📅 Original date posted:2015-12-20
📝 Original message:Peter was referring to pool-block-withholding, not selfish mining.
On December 19, 2015 7:34:26 PM PST, Chris Priest via bitcoin-dev <bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote:
>Block witholding attacks are only possible if you have a majority of
>hashpower. If you only have 20% hashpower, you can't do this attack.
>Currently, this attack is only a theoretical attack, as the ones with
>all the hashpower today are not engaging in this behavior. Even if
>someone who had a lot of hashpower decided to pull off this attack,
>they wouldn't be able to disrupt much. Once that time comes, then I
>think this problem should be solved, until then it should be a low
>priority. There are more important things to work on in the meantime.
>
>On 12/19/15, Peter Todd via bitcoin-dev
><bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote:
>> At the recent Scaling Bitcoin conference in Hong Kong we had a
>chatham
>> house rules workshop session attending by representitives of a super
>> majority of the Bitcoin hashing power.
>>
>> One of the issues raised by the pools present was block withholding
>> attacks, which they said are a real issue for them. In particular,
>pools
>> are receiving legitimate threats by bad actors threatening to use
>block
>> withholding attacks against them. Pools offering their services to
>the
>> general public without anti-privacy Know-Your-Customer have little
>> defense against such attacks, which in turn is a threat to the
>> decentralization of hashing power: without pools only fairly large
>> hashing power installations are profitable as variance is a very real
>> business expense. P2Pool is often brought up as a replacement for
>pools,
>> but it itself is still relatively vulnerable to block withholding,
>and
>> in any case has many other vulnerabilities and technical issues that
>has
>> prevented widespread adoption of P2Pool.
>>
>> Fixing block withholding is relatively simple, but (so far) requires
>a
>> SPV-visible hardfork. (Luke-Jr's two-stage target mechanism) We
>should
>> do this hard-fork in conjunction with any blocksize increase, which
>will
>> have the desirable side effect of clearly show consent by the entire
>> ecosystem, SPV clients included.
>>
>>
>> Note that Ittay Eyal and Emin Gun Sirer have argued(1) that block
>> witholding attacks are a good thing, as in their model they can be
>used
>> by small pools against larger pools, disincentivising large pools.
>> However this argument is academic and not applicable to the real
>world,
>> as a much simpler defense against block withholding attacks is to use
>> anti-privacy KYC and the legal system combined with the variety of
>> withholding detection mechanisms only practical for large pools.
>> Equally, large hashing power installations - a dangerous thing for
>> decentralization - have no block withholding attack vulnerabilities.
>>
>> 1) http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/12/03/the-miners-dilemma/
>>
>> --
>> 'peter'[:-1]@petertodd.org
>> 00000000000000000188b6321da7feae60d74c7b0becbdab3b1a0bd57f10947d
>>
>_______________________________________________
>bitcoin-dev mailing list
>bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org
>https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev
Matt Corallo [ARCHIVE] /
npub1e4…jxmcu
2023-06-07 17:46:56
in reply to nevent1q…2l88
Author Public Key
npub1e46n428mcyfwznl7nlsf6d3s7rhlwm9x3cmkuqzt3emmdpadmkaqqjxmcuPublished at
2023-06-07 17:46:56Event JSON
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"content": "📅 Original date posted:2015-12-20\n📝 Original message:Peter was referring to pool-block-withholding, not selfish mining.\n\nOn December 19, 2015 7:34:26 PM PST, Chris Priest via bitcoin-dev \u003cbitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\u003e wrote:\n\u003eBlock witholding attacks are only possible if you have a majority of\n\u003ehashpower. If you only have 20% hashpower, you can't do this attack.\n\u003eCurrently, this attack is only a theoretical attack, as the ones with\n\u003eall the hashpower today are not engaging in this behavior. Even if\n\u003esomeone who had a lot of hashpower decided to pull off this attack,\n\u003ethey wouldn't be able to disrupt much. Once that time comes, then I\n\u003ethink this problem should be solved, until then it should be a low\n\u003epriority. There are more important things to work on in the meantime.\n\u003e\n\u003eOn 12/19/15, Peter Todd via bitcoin-dev\n\u003e\u003cbitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\u003e At the recent Scaling Bitcoin conference in Hong Kong we had a\n\u003echatham\n\u003e\u003e house rules workshop session attending by representitives of a super\n\u003e\u003e majority of the Bitcoin hashing power.\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e One of the issues raised by the pools present was block withholding\n\u003e\u003e attacks, which they said are a real issue for them. In particular,\n\u003epools\n\u003e\u003e are receiving legitimate threats by bad actors threatening to use\n\u003eblock\n\u003e\u003e withholding attacks against them. Pools offering their services to\n\u003ethe\n\u003e\u003e general public without anti-privacy Know-Your-Customer have little\n\u003e\u003e defense against such attacks, which in turn is a threat to the\n\u003e\u003e decentralization of hashing power: without pools only fairly large\n\u003e\u003e hashing power installations are profitable as variance is a very real\n\u003e\u003e business expense. P2Pool is often brought up as a replacement for\n\u003epools,\n\u003e\u003e but it itself is still relatively vulnerable to block withholding,\n\u003eand\n\u003e\u003e in any case has many other vulnerabilities and technical issues that\n\u003ehas\n\u003e\u003e prevented widespread adoption of P2Pool.\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e Fixing block withholding is relatively simple, but (so far) requires\n\u003ea\n\u003e\u003e SPV-visible hardfork. (Luke-Jr's two-stage target mechanism) We\n\u003eshould\n\u003e\u003e do this hard-fork in conjunction with any blocksize increase, which\n\u003ewill\n\u003e\u003e have the desirable side effect of clearly show consent by the entire\n\u003e\u003e ecosystem, SPV clients included.\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e Note that Ittay Eyal and Emin Gun Sirer have argued(1) that block\n\u003e\u003e witholding attacks are a good thing, as in their model they can be\n\u003eused\n\u003e\u003e by small pools against larger pools, disincentivising large pools.\n\u003e\u003e However this argument is academic and not applicable to the real\n\u003eworld,\n\u003e\u003e as a much simpler defense against block withholding attacks is to use\n\u003e\u003e anti-privacy KYC and the legal system combined with the variety of\n\u003e\u003e withholding detection mechanisms only practical for large pools.\n\u003e\u003e Equally, large hashing power installations - a dangerous thing for\n\u003e\u003e decentralization - have no block withholding attack vulnerabilities.\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e 1) http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/12/03/the-miners-dilemma/\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e\u003e --\n\u003e\u003e 'peter'[:-1]@petertodd.org\n\u003e\u003e 00000000000000000188b6321da7feae60d74c7b0becbdab3b1a0bd57f10947d\n\u003e\u003e\n\u003e_______________________________________________\n\u003ebitcoin-dev mailing list\n\u003ebitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\n\u003ehttps://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev",
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