Stealthcoin

[NghtRppr]

I have a friend that runs a computer lab of about 200+ computers for training purposes and he doesn't care if I use up his electricity but he had a few objections to letting me generate bitcoins on his computers.

• can't have CPU usage pegged at 100% because users might bug him about it
• can't be bothered to install anything himself unless it's a single executable he can push to all his computers
• can't be bothered to check the balances and send bitcoins when generated

With this in mind, I created Stealthcoin. It uses a modified version of the vanilla Bitcoind with an added sleep() call so that CPU usage isn't maxed out while generating. Obviously, it generates slower, about half the speed, but half is better than nothing in my case. I also wanted to gain experience with compiling/developing Bitcoin, as well as using Github, so I can start contributing to the project. If you have barely-computer-literate friends that don't mind letting you use their electricity, this should help you out a bit as well.

https://github.com/bitcoin2cash/Stealthcoin

Stealthcoin is an installation wrapper for a modified Bitcoind CPU miner. The
editor allows you to create an installation binary which can then be executed on
any Windows NT compatible operating system. The editor allows you to specify the
installation path, the name to use for running the Stealthcoin service, the name
to use for running the Bitcoind executable and a bitcoin address to send all
generated bitcoins to. Once the installation binary is executed, it will copy
itself to the specified installation path, extract the Bitcoind binary, as well
as the libeay32.dll binary. It will then execute Bitcoind using the installation
path as the data directory. The Stealthcoin service periodically checks if any
bitcoins have been generated and if so, sends them to the bitcoin address you
specified in the editor.

If this project is useful to you please send donations to 1HXD5xHpz6cxbrqNekzGFTow6gjeuTNR4j in order to encourage me to keep developing this.

[Patat3]

I know a lot more Linux than Windows, so I might be wrong.

In Unix, you can change the priority of a process, from -20 (higher priority) to 19 (lower priority). Process with least priority will consume CPU time only when no other process with higher priority need it. The binary for that is nice (to launch at a specific priority) or renice (to change during runtime).
This priority does not impact memory usage and I/O (for that, in Linux there is ionice).

A bitcoin miner is a perfect candidate for this, it does not need large amount of memory and won't be in swap when idling and it does not perform intensive I/O on disk.

For Windows, in "Process Explorer" I can set a lower priority to a running process, such as "Idle" or "Idling" the equivalent of renice -n 19 $unixpid.

Instead of hacking the miner and slow it down, you can run it full speed but with lower priority.
I don't know how to do that in Windows... everything is so complex. Butif no tools in Windows userspace can let you do that, you can write a small app that will launch the bitcoin miner and run a low-level Windows standard library call that will change the miner priority.

When students will logoff their workstation 99.9% of CPU time will be spend on your miner!

[NghtRppr]

Running the Bitcoind process at the lowest priority will make the system more responsive because the shell gets priority use of the CPU. However, if you look at the Windows Task Manager, it will still show the CPU being maxed out which is what I'm trying to avoid.

[Patat3]

You want to hide it's CPU usage?

I tought you didn't want to impact the user!

Because... 99% CPU idling vs. 99% CPU on bitcoind, won't do any difference for the user.

You can rename the bitcoind.exe to AntiVirus.exe everybody will feel safer to see an hardworking A/V 

[NghtRppr]

You want to hide it's CPU usage?

Yes, that's why I named the project Stealthcoin. If someone sees 100% usage, which isn't a typical thing people see, they are going think something is going wrong and start bugging the administrator. Also, he wouldn't let me install a rootkit.

[error]

You want to hide it's CPU usage?

Yes, that's why I named the project Stealthcoin. If someone sees 100% usage, which isn't a typical thing people see, they are going think something is going wrong and start bugging the administrator. Also, he wouldn't let me install a rootkit.

Just name it "System Idle Process". Nobody will be able to tell the difference.

[Raoul Duke]

Can i use your code to setup a PPI campaign?

EDIT: This thing trips all kinds of alarms on the antivirus  

EDIT II : Just don't give the process/service names that are used by windows processes and the av stops complainting

[theGECK]

In a previous topic of mine, we talked about using a .vbs script to create a hidden instance of ufasoft's miner, which throttles well and stays out of the way. Nothing to install, doesn't trip any A/V. While I don't advocate doing this, he could stick it in a network share, and slap the vbs script into their login, or into startup folders. This is especially easy if you use Active Directory.

[dust]

Bitcoin: Botnet Edition

[EPiSKiNG]

Bitcoin: Botnet Edition

roflcopters!

[NghtRppr]

Please don't use this for nefarious purposes.

[marcus_of_augustus]

Please don't use this for nefarious purposes.

Well duh.

You just handed the botnetters a bitcoin miner on a platter ... just call it botcoin miner and be done with it.

[DeadJDona]

Just wonder if I can lend some botnet resurces for this ))

[NghtRppr]

just call it botcoin miner and be done with it

Well, I have to admit, that is a catchier name.

Just wonder if I can lend some botnet resurces for this ))

No! Please don't! Stop!

[Rena]

Just run it when the computer isn't in use (nobody logged in)? I assume all 200 machines aren't in use 24/7.

[casascius]

I can think of one way botnets could harm the network...  botnets that solve blocks without any transactions do less good than miners who include transactions in their blocks.

Why does this matter?  Normal transaction activity would increase the amount of traffic needed between botnet operator and his bots, the resource consumption increasing his odds of getting detected and found.  If someone had 10,000 bots, his bots would have to be constantly getting work from him in order to properly include transactions in a block.  He would be incentivized to program his botnet to solve empty blocks so he could skip the getwork overhead and only have to send out new work messages every 10 minutes on average, to tell his bots when to start working on a new block.

[lulzplzkthx]

No pooled mining support?

[tryptamine]

Doesn't look like it works, tested on Win7 64-bit.

[NghtRppr]

Doesn't look like it works, tested on Win7 64-bit.

I've only tested it on Windows 7 32-bit and Windows XP. I'll install 64-bit on VMware and see what the problem is. If you can figure out exactly what parts aren't working, please let me know. Does it create the installation folder? Did you run it as administrator? Etc...

Thanks!

[tryptamine]

I run as administrator; it does not create directory nor service. Tested on a 32-bit Vista and it works fine, though.