51% attack

[podyx]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi2thGzzNSs

seems like it's alot easier then some people claimed...

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[franky1]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi2thGzzNSs

seems like it's alot easier then some people claimed...

in theory.. you dont need to buy thousands of ASICS.

you just need to bribe the top 3 mining pool owners to collectively use a different mining script that you have coded.

bribing 3 mining pool owners is much cheaper then buying the equipment

[QuestionAuthority]

Yep, we're all doomed. Remember you heard it here first.

[podyx]

Yep, we're all doomed. Remember you heard it here first.

Sarcasm?? This don't look too great... but I guess it can be solved?

[kwukduck]

Nothing new here, we have been talking about this for years now on both irc and the forum, but he explains it nice and clear. Hopefully putting it in a video this way people will start to care about it a bit more to find a solution.

[Brangdon]

He made it sound more expensive than I expected. There was an Ars Technica article about a miner which implied $60m might be enough. I guess that's because it does change with time. He does mention it being cheaper a few months ago.

Part of Bitcoin security comes from it being more profitable to use the 51% to mine for honest block rewards than to attack Bitcoin. Perhaps he'll address that point in the second video.

[jparsley]

Hope it dosent happen

[leopard2]

don't be too afraid, a 51% attack would destroy btc and drive its value to zero

no one will do that to steal coins, because they would become worthless, so forget bribing miners

only someone who wants to destroy BTC would do this and I don't think this is likely to happen (buy some VTC & such as insurance)

[podyx]

don't be too afraid, a 51% attack would destroy btc and drive its value to zero

no one will do that to steal coins, because they would become worthless, so forget bribing miners

only someone who wants to destroy BTC would do this and I don't think this is likely to happen (buy some VTC & such as insurance)

Well, like he mentioned in the video there are terrorists with alot of money
They might not be in for the profit but rather to destroy

I do hold 34 vtc actually

[Meuh6879]

it's doesn't happen.
bank are rich with virtual money ... when you buy physical stuff, they have always a problem.



that why credit card security and bank security (internet) is poor compared to the bitcoin secure transaction system and mining adaptative power.

[LiteCoinGuy]

after that we could switch to Litecoin  

[AT101ET]

Bribing the 3 pools is actually pointless. Ultimately, they'd be the ones losing out as after a 51% attack nobody would want to mine anymore. They lose miners, they lose fees... Won't benefit them really. (Unless the bribe is HUGE).
Still, won't actually happen!

[Meuh6879]

it's because p2pool is more "bitcoin complain" ... (decentralized way of mining).

[franky1]

Bribing the 3 pools is actually pointless. Ultimately, they'd be the ones losing out as after a 51% attack nobody would want to mine anymore. They lose miners, they lose fees... Won't benefit them really. (Unless the bribe is HUGE).
Still, won't actually happen!

you would be surprised if i told you that many people are not bitcoin 'lifers' they dont care about the future of bitcoin, they just want wealth now to cash out to fiat.

as for not wanting to do it because it would ruin rep. .. pirate had a price in mind of how much he deemed as 'enough' before running, mark karpeles had a figure in mind before he decided to screw people over. i bet if i offered anyone here $10m just to install some code on their server. knowing that although bitcoin would be screwed they would atleast have $10m to play with instantly . which would have taken 10-12* years to get, by just continuing to run bitcoinpools. miners are very visibly greedy and would definetely be tempted by a instant $10m payout for 5 minutes work.

which would put the 51% attack price as low as $30m, maybe less


*at todays fiat price calculated against the 1% pool fee and average blocks per hour/day/year/10 year

[Tzupy]

Since the 18th March there seems to be a significant increase in orphan blocks and possibly in transaction times.
Could this be a sign of a 'selfish miner' attack?

[devphp]

That's why diversifying into NXT, which is already now protected against 51% (and even against 90% when TF feature is completed later) attack makes perfect sense. Another one that protects users better against 51% attack is Myriadcoin.

[Velkro]

its just speculation, nothing really new

[Wilikon]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi2thGzzNSs

seems like it's alot easier then some people claimed...

So someone will buy 1 billion worth of machines to destroy bitcoin. The thing is if someone buys that much of ASIC power it will increase the value of bitcoin because that would be the number one news on Coindesk, bloomberg, etc for a while. That someone would have increased his capital just by simply buying the gear. Next is the 51% attack to destroy bitcoin. Way before the value of bitcoin goes down to zero, a lot of bitcoiners would have converted to another alt coin, making that new alt coin the new Gold crypto. Since his Asic were specifically made for bitcoin mining, that someone will need to invest in another billion to break that new gold crypto.
Meanwhile investors are looking into that someone (most likely an evil bank in that scenario) and wonder why their money is spent so foolishly then will force a change the board direction or walk with their captial.

You don't need 1 billion to kill bitcoin. You would need multiple of billions and even that does not guaranty anything.

Does that story make sense to you?

[-droid-]

 he explains this pretty good

[tzortz]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi2thGzzNSs

seems like it's alot easier then some people claimed...

So someone will buy 1 billion worth of machines to destroy bitcoin. The thing is if someone buys that much of ASIC power it will increase the value of bitcoin because that would be the number one news on Coindesk, bloomberg, etc for a while. That someone would have increased his capital just by simply buying the gear. Next is the 51% attack to destroy bitcoin. Way before the value of bitcoin goes down to zero, a lot of bitcoiners would have converted to another alt coin, making that new alt coin the new Gold crypto. Since his Asic were specifically made for bitcoin mining, that someone will need to invest in another billion to break that new gold crypto.
Meanwhile investors are looking into that someone (most likely an evil bank in that scenario) and wonder why their money is spent so foolishly then will force a change the board direction or walk with their captial.

You don't need 1 billion to kill bitcoin. You would need multiple of billions and even that does not guaranty anything.

Does that story make sense to you?

Can you please explain your calculations again?

The current hashrate is 55,000 Th/s.

Each Th/s at this time costs around $2,500 (maybe lower in huge orders).
In order to hit the 51% , you need at least lets say 30,000Th/s , to make sure by the time they get delivered you can counter it.

So $2,500 X 30,000Th/s = $75,000,000 approximately.

With $75,000,000, you can potentially control the whole BTC network.

Not close to a billion you say.