in motion, their mechanism can no longer be unilaterally intercepted. This applies without exception, even if for legal reasons the performance of obligations between the two parties is unenforceable, e.g. because the underlying contract is void. Smart contracts are thus sometimes performed even though, in the particular case, they should not be. The question then arises: How to stop the unstoppable, and how to unwind the immutable?