Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 269 posts

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#191

Post by AlexAffe »

superkuh wrote: post #104
pishpash wrote: post #36

Use of excessive resources should be a privileged action, isn't something like coinhive a malicious vector?

No more than the existing trend of 'web app' entirely Javascript rendered websites. My solution to both is very simple: I run JS only from white-listed domains. Sure this breaks many sites but, well, fuck those sites.

Someone mentioned a CoinHive Captcha. This is usually when my NoScript approach breaks. There would be no way around enabling the captcha script, therefore enabling the miner. Normally I then... fuck those sites, but what if that's reaaaally becoming a thing and say StackOverflow does it? You would need some way of adjusting allocated browser resources real fast and precise. Only way I can think of right now...

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#192

Post by beejamin »

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #101
slg wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as there is disclosure of it and the mining is relatively efficient, that is a very interesting business model. The site collects revenue relative to the amount of time users spend on the site and not the number of page/ad views. It is also a pretty seamless way to integrate micropayments from users into a site. Handing over a credit card number or similar is a big barrier to overcome while this requires no s…

> and the mining is relatively efficient That's a huge "if"; it's my understanding that most cryptocurrencies are currently only efficient with ASICs.

Monero is designed to be mined more efficiently with CPUs, or rather, not give such a huge advantage to GPU or dedicated systems (I've read that GPU mining is only 2x the performance of a roughly equivalent CPU, instead of 1000+x as with bitcoin).

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#193

Post by Nursie »

phailhaus wrote: post #169
outoftacos wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Solution" wow, just step back a second here, I never signed up for advertisements AT ALL, much less background CPU miners for shady schemes. Solution is the last word to use, there is no problem first off and malware is not how you would solve this fantasy of a "problem".

You have to remember that you're not entitled to their server resources. If you are not okay with a CPU miner, then don't use their site. I'm okay with this as long as they are 100% transparent about their monetization scheme.

I'm pretty sure I'm entitled to request content, and my machine can render it however it likes.

They make the choice whether to serve it or not.

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#194

Post by granitosaurus »

superkuh wrote: post #104
pishpash wrote: post #36

Use of excessive resources should be a privileged action, isn't something like coinhive a malicious vector?

No more than the existing trend of 'web app' entirely Javascript rendered websites. My solution to both is very simple: I run JS only from white-listed domains. Sure this breaks many sites but, well, fuck those sites.

> Sure this breaks many sites but, well, fuck those sites

I wish general population would subscribe to a similar paradigm. Web-space is probably one of few mediums where vote-with-your-wallet philosophy can have a substantial effect.

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#195

Post by granitosaurus »

Philomath wrote: post #96

It's funny because just yesterday I was at a hackathon and made AddCoinPlus [1], a browser extension that uses a very tiny bit of your CPU to mine for non-profits of your choice. People really loved it because it is your choice to do so or not, it's not a website making your CPU work for their own profit. [1]: http://addcoinplus.com/

I feel that extension as a medium is a werid choice here. Shouldn't it be some individual app? When computer is an relative idle state (e.g. playing a movie) it could fire up some mining.

Why would anyone want already slow javascript web to load even slower?

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#196

Post by adrianN »

testestx wrote: post #183
phailhaus wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but you're not entitled to use their server's resources for free. If you're not okay with them running a miner while you use their site, don't use their site. I'm okay with this approach as long as they are transparent about it.

Simply return an HTTP error code if your server doesn't want to spend resources with my request. HTTP 500 perhaps.

HTTP 402 was made for this.

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#197

Post by tentaTherapist »

phailhaus wrote: post #169
outoftacos wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Solution" wow, just step back a second here, I never signed up for advertisements AT ALL, much less background CPU miners for shady schemes. Solution is the last word to use, there is no problem first off and malware is not how you would solve this fantasy of a "problem".

You have to remember that you're not entitled to their server resources. If you are not okay with a CPU miner, then don't use their site. I'm okay with this as long as they are 100% transparent about their monetization scheme.

If you give me code and I don't run it, I don't really think I'm at fault here. If this was opt-in maybe they'd receive more sympathy, but as it stands wasting my electricity to make them a fraction of a cent is a rather unwelcome surprise.

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#199

Post by rhaps0dy »

aoeusnth1 wrote: post #190
thinkloop wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that mining is a waste is a bit strange to me - of course it is a waste, that is the genius insight of it all. Waste is the most powerful thing, it is pure cost, the hardest thing to do, raw sacrifice. There are no tricks or shortcuts to over-taking the blockchain, just pure cost and waste. If the proof-of-work had value and could be sold, it would make the network less safe, and less predictable, subject to…

Two quibbles I have with this argument: 1. PoW based on waste which has massive negative externalities is abusive. Power generation generally has large negative externalities. Bitcoin kills. 2. PoS is just another type of PoW - people will compete to earn the PoS rewards up until they are "burning" 0.99 worth of potential ETH they could have earned (with stocks or bonds for example) for every 1 ETH they earn through…

Typo, I believe: switching to PoS is a capital-creating act, not PoW!

PoW is disgusting.

Re: Show HN: No Coin – A browser extension to block coin miners

#200

Post by PUSH_AX »

have_faith wrote: post #25
tombrossman wrote: post #10

Title could be improved - this is for Google Chrome only. Anyone using an ad blocker can simply add... https://coin-hive.com/lib/coinhive.min.js ...to their custom block-list instead, no need for an extension.

What if they self host the code?

You need an extension, pretty much anyone doing this won't use a CDN for this very reason.
Post reply on HN