📅 Original date posted:2017-04-08
📝 Original message:Jorge,
Suppose someone figures out an ASIC optimization that's completely
unrelated that gives X% speed boost over your non-ASICBoosted
implementation. If you ban ASICBoost, someone with this optimization can
get 51% of the network by adding N machines with their new optimization. If
you allow ASICBoost and assuming this gets a 20% speed boost over
non-ASICBoosted hardware, someone with this optimization would need 1.2N
machines to get 51%. The network in that sense is 20% stronger against this
attack in terms of cost.
Jimmy
On Sat, Apr 8, 2017 at 12:22 PM, Jorge Timón <jtimon at jtimon.cc> wrote:
> To be more specific, why "being higher will secure the Bitcoin network
> better against newer optimizations"?
> Or, to be more clear, let's forget about future "optimizations", let's
> just think of an attacker. Does asicboost being used by all miners
> make the system more secure against an attacker? No, for the attacker
> can use asicboost too.
> What about the case when not all the miners are using asicboost? Then
> the attacker can actually get an advantage by suing asicboost.
>
> Sometimes people compare asicboost with the use of asics in general as
> both providing more security for the network and users. But I don't
> think this is accurate. The existence of sha256d asics makes an attack
> with general purpose computing hardware (or even more specialized
> architectures like gpgpu) much more expensive and unlikely. As an
> alternative the attacker can spend additional resources investing in
> asics himself (again, making many attacks more expensive and
> unlikely).
>
> But as far as I know, asicboost can be implemented with software
> running on general purpose hardware that integrates with regular
> sha256d asics. There is probably an advantage on having the asicboost
> implementation "in the same box" as the sha256d, yet again the
> attacker can invest in hardware with the competitive advantage from
> having asicboost more intergrated with the sha256d asics too.
>
> To reiterate, whether all miners use asicboost or only a subset of
> them, I remain unconvinced that provides any additional security to
> the network (to be more precise whether that makes "tx history harder
> to rewrite"), even if it results on the hashrate charts looking "more
> secure".
>
>
> On Sat, Apr 8, 2017 at 6:27 PM, Jorge Timón <jtimon at jtimon.cc> wrote:
> >
> >
> > On 8 Apr 2017 5:06 am, "Jimmy Song via bitcoin-dev"
> > <bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote:
> >
> > Praxeology Guy,
> >
> >> Why would the actual end users of Bitcoin (the long term and short term
> >> owners of bitcoins) who run fully verifying nodes want to change Bitcoin
> >> policy in order to make their money more vulnerable to 51% attack?
> >
> >
> > Certainly, if only one company made use of the extra nonce space, they
> would
> > have an advantage. But think of it this way, if some newer ASIC
> optimization
> > comes up, would you rather have a non-ASICBoosted hash rate to defend
> with
> > or an ASICBoosted hash rate? Certainly, the latter, being higher will
> secure
> > the Bitcoin network better against newer optimizations.
> >
> >
> > Why?
>
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Jimmy Song [ARCHIVE] /
npub17w…3nc05
2023-06-07 17:59:50
in reply to nevent1q…uq3c
Author Public Key
npub17w8rw3wtcr03zdsdjhmcj37w0g6l79gsspleltsznexdktv0qw0qd3nc05Published at
2023-06-07 17:59:50Event JSON
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"content": "📅 Original date posted:2017-04-08\n📝 Original message:Jorge,\n\nSuppose someone figures out an ASIC optimization that's completely\nunrelated that gives X% speed boost over your non-ASICBoosted\nimplementation. If you ban ASICBoost, someone with this optimization can\nget 51% of the network by adding N machines with their new optimization. If\nyou allow ASICBoost and assuming this gets a 20% speed boost over\nnon-ASICBoosted hardware, someone with this optimization would need 1.2N\nmachines to get 51%. The network in that sense is 20% stronger against this\nattack in terms of cost.\n\nJimmy\n\nOn Sat, Apr 8, 2017 at 12:22 PM, Jorge Timón \u003cjtimon at jtimon.cc\u003e wrote:\n\n\u003e To be more specific, why \"being higher will secure the Bitcoin network\n\u003e better against newer optimizations\"?\n\u003e Or, to be more clear, let's forget about future \"optimizations\", let's\n\u003e just think of an attacker. Does asicboost being used by all miners\n\u003e make the system more secure against an attacker? No, for the attacker\n\u003e can use asicboost too.\n\u003e What about the case when not all the miners are using asicboost? Then\n\u003e the attacker can actually get an advantage by suing asicboost.\n\u003e\n\u003e Sometimes people compare asicboost with the use of asics in general as\n\u003e both providing more security for the network and users. But I don't\n\u003e think this is accurate. The existence of sha256d asics makes an attack\n\u003e with general purpose computing hardware (or even more specialized\n\u003e architectures like gpgpu) much more expensive and unlikely. As an\n\u003e alternative the attacker can spend additional resources investing in\n\u003e asics himself (again, making many attacks more expensive and\n\u003e unlikely).\n\u003e\n\u003e But as far as I know, asicboost can be implemented with software\n\u003e running on general purpose hardware that integrates with regular\n\u003e sha256d asics. There is probably an advantage on having the asicboost\n\u003e implementation \"in the same box\" as the sha256d, yet again the\n\u003e attacker can invest in hardware with the competitive advantage from\n\u003e having asicboost more intergrated with the sha256d asics too.\n\u003e\n\u003e To reiterate, whether all miners use asicboost or only a subset of\n\u003e them, I remain unconvinced that provides any additional security to\n\u003e the network (to be more precise whether that makes \"tx history harder\n\u003e to rewrite\"), even if it results on the hashrate charts looking \"more\n\u003e secure\".\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e On Sat, Apr 8, 2017 at 6:27 PM, Jorge Timón \u003cjtimon at jtimon.cc\u003e wrote:\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e On 8 Apr 2017 5:06 am, \"Jimmy Song via bitcoin-dev\"\n\u003e \u003e \u003cbitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\u003e wrote:\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e Praxeology Guy,\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e\u003e Why would the actual end users of Bitcoin (the long term and short term\n\u003e \u003e\u003e owners of bitcoins) who run fully verifying nodes want to change Bitcoin\n\u003e \u003e\u003e policy in order to make their money more vulnerable to 51% attack?\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e Certainly, if only one company made use of the extra nonce space, they\n\u003e would\n\u003e \u003e have an advantage. But think of it this way, if some newer ASIC\n\u003e optimization\n\u003e \u003e comes up, would you rather have a non-ASICBoosted hash rate to defend\n\u003e with\n\u003e \u003e or an ASICBoosted hash rate? Certainly, the latter, being higher will\n\u003e secure\n\u003e \u003e the Bitcoin network better against newer optimizations.\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e\n\u003e \u003e Why?\n\u003e\n-------------- next part --------------\nAn HTML attachment was scrubbed...\nURL: \u003chttp://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/attachments/20170408/9e9e1ff3/attachment.html\u003e",
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