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[BitcoinEXpress]

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[tacotime]

go for it

[amazingrando]

[sigh]  Can't tell if they are just talking shit or actually making a plan to execute.  Regardless, it's further demonstration of why any reasonable people should stay as far away from RS/CH and SolidCoin as possible.  To them it's all just a game.  No amount of deflating or trying to 51% competitors is going to make people take a heavily manipulated closed-source crytocurrency seriously.  In fact it should be a giant blinking warning sign that there is nothing democratic, trustworthy, or valuable about SolidCoin.  Participation in such a currency is asking to be exploited for the fun and enrichment of those behind the currency.

Hopefully RS/CH and his disciples will realize the futility of such efforts and start to act maturely.  But I'm definitely not holding my breath.

[johnj]

Hmm, first they talk about attacking it, but now...



That's a Grade A endorsement right there!

[DeathAndTaxes]

Just read this transcript and the only mention of them doing an attack is the title of this post.  Wish I hadn't unignored BCX to read this garbage, should have expected more lies :-(

Found this for you.

<@Ten98> but yeah, if u pay amazon money, it cost u $700 per hour to 51% LTC
...
[15:52] <@RealSolid> Ten98: right, pretty cheap to end a coin

You can pay me a dollar for finding those.  Don't worry if you keep mining ScamCoins for a week or so you might have enough (assumming the price doesn't go lower)  .

If you don't/know/understand what 51% is a reference to then I recommend you just uninstall your miner and delete the ScamCoin code now.  

[Bobnova]

Taking the time to calculate it shows some interest, if not specific intent.

[Raoul Duke]

So what? The only criminals that can perform 51% attacks around here are douchebagexpress and artforz, is that it?
Oh wait, that would be artforz only, because everybody knows that douchebagexpress is full of shit and the only thing he 51% attacked on his life was his moms' wallet...

[localhost]

If you don't/know/understand what 51% is a reference to then I recommend you just uninstall your miner and delete the ScamCoin code now.  

You are the height of dumb.... saying something costs X amount of money to achieve indicates a planned attack?  Were you dropped on your head as a child?  About a dozen or so times?

Actually, the TaxCoin fanboy has a point there. This transcript just reflects the nursery school maturity level of some discussions on the SC IRC, not a real attack intent.

[Spacy]

If you don't/know/understand what 51% is a reference to then I recommend you just uninstall your miner and delete the ScamCoin code now.  

You are the height of dumb.... saying something costs X amount of money to achieve indicates a planned attack?  Were you dropped on your head as a child?  About a dozen or so times?

Actually, the TaxCoin fanboy has a point there. This transcript just reflects the nursery school maturity level of some discussions on the SC IRC, not a real attack intent.

And what is the actual maturity level then if someone actually DID multiple 51% attacks?

[MSAvenger]

The point is: are they right? Is 51% attack so cheap? Litecoin's hashrate have pumped up significantly last few hours due to Solidcoin's so-called "economic change". If 51% attack is indeed so easy and cheap, it is very hard to trust Litecoin...

[DeathAndTaxes]

The point is: are they right? Is 51% attack so cheap? Litecoin's hashrate have pumped up significantly last few hours due to Solidcoin's so-called "economic change". If 51% attack is indeed so easy and cheap, it is very hard to trust Litecoin...

The dangers of CPU based chains.  Renting CPU is very very very cheap.  There is no cost effective method of renting GPUs.  In an attack you don't need hardware over the course of years you just need it over the course of a dozen blocks or so.  Renting gives you a huge multiplier.

Instead of buying 1 CPU and running it for a year.  You can rent 300 CPU for an hour at the same price.  That muliplier effect is what makes CPU based chains vulnerable and likely futile in the long run.

The only way I see "cpu chain" working is a blockchain which has the option of using one of two algorithms.  They algorithms are selected to provide roughly comparable benefit on CPU or GPU.  Even that may be not worth the complexity but a straight "GPU-hostile" chain is critically flawed in my opinon.  It is the specalized hardware (GPU) that have pushed Bitcoin out of the reach of "cheap" 51% attacks.

[localhost]

The dangers of CPU based chains.  Renting CPU is very very very cheap. 
[...]
The only way I see "cpu chain" working is a blockchain which has the option of using one of two algorithms.  They algorithms are selected to provide roughly comparable benefit on CPU or GPU.

Doesn't work: CPU remains efficient and cheap, only we can expect to have maybe twice the hashing power because people will mine both with CPU and GPU. That is, supposing they're willing to drop BTC mining in favor of this new chain where GPU doesn't have an advantage over CPU.

[DeathAndTaxes]

The dangers of CPU based chains.  Renting CPU is very very very cheap. 
[...]
The only way I see "cpu chain" working is a blockchain which has the option of using one of two algorithms.  They algorithms are selected to provide roughly comparable benefit on CPU or GPU.

Doesn't work: CPU remains efficient and cheap, only we can expect to have maybe twice the hashing power because people will mine both with CPU and GPU. That is, supposing they're willing to drop BTC mining in favor of this new chain where GPU doesn't have an advantage over CPU.

Well no because most people would use massive GPU farms.  For example if Bitcoin had an "alternate" hash algorithm that got say 100MH from a top of the line CPU.  There would be a lot more CPU mining BUT GPU mining would still have an advantage.  You can fairly easily add 8 GPU to a rig.  8 socket servers aren't economical. Now I don't think CPU mining is needed AT ALL.  I think it is a fad.  A case of "not fair he has all those GPU toys, well I am going to come over here and play w/ my CPU toys - no GPU allowed".

Still a hyrbrid chain would at least gain the hashing power necessary to present at least a challenge to CPU based attackers.  Granted it wouldn't be as strong as an "open chain" which doesn't attempt to exclude CPU/GPU/FPGA/ASICS.  The funny thing is restricting hardware is simply reactionary.   Mining is getting to be a lower profit enterprise.  Soon economics will force the move to FPGA.  Eventually it will move from FPGA to Structured ASICS (like Altera Hardcopy) and finally to fully custom ASICS (if crypto currency lives long enough).  Even the move to custom chips isn't the end of the road.  Those designs will increase in complexity and density.  They will go from single chip module to multichip boards to finally massive parallel clusters. 

Like this:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/bd/Board300.jpg/572px-Board300.jpg

This is a board from EFF "Deep Crack" a custom built DES cracking array (to prove DES is insecure).  Each board is doublesided and has 64 custom built ASICS optimized to do nothing but crack DES.  5 boards of 64 ASICS ea were installed into each rack chassis.  The entire system was 6 chassis connected together.  A single off the shelf PC controlled the array of 1856 ASICS.

You can't stop technology.  It will always be pushing forward.  This is a good thing.  Custom built hashing arrays could achieve higher throughput, higher density, and lower cost per hash than less customized systems.  This means the attacker has a reverse multiplier.  The attacker is using less efficiency equipment which means it takes more attackers to equal the power of one "good guy".

[localhost]

Well no because most people would use massive GPU farms.  For example if Bitcoin had an "alternate" hash algorithm that got say 100MH from a top of the line CPU.  There would be a lot more CPU mining BUT GPU mining would still have an advantage.

Well, in this case okay, but what you describe here isn't a "comparable benefit" between GPU and CPU (top of the range GPU=somewhere around 800MH, not 100).

Nice DES cracking board, btw

[DeathAndTaxes]

Well, in this case okay, but what you describe here isn't a "comparable benefit" between GPU and CPU (top of the range GPU=somewhere around 800MH, not 100).

Yeah I was loose and fast with the numbers.  It would make sense to let each algorithm float on its own (independent difficulty) as a result they both would achieve similar economic benefits (i.e. value of blocks over cost of hardware & electrical costs).  Still I don't think that system would be wise because while it would be better than a "GPU-hostile" chain it is still inferior to an "open chain" in terms of making the network as difficult.  It is really just a half step to be more "fair" (a dubious reason IMHO).  

Why are GPU used over CPU?  Simple they are more efficient.  If a person is only concerned about the security of the network (not their personal gain) then you want the most efficient hardware possible protecting the network.  Sadly I think in 5 or so years the rise of APUs mean that botnets will represent a greater danger to Bitcoin because it closes the multiplier (difference in hashing power between average attacker node and defender node).  All of AMD APU have modest hashing performance (~60MH/s) and AMD default drivers enable OpenCL now so as time increases we should expect greater performance from zombie computers.

So what is the solution? Not reggressive nonsense like "GPU hostile" alt-chains.  The solution is EVEN GREATER efficiency.  It is an arms race.  Granted that likely will result in a second wave of "not fair" and probably a spwan of "GPU friendly alt chains" because now FPGA and other exotic hardware will be considered the "not fair enemy".  Hopefully by the time APU make botnets more dangerous a significant fraction of Bitcoin hashing power will be from devices with even greater efficiency keeping that vital multiplier between defender hashing power and attacker hashing power high.

Trying to criple efficient hardware is a deathblow to security of any blockchain.  You are simply bringing defenders down to the same level as the botnets.  The bad news is botnets win in that crippled race by pure numerical superiority.

Nice DES cracking board, btw

Yeah it is pretty sweet.  I am glad they built it.  EFF said that DES was "broken" but most people dismissed it as "theoretical attack".  So they collected some donations (include some from me) and built one.  It only took 18 months and about $250K.  It could crack any DES password in 4-5 days (max time 10 days).  That lead to acceleration in adopting stronger hashes (albeit with the interim step of the fugly Triple-DES).

[MSAvenger]

(...) Trying to criple efficient hardware is a deathblow to security of any blockchain.  You are simply bringing defenders down to the same level as the botnets.  The bad news is botnets win in that crippled race by pure numerical superiority.

Well, I agree but it isn't that simple. Bitcoin's mining algorithm cripples any hardware other than Radeons HD5000 & 6000. Of course not intentionally but still. There are efficent hashing algorithms out there that runs better on Nvidia hardware or runs similarly od HD4000 and HD5000 hardware (with the same number of SPUs). Bitcoin's doesn't.

[Clipse]

We miss you in the solidcoin channel BitcoinEXpress.

[DeathAndTaxes]

True but as you state it wasn't intentional.  There is no guarantee SHA-256 will be efficient on the new 79xx series card which use a new architecutre.  Nvidia has indicated they intend to improve GPGPU integer performance so future cards may close the performance gap.  There is no way to know how well algorithms will work on future FPGA or Structured ASIC designs.

IMHO one shouldn't try to optimize the algorithm.  I doubt Satoshi did.  SHA-256 is an industry standard hashing algorithm with public and documented crypto-analysis.  It is currently secure and has been extensively tested.  That is more important than trying to find a "fair" algorithm.  NVidia GPU tend to perform poorly on most block ciphers not just SHA-256.  I imagine market forces will demand NVidia improve integer performance in future generations.

[MSAvenger]

True, I didn't mean completely different hashing algorithms but different SHA-2 implementations. Sisoft Sandra benchmark also uses SHA256 and the performance is completely different:
http://www.sisoftware.net/?d=qa&f=cpu_vs_gpu_crypto

Even old SHA-1 can be extensively optimized:
http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/improving-the-performance-of-the-secure-hash-algorithm-1/

[DeathAndTaxes]

True, I didn't mean completely different hashing algorithms but different SHA-2 implementations. Sisoft Sandra benchmark also uses SHA256 and the performance is completely different:
http://www.sisoftware.net/?d=qa&f=cpu_vs_gpu_crypto

Even old SHA-1 can be extensively optimized:
http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/improving-the-performance-of-the-secure-hash-algorithm-1/

If it is just an issue of implementation then one could simply make a better CUDA miner.  The reality is that Nvidia has critical "flaws" (or maybe design decisions is better way to say it) that limit throughput on their existing hardware.

Bitcoin doesn't require any specific implementation.  Any method that produces valid SHA-256 hash is fine.

sisoft throughput is horrible which would indicate a non-optimized solution (likely masking inferiority of Nvidia GPU).

For example: HD 6970 3649 MB/s
3649 MB/s *8 = 29192 Mbps
29192 / 512 = 51.6 MH/s (512 bits in SHA-256 hash)

Bitcoin MH is actually SHA-256(SHA-256(block header))
51.6MH/s /2 = 25.8 Bitcoin MH/s

There has been a lot of work in optimizing bitcoin hashing performance.  Things like vectors, workgroup sizes, BFI, etc.  Sisoft may have simply decided on an implementation and stuck with it to provide comparable performance but their results don't indicate the peak of what AMD cards can do.

[makomk]

True but as you state it wasn't intentional.  There is no guarantee SHA-256 will be efficient on the new 79xx series card which use a new architecutre.  Nvidia has indicated they intend to improve GPGPU integer performance so future cards may close the performance gap.  There is no way to know how well algorithms will work on future FPGA or Structured ASIC designs.

From the currently available information, it's looking like 79xx should be at least as efficient at it as previous generations of AMD cards; all the parts still seem to be there. No idea about NVidia though. FPGA and structured ASIC is more dependent on what kind of pricing you can get than anything else.

[deepceleron]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

[DeathAndTaxes]

True but as you state it wasn't intentional.  There is no guarantee SHA-256 will be efficient on the new 79xx series card which use a new architecutre.  Nvidia has indicated they intend to improve GPGPU integer performance so future cards may close the performance gap.  There is no way to know how well algorithms will work on future FPGA or Structured ASIC designs.

From the currently available information, it's looking like 79xx should be at least as efficient at it as previous generations of AMD cards; all the parts still seem to be there. No idea about NVidia though. FPGA and structured ASIC is more dependent on what kind of pricing you can get than anything else.

The next gen is going to be different.

AMD is keeping the 78xx series card the "same".  It is simply a die shrink.  Same GPU, more shaders, smaller, cooler, faster, cheaper.  We can make pretty good gueses as to performance per watt and performance per $.

The 79xx however is a completely new architecture (code named "graphics core next", with new instruction set, and shader design.  There are also signficant hardware changes both inside and outside the GPU.  The cards will move to higher cost but lower latency XDR2 ram for example.

How well it stacks up on both MH/w and MH/$ remains to be seen.  

[Raoul Duke]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

How dare you to be rational when it doesn't fit douchebagexpress agenda?

[Bobnova]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

How dare you to be rational when it doesn't fit douchebagexpress agenda?

Not sure what your point is Psy.

[Raoul Duke]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

How dare you to be rational when it doesn't fit douchebagexpress agenda?

Not sure what your point is Psy.

Then you should put your brain to work.

[Bobnova]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

How dare you to be rational when it doesn't fit douchebagexpress agenda?

Not sure what your point is Psy.

Then you should put your brain to work.

Far as I can tell you're implying that only BEX would rent CPU power to attack a CPU coin when there is actually an exchange, and it would be far smarter to mine once the exchanges are all closed?

[Raoul Duke]

The point they seem to be discussing is, with the availability of cloud computing rental services, if you want to generate a few blocks in a row on any of these ponzicoins for nefarious purposes, all you have to do is rent the horsepower to do it. However, you can just wait for the creators of any of these faulternate blockchains to let them fizzle after they pump-and-dump, and then you can be the only one mining anyway (that is, if it's not completely broken by poorly informed implementation.)

How dare you to be rational when it doesn't fit douchebagexpress agenda?

Not sure what your point is Psy.

Then you should put your brain to work.

Far as I can tell you're implying that only BEX would rent CPU power to attack a CPU coin when there is actually an exchange, and it would be far smarter to mine once the exchanges are all closed?

Not really... I was just implying that deepceleron was being rational and that his reasoning wasn't what BCX intended when he posted this thread with the title he used and incomplete logs that could be wrongly interpreted by people who don't pay much attention to details.
I guess I could've told you this in my previous post... sorry.

[makomk]

The 79xx however is a completely new architecture (code named "graphics core next", with new instruction set, and shader design.  There are also signficant hardware changes both inside and outside the GPU.  The cards will move to higher cost but lower latency XDR2 ram for example.

How well it stacks up on both MH/w and MH/$ remains to be seen.  

Information about the new instruction set actually leaked ages ago, and it looks promising on paper.

[DeathAndTaxes]

The 79xx however is a completely new architecture (code named "graphics core next", with new instruction set, and shader design.  There are also signficant hardware changes both inside and outside the GPU.  The cards will move to higher cost but lower latency XDR2 ram for example.

How well it stacks up on both MH/w and MH/$ remains to be seen.  

Information about the new instruction set actually leaked ages ago, and it looks promising on paper.

Please provide a cite.

[simonk83]

[sigh]  Can't tell if they are just talking shit or actually making a plan to execute.

Who cares.  Bunch of retards in that camp anyway.   LTC is doing well and it sounds like they're feeling threatened to me.  So they should be

Regardless, it's further demonstration of why any reasonable people should stay as far away from RS/CH and SolidCoin as possible.

Yup.

[BTCurious]

The hashrate of the litecoin network just shot up from 8 Mhash/s to 13 Mhash/s.

[DeathAndTaxes]

The hashrate of the litecoin network just shot up from 8 Mhash/s to 13 Mhash/s.

That is close to the botnet scum that show up every day around this time...

The fact that it is the same time makes me think system admin.  Either rouge or authorized.  When users go home he has x thousands of machines that can hash.  Hopefully it is a rogue admin so eventually he gets caught.

[BeeCee1]

The hashrate of the litecoin network just shot up from 8 Mhash/s to 13 Mhash/s.

Now it is up to around 15, right around half the network.  And all of it in the "other" category, not in one of the pools.  It could be an attack, or it could be a user with a lot of cpu's.  Should make for an interesting couple of hourse.

[johnj]

Quite interesting.

[Raoul Duke]

That's not a 51%, that's a 66% 

[johnj]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

[Coinbuck @ BTCLot]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

There's no way to find out that 

[johnj]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

There's no way to find out that 

Ahh yeah, I have no idea how to check blockchain stuff.  I'm sure other folks do, it'll be interesting to see if they're legitimite miners, or if someone is trying to pull off something malicious.

[Raoul Duke]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

Well SC is down 5mh/s at the moment on the coinotron so could well be them and the ~4mh/s in bot machines that show up at this time of day making it all up.

Wouldn't the 4MH/s from coinotron continue mining in coinotron if it was like that?

[DeathAndTaxes]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

Well SC is down 5mh/s at the moment on the coinotron so could well be them and the ~4mh/s in bot machines that show up at this time of day making it all up.

Wouldn't the 4MH/s from coinotron continue mining in coinotron if it was like that?

Why?

I doubt it is an attack but if you have a group of motivated people willing to join the attack why not use that hashing power.

[Raoul Duke]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

Well SC is down 5mh/s at the moment on the coinotron so could well be them and the ~4mh/s in bot machines that show up at this time of day making it all up.

Wouldn't the 4MH/s from coinotron continue mining in coinotron if it was like that?

Why?

I doubt it is an attack but if you have a group of motivated people willing to join the attack why not use that hashing power.

I wasn't saying that the miners that stopped mining SC at coinotron were attacking, and I think that wasn't what SAC meant either. Unless those miners joined the "bots", which is kind of doubtful, but not impossible ofcourse
I guess if the miners from coinotron switched to mine LTC they would stay at coinotron the same way, given that all they would need to do was select LTC from a dropdown box if I'm not mistaken. So it is also doubtful that those 4MH/s that dropped from coinotron would now be mining as "others".
Looking at the hashrate of these CPU based coins 4MH/s is a lot of hashing power, is it not?

[DeathAndTaxes]

Well the unknown wasn't '0' before hand, so much of that unknown is probably honest solo miners.

Well SC is down 5mh/s at the moment on the coinotron so could well be them and the ~4mh/s in bot machines that show up at this time of day making it all up.

Wouldn't the 4MH/s from coinotron continue mining in coinotron if it was like that?

Why?

I doubt it is an attack but if you have a group of motivated people willing to join the attack why not use that hashing power.

I wasn't saying that the miners that stopped mining SC at coinotron were attacking, and I think that wasn't what SAC meant either. Unless those miners joined the "bots", which is kind of doubtful, but not impossible ofcourse
I guess if the miners from coinotron switched to mine LTC they would stay at coinotron the same way, given that all they would need to do was select LTC from a dropdown box if I'm not mistaken. So it is also doubtful that those 4MH/s that dropped from coinotron would now be mining as "others".
Looking at the hashrate of these CPU based coins 4MH/s is a lot of hashing power, is it not?

Gotcha.  Also SC has a higher hashrate than LTC on same hardware by a factor of 10x.  4MH/s of SC switching to LTC would only be 400KH/s

[tacotime]

It's definitely not an EC2 attack that much I know. Confirmed it with AWS and furthermore they added SC to their filters. In the event a large number of EC2 instances start to come online with SC2 running they are going to be dealing with and having to convince AWS Compliance they are legit. Not an easy task.

ec2 is definitely not banning litecoin mining yet, i had a cluster doing it yesterday

[Raoul Duke]

Now it's official! Only BitcoinEXpress can launch 51% attacks on EC2... I think it's time for me to contact them and show them the postings about the attack he supposedly launched from there with his 400 free instances that he stole from the company he's working for...
It will not be hard for them to discover who he is when they know it's the same dude that warned them about LTC mining and give him a royal kick in the ass for abusing resources that AWS gave to the company he works for, for his own personal vendettas...

This will be fun! Or he's just full of shit.
I vote the full of shit hyphotesis...

BCX is a real grave digger... Too bad the grave he's digging is his own grave...

[Spacy]

True, they aren't banning LTC mining, but if you launch a couple hundred Litecoin miners they are going to be asking why and a phone call with shut it down if it is deemed an attack.

Based on what?  Mining is proof of an attack.  LTC isn't licensed software.  There are no prohibitions on someone using 1 copy or 100,000 copies of mining software.

I don't buy it. 

Not meaning to disagree with you D&T but anything even remotely related to an attack is knocked down. Launch 200 instances of EC2 with LTC and see if you aren't talking to compliance.

This is bullshit, do you think EC2 shuts down instances just because you want it? Any why should they add SC to their filter list, even if 51% is not possible in SC2? Another path of bullshit coming from your keyboard 

[3phase]

I would wish that all those fantasies about using EC2 to 51% LTC were put to rest (to say it mildly). You all seem to think that AWS is a game that anyone can play as much as they want to their heart's wish.

First of all, some simple math. A High-CPU Extra Large Instance has a current best spot price of 0.24$/hr on US-East and produces about 15KH/s with the latest optimized miners. In order to get 9MH/s in order to have a good chance of overtaking the network you would need 600 of those which I doubt you could get on that region by itself, therefore you would have to split them to other, more expensive, regions also.

So assuming an average cost of 0.3$/hr per instance, this would mean 180$ per hour of operation.

Mind you, it would take at least a full 24-hrs to get such a full network started properly, and ensure that it is operational as intended. A small script mistake, a reach of the ceiling of available capacity in one region and the subsequent increase of the spot price, a controller instance malfunction (yes, you need controller instances: think you can just list 600 instances on a command line and find out what is wrong where?), or any other incident, costs a few hundreds of $$$ at this scale.

So actual costs to pull this off are in the range of a few thousand $$$.

1. You cannot just rent more than 20 standard instances or 100 spot (the latter is the most efficient one in terms of costs) without submitting a special Instance Limit Increase Request at:

http://aws-portal.amazon.com/gp/aws/html-forms-controller/contactus/AWSAbuse

and then your request will be "considered". You can bet that there are not that many such requests every day so they are scrutinized sufficiently. And you definitely cannot submit a request like this and remain anonymous at the same time.

2. Large customers of AWS and large public traded companies can definitely get this Limit Increase easier, but then anyone doing this from within a company account, cannot do this anonymously and definitely risks a lot of their company's reputation. Just think what would happen when a "smart" rogue reporter breaks the news that "ACME Corp. is secretly involved in crypto-currency wars, aiming to (pick one or more of the following: devalue the dollar/end the Fed/undermine the financial stability of the nation/engage in money laundering/engage in illegal untraceable activities)".

Find me one CEO of such a company that would approve of this. And please BTCExpress, if you disagree with that view, feel free to offer a counter argument, since you have publicly claimed that you did such a thing at SC2 launch.

3. You can of course, create multiple accounts and circumvent these limits, but then you would definitely catch the eye of the monitors as a few hundred instances with similar network footprint would ring several bells at the NOC. I've personally seen that AWS response times when trouble is suspected is very fast (much faster that response to support requests TBH), and you can bet that they will investigate it extensively. Finding proof of the use of multiple accounts to circumvent the Instance limits is not that hard. And when that happens, account locking is warranted.

4. And finally anyone who finds proof that they are getting attacked by an AWS cluster of nodes, can use the abuse form:

http://aws-portal.amazon.com/gp/aws/html-forms-controller/contactus/AWSAbuse

which, according to the AUP (http://aws.amazon.com/aup) can be problems that affect a "System" which would definitely fit to an existing P2P network. Anyone with an exposed public face/company is free to claim this (Graeme of Ozco.in comes to mind as an example).

So tl;dr:

Stop fantasizing about the dangers of EC2, and about such attacks to LTC or any other chain (I might add "of equivalent network size" in order to avoid misinterpretations). AWS is not child's games, unlike some of the crypto-currency experiments. It's a huge cloud service, run by people who might not be the best in the business in terms of support, but they are very sensitive to the responsibilities that they share with their customers and any liability that arises for them due to the actions of their customers.

P.S.
On the other hand, it's very easy to use EC2 to LOSE some money in mining. Even with spot instance pricing, it is still not profitable to mine any CPU chain.

[Spacy]

@3phase,

Not going to argue with you on any of it.

Sounding very strangely like I am defending SC goons, your numbers are exactly what Ten98 came up with more or less. You are correct on a 24 hour setup, but it isn't rocket science to perfect an instance and clone it. Ten98 was aware of the cost and I firmly believe he can fund it if he wants to. A few thousand dollars isn't the end of the world for some people.

I can absolutely assure you it doesn't take the CEO of one of the largest companies to ever exist to approve a simple EC2 expansion. It's simply a matter of logging in and doing what I want actually. EC2 attacks are real and the report links you posted are nothing more than a black hole. Kind of like the "Contact Us" at iTunes LOL...

The 20 instance limit is for new users. I have access to 750 out of more than 2500 total at any time I want. They sit idle 24/7/365 until we use them. Could be why it's called Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud or Amazon EC2 (get it EC2).

FYI, many miners on several chains have been using EC2 to mine. When SC launched more than 20% of SC network hash were EC2 nodes (not all mine) and finally, just because you can't do it or it is difficult for you doesn't mean it is the same for everyone else.

Peace,

BCX

Yeah so the conclusion of this is: BCX can 51% LTC whenever he wants (maybe therefore he currently is buying all the coins?).

[3phase]

@3phase,

Not going to argue with you on any of it.

Sounding very strangely like I am defending SC goons, your numbers are exactly what Ten98 came up with more or less. You are correct on a 24 hour setup, but it isn't rocket science to perfect an instance and clone it. Ten98 was aware of the cost and I firmly believe he can fund it if he wants to. A few thousand dollars isn't the end of the world for some people.

I can absolutely assure you it doesn't take the CEO of one of the largest companies to ever exist to approve a simple EC2 expansion. It's simply a matter of logging in and doing what I want actually. EC2 attacks are real and the report links you posted are nothing more than a black hole. Kind of like the "Contact Us" at iTunes LOL...

The 20 instance limit is for new users. I have access to 750 out of more than 2500 total at any time I want. They sit idle 24/7/365 until we use them. Could be why it's called Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud or Amazon EC2 (get it EC2).

FYI, many miners on several chains have been using EC2 to mine. When SC launched more than 20% of SC network hash were EC2 nodes (not all mine) and finally, just because you can't do it or it is difficult for you doesn't mean it is the same for everyone else.

Peace,

BCX

Acknowledged. You have obviously access to more resources than I do. Can you confirm that you are talking about c1.xlarge instances? Because if you are talking about other instance types, the efficiency and the economics change (dramatically so). I would also personally doubt that you or any other could have 750 c1.xlarge instances at will, not because you can't, but this size is too big even for EC2 itself. However, I might be wrong in my assumption about this.

Just to clarify that my note about CEO approval was not concerning the EC2 usage, but concerning handling the effects of such an action becoming public, which is not difficult to happen. You can't hide 600 instances under the matress  

[MaGNeT]

What would it take to take out SC?

[makomk]

Information about the new instruction set actually leaked ages ago, and it looks promising on paper.

Please provide a cite.

It's somewhere in a huge Guru3D thread, but I can't remember the keywords to find it off-hand...