Wonder who this solominer is? 88.6.216.9

[wachtwoord]

Nah, no shallow denial only, I would orphan the second example as well.

[1714185095]

1714185095

[1714185095]

1714185095

[1714185095]

1714185095

[1714185095]

1714185095

[DeepBit]

I've being trying to label 88.6.216.9 (and their old ip 88.6.208.35) for a while.
I hope they know about/support BIP30 and BIP16.

At least BIP16 can be a way to stop them :) (joke)

By the way, Luke-Jr used this method of not including any TXes to suppress springcoin's altchain.

[eleuthria]

By the way, Luke-Jr used this method of not including any TXes to suppress springcoin's altchain.

A little different, my understanding is Luke-Jr was actually ignoring other nodes blocks and just kept building upon his own?

Either way, the suppression attack is what I meant by "strangulation attack" - It slows down the networks ability to process transactions because a portion of blocks ignore all TXes, which also raises the difficulty.  This means that transactions are now slowed down by *AT LEAST* their portion of the network due to legit miners now running at a higher difficulty.  It could slow down the network even more if enough nodes were doing this type of "attack" and created a backlog of transactions where legit nodes could not wrap them up into blocks as fast as they're coming in.

[TurdHurdur]

Without including transactions, they'll never be accused of trying to double spend, at least.

[wabber]

From my point of view the reason why ppl can do this without losing anything are the small transaction fees. But in the long term no processed transactions will cause higher transaction fees and that will cause more miners to include transactions.

I agree that they are harming the network because they could include transactions with little effort. But higher tx fees are anyways necessary for the future and this seems like a small step to it for me.

The transactions are currently not worth beeing included and that needs to change.

[DeepBit]

By the way, Luke-Jr used this method of not including any TXes to suppress springcoin's altchain.

A little different, my understanding is Luke-Jr was actually ignoring other nodes blocks and just kept building upon his own?

Yes, but this miner is less than 50%, so ignoring won't work.

[Syke]

I implore the three biggest pool operators to stop accepting empty blocks as valid. After that, everyone will follow.

Let's say that happens. Then what? Which scenario do you think will play out:

A. Empty-block miners see their blocks invalidated, so they pack up and go home.
B. Empty-block miners see their blocks invalidated, so they create a little dust so they don't have empty blocks anymore.

Bottom line: Empty-block miners are passing up on fees. That's their loss, and everyone else's gain.

[BombaUcigasa]

I implore the three biggest pool operators to stop accepting empty blocks as valid. After that, everyone will follow.

Let's say that happens. Then what? Which scenario do you think will play out:

A. Empty-block miners see their blocks invalidated, so they pack up and go home.
B. Empty-block miners see their blocks invalidated, so they create a little dust so they don't have empty blocks anymore.

Bottom line: Empty-block miners are passing up on fees. That's their loss, and everyone else's gain.

What about:
C. Empty-block miners make a union and hijack the network by doing 51% of the hashrate and ignoring blocks with transactions.

You guys realize that with a few thousand dollars a day (10-20k), any government can disrupt bitcoin sufficiently? For the millions of dollars each government agency wastes yearly, surely they could do this if they wanted to.

[pieppiep]

The transactions are currently not worth beeing included and that needs to change.

When the block value drops from 50 to 25 BTC the transaction are a bigger part of the mining, so that's already going to change.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Who cares if a block is empty?

One more block above your transaction = your transaction 1 confirmation deeper in the block chain.
Yes even empty blocks make everyone's transactions stronger.

Plus no block is "empty" it always have 1 transactions.

Lastly there is no good way to enforce including transactions in a block.

If you
a) ask largest pools to ignore these blocks you are asking them to 51% the network.  come on people think a little.  should we be encouraging major pools to 51% our own network?
b) change the protocol to require transactions other than the coinbase in a block then it creates all kinda of new problems

First  people who currently mine empty blocks will simply include a single transaction from one account they own to another.  What's next a rule of at least 5 transactions? Still easily spoofed.  The second issue is you create a situation when no transactions happen that a "good miner" will need to either spoof the network or choose to stop mining.  Do we want to encourage block chain spam really?  Lastly if miners did stop mining when no transactions occured you would totally fuck up the difficulty adjustment algorithms.

Bitcoin is about freedom.   The protocol rules so you can mine a block with no transactions yet people decide "it isn't fair" and want to change it.  Some people just can't escape the nanny state mentality ("there should be a rule against that").  Sad. 

So TL/DR:
There are no empty blocks, blocks with a single transactions don't hurt you, trying to change it is next to impossible, and ANY BLOCK above your transaction makes it stronger.

[DeathAndTaxes]

You guys realize that with a few thousand dollars a day (10-20k), any government can disrupt bitcoin sufficiently? For the millions of dollars each government agency wastes yearly, surely they could do this if they wanted to.

You guys realize that for a $1.99 you can buy a SuperComputer for a week.  Oh wait you can't and neither can you disrupt Bitcoin for "a few thousand dollars a day".

[lodcrappo]

You guys realize that with a few thousand dollars a day (10-20k), any government can disrupt bitcoin sufficiently? For the millions of dollars each government agency wastes yearly, surely they could do this if they wanted to.

You guys realize that for a $1.99 you can buy a SuperComputer for a week.  Oh wait you can't and neither can you disrupt Bitcoin for "a few thousand dollars a day".

Just wanted to mention I am now offering the Deluxe Bitcoin Network Disrupter Service.

Bring down this crazy train once and for all!  Starter packages from as little as $2,999.95 USD per day!

Results absolutely guaranteed.  Sorry, no paypal.


 

[finway]

I think we need specialized ASIC miners, to defeat the botnet.

And btw:  this is not botnet, cause i can't find a block today.

[D.H.]

Who cares if a block is empty?

One more block above your transaction = your transaction 1 confirmation deeper in the block chain.

Well, if my transaction has not been included in a block yet I have to wait longer before it is.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Who cares if a block is empty?

One more block above your transaction = your transaction 1 confirmation deeper in the block chain.

AND?

If there was a rule that a block must have 2+ transaction don't you think he could simply pass 1 satoshi from one of this accounts to another in every single block?

You have no right to have your transaction in the next block.  If you want higher assurances then increase the fee you pay.  As block subsidy declines this entity will either need to start including transactions or face dwindling revenue.


Well, if my transaction has not been included in a block yet I have to wait longer before it is.

[cunicula]

Say this guy acquires 51%. Is an option for him to include txns and operate responsibly, but refuse to accept any blocks issued by other parties. Thus, anyone with 51% effectively can have 100% and mines every single block. Is this correct?

[DeathAndTaxes]

Say this guy acquires 51%. Is an option for him to include txns and operate responsibly, but refuse to accept any blocks issued by other parties. Thus, anyone with 51% effectively can have 100% and mines every single block. Is this correct?

Yes that is called a 51% attack. Even if the "good chain" pulls ahead for a block (or 20) given enough time someone with 51% of hashing power will always have the longest chain.

51% is mostly academic likely one would want a larger "house advantage" in these coin flips between good side and bade side.  Meni did some math on "how long" it would take with various % to have a 99% chance of being ahead.  51% is very long but is scales up very rapidly.  So likely someone who could afford ~5TH/s would spend a little more and make their attack more efficient.

[kjj]

The idea has floated several times to reject blocks that don't contain at least some portion of the transactions that you node is aware of.  Might be time to reconsider it

Of course, it wouldn't be anything as simple as "reject empty blocks" or "reject blocks with less than X transactions".  Those won't work.

It will need to be more like "I see 100 pending transactions that are valid and should be included in the next block.  This block I just got from the network contains less than 25% of them, so I will reject it."  There will probably need to be a threshold too, like "I only see 10 pending transactions, and that isn't enough to enforce a minimum number on this incoming block, so I will accept it, even though it has none".

As a first guess, I would say that a threshold of 10 or 20 and a fraction of 1/4 to 1/2 would work well. 

[D.H.]

Well, if my transaction has not been included in a block yet I have to wait longer before it is.

AND?

If there was a rule that a block must have 2+ transaction don't you think he could simply pass 1 satoshi from one of this accounts to another in every single block?

Sure, I never suggested such a thing.

You have no right to have your transaction in the next block.  If you want higher assurances then increase the fee you pay.  As block subsidy declines this entity will either need to start including transactions or face dwindling revenue.

I merely opposed your "Who cares?" attitude. If 15% of the blocks never includes any transactions then Bitcoin does not behave as people expect it to and that might hurt Bitcoin's reputation. It's possible to worry a little bit about the state of the network without screaming for protocol changes.

[wachtwoord]

@DeathAndTaxes, this:

The idea has floated several times to reject blocks that don't contain at least some portion of the transactions that you node is aware of.  Might be time to reconsider it

Of course, it wouldn't be anything as simple as "reject empty blocks" or "reject blocks with less than X transactions".  Those won't work.

It will need to be more like "I see 100 pending transactions that are valid and should be included in the next block.  This block I just got from the network contains less than 25% of them, so I will reject it."  There will probably need to be a threshold too, like "I only see 10 pending transactions, and that isn't enough to enforce a minimum number on this incoming block, so I will accept it, even though it has none".

As a first guess, I would say that a threshold of 10 or 20 and a fraction of 1/4 to 1/2 would work well. 

And the rules are made by the majority of the hashing power. So considering we all want what is best for Bitcoin I am hoping that the 3 biggest pools will apply this rule and kill this ignore nonsense. Otherwise it could potentially take a very long time for transactions to be confirmed. Like I said before: I regard this as simply malevolent  behavior and if I had access to >50% of the hashing power would ban it.

I'm hoping some group of people that actually has >50% hashing power agrees.