Malicious ASIC - What's the cost?

[hazek]

Someone please answer me this: Does an ASIC have to be built differently if one wants to use it for malicious purposes, specifically a 51% attack?


I'm not entirely sure how ASICs work but I thought the chips have the mining code backed in meaning if someone would want to change that code to do something malicious they'd need new chips with the new code backed in? Is this so?

If not, how hard is it to use ASICs for malicious purposes? Are there any barriers?

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[cedivad]

You mean selling chips with a backdoor that once activated redirects the outputs of the hashing process to a private pool? I take that as highly unlikely. You can only hide your code in the chips itself, but you need to have it at a higher level, like board level.

[hazek]

No I mean, is the part of the code of a miner that deals with adding transactions and building blocks according to the rules backed into the chips and an attacker who would want to do a 51% would have to get new chips or is that part of a miner just software that can be easily changed to perform the 51% attack?

[Atruk]

No I mean, is the part of the code of a miner that deals with adding transactions and building blocks according to the rules backed into the chips and an attacker who would want to do a 51% would have to get new chips or is that part of a miner just software that can be easily changed to perform the 51% attack?

That would be in the software. The ASICs would just hash whatever they are fed. Feeding the ASICs values to hash is all in the software.

[hazek]

No I mean, is the part of the code of a miner that deals with adding transactions and building blocks according to the rules backed into the chips and an attacker who would want to do a 51% would have to get new chips or is that part of a miner just software that can be easily changed to perform the 51% attack?

That would be in the software. The ASICs would just hash whatever they are fed. Feeding the ASICs values to hash is all in the software.

Ouch, so ASICs made Bitcoin quite a bit more susceptible to an attack since it's likely they'll be in less hands than GPU and FPGA miners were. Of course someone would have to be determined enough to waste a bunch of money on something he wont be able to use for anything else once Bitcoin is disrupted and likely destroyed.

[jabetizo]

No I mean, is the part of the code of a miner that deals with adding transactions and building blocks according to the rules backed into the chips and an attacker who would want to do a 51% would have to get new chips or is that part of a miner just software that can be easily changed to perform the 51% attack?

That would be in the software. The ASICs would just hash whatever they are fed. Feeding the ASICs values to hash is all in the software.

Ouch, so ASICs made Bitcoin quite a bit more susceptible to an attack since it's likely they'll be in less hands than GPU and FPGA miners were. Of course someone would have to be determined enough to waste a bunch of money on something he wont be able to use for anything else once Bitcoin is disrupted and likely destroyed.

in the GPU/FPGA days, a malicious entity could have developed their own ASICs and relatively easily performed a >50% attack. once asics are widely available, it will be much more difficult.

[hazek]

No I mean, is the part of the code of a miner that deals with adding transactions and building blocks according to the rules backed into the chips and an attacker who would want to do a 51% would have to get new chips or is that part of a miner just software that can be easily changed to perform the 51% attack?

That would be in the software. The ASICs would just hash whatever they are fed. Feeding the ASICs values to hash is all in the software.

Ouch, so ASICs made Bitcoin quite a bit more susceptible to an attack since it's likely they'll be in less hands than GPU and FPGA miners were. Of course someone would have to be determined enough to waste a bunch of money on something he wont be able to use for anything else once Bitcoin is disrupted and likely destroyed.

in the GPU/FPGA days, a malicious entity could have developed their own ASICs and relatively easily performed a >50% attack. once asics are widely available, it will be much more difficult.

Yeah, you're right.

[Korbman]

in the GPU/FPGA days, a malicious entity could have developed their own ASICs and relatively easily performed a >50% attack. once asics are widely available, it will be much more difficult.

Precisely. So long as ASICs are widely distributed, the chance of an attack occurring dwindles significantly. The question then becomes what will eventually replace an ASIC (if anything) that is much more powerful?

[kjj]

in the GPU/FPGA days, a malicious entity could have developed their own ASICs and relatively easily performed a >50% attack. once asics are widely available, it will be much more difficult.

Precisely. So long as ASICs are widely distributed, the chance of an attack occurring dwindles significantly. The question then becomes what will eventually replace an ASIC (if anything) that is much more powerful?

Nothing.  Purpose-built ICs are the end of the line.

Or rather, better ASICs replace the early ASICS, and eventually will be replaced by even better ASICs.