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We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

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Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#11

Post by orblivion »

bonyt wrote: post #8
aetherspawn wrote: post #2

What does this mean? (Not all of us know a whole lot about how crypto works or why this is good or bad and what it means for our investments)

In this kind of blockchain network, the longest chain of blocks is considered to be the valid one. However, someone that has 51% of the hashing power (i.e. more hashing power than everyone else combined) can create a chain that grows faster than the chain used by everyone else. This means that they could tamper with their chain, potentially rewriting history on it, and because it is the longest chain, it will be acce…

Being only somewhat familiar, I wonder this: Why don't clients have a simple rule against accepting changes to history that are more than one or two blocks old?

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#14

Post by viraptor »

An update from eth classic amount linked in that thread: (not sure what they mean by selfish mining...)

Regarding the recent mining events. We may have an idea of where the hashrate came from. ASIC manufacturer Linzhi confirmed testing of new 1,400/Mh ethash machines #projectLavaSnow

- Most likely selfish mining (Not 51% attack)

- Double spends not detected (Miner dumped bocks)

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#15

Post by DyslexicAtheist »

aetherspawn wrote: post #2

What does this mean? (Not all of us know a whole lot about how crypto works or why this is good or bad and what it means for our investments)

51% attack: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/51-attack.asp

I can't comment on investment. Note Ethereum has always been over-hyped which (imvho) makes it useless for any serious engineering. see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18780489

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#16

Post by wmf »

orblivion wrote: post #11
bonyt wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this kind of blockchain network, the longest chain of blocks is considered to be the valid one. However, someone that has 51% of the hashing power (i.e. more hashing power than everyone else combined) can create a chain that grows faster than the chain used by everyone else. This means that they could tamper with their chain, potentially rewriting history on it, and because it is the longest chain, it will be acce…

Being only somewhat familiar, I wonder this: Why don't clients have a simple rule against accepting changes to history that are more than one or two blocks old?

Those rules can cause breakage under normal usage because the probability of an N-deep reorganization is low but nonzero. They also don't help nodes that are syncing the chain from scratch.

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#17

Post by stcredzero »

hacker_9 wrote: post #3

Amazing, this blockchain technology really just keeps on giving. I have to say, it's quite entertaining to watch. It's pretty much a car crash happening in slow motion at this point. At least it provides something else to nerd joke about by the watercooler that isn't brexit for once.

I have to say, it's quite entertaining to watch. It's pretty much a car crash happening in slow motion at this point. At least it provides something else to nerd joke about by the watercooler...

The above part pretty much applies to humanity as a whole, going back at least 200k years.

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#18

Post by NathanCH »

johndunne wrote: post #7

This is inevitable. Ethereum Classic (ETC) isn't the only currency such attacks have been successful on. The site https://www.crypto51.app/ puts the cost of running a 51% attack on ETC at ~$5k per hour. The incentive for running these attacks for profit becomes higher as the market cap of these coins increases, making long-term 'investment' in these coins nonsensical.

Some of these numbers are very low. $30/h for Bitcoin Private? Seems inexpensive, what am I missing?

Re: We can confirm that there was a successful 51% attack on Ethereum Classic

#20

Post by brokensegue »

Klathmon wrote: post #6
hacker_9 wrote: post #3

Amazing, this blockchain technology really just keeps on giving. I have to say, it's quite entertaining to watch. It's pretty much a car crash happening in slow motion at this point. At least it provides something else to nerd joke about by the watercooler that isn't brexit for once.

That's like saying "this whole programming thing just keeps on giving" every time a bug is discovered in any program. Those involved have been warning of the insecurity of smaller chains for a long time now, and they aren't representative of the entire ecosystem.

well programming is providing lots of value to humanity at the moment so it gets a pass
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