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Backdoor Could Allow Company To Shut Down 70% of All Bitcoin Mining Operations (bleepingcomputer.com)
An anonymous reader writes: "An anonymous security researcher has published details on a vulnerability named "Antbleed," which the author claims is a remote backdoor affecting Bitcoin mining equipment sold by Bitmain, the largest vendor of crypto-currency mining hardware on the market," reports Bleeping Computer. The backdoor code works by reporting mining equipment details to Bitmain servers, who can reply by instructing the customer's equipment to shut down. Supposedly introduced as a crude DRM to control illegal equipment, the company forgot to tell anyone about it, and even ignored a user who reported it last fall. One of the Bitcoin Core developers claims that if such command would ever be sent, it could potentially brick the customer's device for good. Bitmain is today's most popular seller of Bitcoin mining hardware, and its products account for 70% of the entire Bitcoin mining market. If someone hijack's the domain where this backdoor reports, he could be in the position to shut down Bitcoin mining operations all over the world, which are nothing more than the computations that verify Bitcoin transactions, effectively shutting down the entire Bitcoin ecosystem. Fortunately, there's a way to mitigate the backdoor's actions using local hosts files.
A company based on Bitcoin isn't operating according to the highest standards?
Wow. I'm definitely making a note in my diary about this unique and surprising turn of events.
APK!
My imaginary money is at risk!!!
If ONLY there was a host file expert here to tell us if this were true!
If you haven't got a billion dollars, you can't blather on about colonising Mars. How admirably crytocurrency fills its niche as a poor man's wild west. It's got everything. A Chinese Boss Hogg with a Fu Machu mustache can suddenly jump out of the woodwork at any moment. Hot damn!
I was never much of an Oregon Trail dreamer myself, so this whole scene amuses me greatly.
He will threaten to brick their mining servers unless he sends them US dollars.
Fortunately, there's a way to mitigate the backdoor's actions using local hosts files.
APK, sir, your time has come. -PCP
It's a Bitcoin article on Slashdot, but as of yet nobody has complained that this is some sort of guerilla BUY BTC marketing. Also the only reference so far to Chinese miners tripped over itself in a clumsy "wild west/colonizing mars" analogy.
/. comments surface. Hope i'm not forced to read at (-1) to find them though.
will check in a few hours later to see if the predictable
Highly misleading. If miners are shut down, Bitcoin transaction processing would operate a bit slower for a bit, then it would adjust to the new capacity.
Yawn...
While that seems bad, it would be fixed without a few hours for most miners. The source code is open (even the mining software with remote stop code). Miners can freely recompile it and update it. There is also a simple dns trick to remove that domain and point it to 127.0.0.1 Don't worry, Bitcoin can't be shut down that easy and there is no single point of failure.
It's a DRM/Phone home feature. A backdoor would be running arbitrary code specified by the manufacturer OR changing the mining workload so the mining activity benefits a Bitcoin address different from the one configured by the owner of the unit.
Long time Slashdot reader (10 years) who has yet to create an account (it's on my bucket list), so posting as an AC for now.
I've always considered Bitcoin to be something of a Ponzi scheme, though I've never been able to pin-point when it would collapse. Upon seeing Bitmain's latest ASIC miner, developed on a 14nm process, I think I've narrowed down the time-frame. 14nm is at the limit of commercial fabrication (Kaby Lake shares the same process node), though historically ASIC's I've seen were developed on a process geometry that was 1 to 2 generations old at the time.
I wonder what will happen when the computational power required to feasibly mine bitcoin exceeds the limitations of what cutting edge semiconductor processes can deliver. I temper this comment with a phase "never underestimate the power of human ingenuity". Time will tell I suppose, but mining difficulty is vastly outpacing semiconductor process technology improvements. It can't continue forever. My bet is that Bitcoin will collapse within the next 5 years and expose crypto-currency for what it really is. One enormous sham.
I welcome debate on the topic.
if such command would ever be sent, it could potentially brick the customer's device for good.
Ssh, noone tell BrickerBot.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
You don't get much of a control, you just get to brick 70% of the computation power, lots of unhappy customers to that company, but overall no significant impact to the bitcoin system itself. Block generation will happen at 30% speed until difficulty adjustment kicks in, that's about all that happens.
shutting down mining equipment from a particular vendor will not stop bitcoin mining. even if it is as much as 99% of hardware miners. in fact, it will have no effect on the bitcoin network block generation or transaction speed. all it means is that the remaining miners will have easier job to do and will earn more reward coins.
For those who are not familiar with what is currently going on in Bitcoin, there is a scaling debate, some call it a scaling war, which may result in a chain split. If a split happens, the chain with more hashing power will prevail. Say, you are mining on chain A and your competing chain is chain B. If you are able to disrupt chain B for several hours, maybe several days you may use your hashing advantage to mine empty blocks on the competing chain B. You want to keep these blocks secret. Once chain B regains its hashing power, you will have a crushing lead in regard to valid blocks. So, when chain B mines 1 block normally, you simply publish 2 blocks of your secret stash, empty blocks, mind you. Chain B will then abaondon their normal block and continue mining on your normal block. You can repeat this until your stash is empty, whlie continuing mining more empty blocks on chain B. This strategy serves as a multiplier of disruption time for chain B. What will happen while chain B is basically worthless (no/empty blocks!)? Price of that chain B's coins will drop significantly, which means that honest miners on chain B will receive less money in block reward, which will make them switch over to your own chain A, crippling chain B's hashing power even more. Shortly after, chain B is completely worthless.
This bakdoor is a nuclear weapon for the scaling war. I find it hard to believe that someone left a nuke lying around, accidentally.
True, but there is lots of motive there to abuse this. If you were able to do it your non-affected hardware will suddenly be much more valuable. Or perhaps could be part of a 50% attack.
love is just extroverted narcissism
Hijack's what?