Many people know that cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum are impressed by the rise and fall of cryptocurrencies. Some people may also understand the mining of cryptocurrencies. But many people may not know what is the harm and danger of cryptocurrency mining. In the following, we will explore the ins and outs of cryptocurrency mining, and what are the risks and harm hidden in mining.

How does cryptocurrency work?

Cryptocurrencies are a virtual asset for payment methods in online transactions. Blockchain databases including ownership records, transaction details, and coin creation information use mathematical encryption functions to protect data.

Before talking about cryptocurrency mining, people should understand how cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum manage transactions and issue new coins.

Concentrated and decentralized system

Unlike the legal currency, cryptocurrencies are not managed by the central financial organization that retains transactions. Concentrated systems (such as banks) record transactions and use classified accounts to manage them, and can only be accessed by limited number of other organizations.

On the other hand, decentralized systems do not need to organize to manage transactions. Instead, the "distributed" classification account storage record called blockchain is called the blockchain. Any user who wants to be a part of the system can access the classification account and view the transaction.

Where is the transaction store?

As mentioned above, the blockchain is responsible for storing transaction records related to cryptocurrencies. Multiple trading links form a block together, and then add it to a distributed classification account. These blocks also include other information, such as the header data and hash value of the previous block.

What is cryptocurrency mining?

Cryptocurrency mining is a public classification ledger/record that verifies digital currency transactions and adds it to the currency (blockchain) to pursue the distributed process of transaction costs and additional digital currencies.

The mining process is calculated, and a large and expensive calculation time and electricity will be used.

Cryptocurrency mining and malware danger

The attacker sometimes uses the Internet fishing technology to trick victims to click the link to load cryptocurrency mining code on their computers. They may also make the website infect malicious code. In addition, some websites include the code running on the computer computer to mine cryptocurrencies for the website owner. The only signs that the victims may notice are their decline in computer performance.

Pay attention to the danger of online fishing and suspicious emails, and pay attention to websites that cause unexpected high resource usage.

Cryptocurrency mining makes UM and personal data risks

Use UM resources or inappropriate protection of personal resources for cryptocurrency mining:

Reduce the performance of legal users.

Can leave vulnerabilities for attackers.

Increase electricity and calculation costs.

IT employees who must solve performance or security issues must be solved.

Place UM data with your privacy in danger.

Cryptocurrency mining can lead to excessive power consumption

Because excavating cryptocurrencies is a complex process, it requires a large amount of energy to run the computer that continues to verify the block. Most cryptocurrency miners run their system 24/7 24/7, which requires a lot of electricity.

With the rise of cryptocurrencies, more and more people have joined the network, increasing total energy consumption. According to a study from the University of Cambridge, Bitcoin mining needs more than 120 Taiwaphta energy each year, let alone this number is still growing.

Considering the large amount of resources required for this process, some countries have prohibited cryptocurrency mining. There are also several environmental cryptocurrencies that claim to be green Bitcoin alternatives.

Encrypted hijacking

The value of cryptocurrencies not only attracts new miners, but also attracts hackers. In the past ten years, a variety of cryptocurrency hackers have been reported.

Not only that, cyber criminals are now infected with personal computers to use their resources to tap cryptocurrencies, also known as encrypted hijacking. Many hackers install scripts based on JavaScript on their computers, which will excavate cryptocurrencies for them in the background.

These hackers will not use the resources of infected equipment 100% because they will immediately expose their strategies. Instead, they use smaller parts to slowly and stably minify them for a long time.

Cryptocurrency mining causes hardware failure

Like other connected electronic devices, the encrypted mining server will encounter problems related to software, incorrect setting challenges, difficult network connections, and other problems that are easy to solve. Different from traditional data centers with appropriate environmental control, the hardware of encrypted mining hardware is placed in a unique position. Power cost and equipment cooling requirements are the main driving factor. In these types of environments, dust, temperature fluctuations, increased humidity and rarely control. Lack of control will cause failure to be related to heat dissipation and bridge:

Heating -heat can adversely affect the encryption mining hardware, and may damage safety, performance and reliability. Excessive heat caused by poor heat dissipation will reduce performance in the form of reducing operating speed. It may also damage the circuit board component and may cause fire.

Electric bridge -when the current deviates from the established circuit channel, it may cause hardware damage, electric shock and even fire.

When the surge -occurs, it searches the simplest grounding path. In many cases, this path is directly through sensitive electrical and electronic components, and these components are not designed to avoid being affected by high current. This over -pressure situation is only temporary, but the components in the ground path will cause severe damage. It is manifested as overheating, breakdown or fire.

Electric energy quality -if the voltage and current provided are within a set of parameter range, the power quality is good. If the voltage or current (or two) exceeds these parameters, the power quality may be poor. Most electrical quality problems are related to problems in facilities, not related to public utilities. Typical problems include grounding and connection problems, wiring problems, violations of norms and power interference generated inside.

The danger of illegal mining

Illegal encryption mining includes online mining tools such as CoinHive and malware accessing other people's computing resources. Mining tools/program infection web pages or prepared web pages to exhaust the CPU ability of page visitors through the Java command. Mining malicious software in turn uses the principle of encrypted hijacking. Through the infected website or download, the malware is smuggled to the computer, so that it can be almost completely (75% to 100%) its CPU is retained for encryption mining. In most cases, infected computing opportunities automatically become part of the mining zombie network.

The adverse effects of mining on the environment

In addition to the threat from malicious software, large -scale encrypted mining also brings environmental risks. With the increase in demand for hardware and computing power, the power consumption of farm -type mining process is also increasing. Although there are no specific figures, according to a study from the University of Cambridge and IEA, cryptocurrency mining consumes about 127 Taiwa time each year (as of 2021), and its annual energy consumption is equivalent to millions of Netherlands with a population of 17. It is expected that by 2024, China's mining industry alone will consume 297 Taiwaphta electricity and generate 130.5 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Black market and economy

Comparing the energy consumption of cryptocurrency mining with the energy consumption of the energy consumption of small industrialized countries. Large -scale mine relies on cheap energy prices, which are usually available in poor countries. Therefore, the profit of high mining profits is generated at the cost of weak economy and poor population. At the same time, the use of cryptocurrencies as a black market has further weakened the economy.

The price of cryptocurrencies is unstable

As the price of cryptocurrencies soared, many people are fascinated by the idea of this "fast rich" plan, but they often do nothing. Not everyone considers the volatility and risk of cryptocurrencies, and invested more funds than they deserve.

In addition, miners who spend thousands of dollars on electricity costs do not know that they may be hacking. Because the return cannot be guaranteed, if you do not consider appropriate, investing in cryptocurrencies may be very dangerous.

The sudden collapse of the excavated coins may cause the overall income to fluctuate sharply, which will eventually determine whether an encrypted mining company can maintain it for a long time. This makes the mining company more vulnerable, especially considering the restrictions and suppression measures that the government may take. If the cryptocurrency market has been declining for a long time, crypto mining companies may quickly decide to transfer investment to other places and reduce losses instead of working hard to keep up with costs and regulations.

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Cryptocurrency mining leads to rising GPU prices

The trend of encryption also led to rising GPUs in 2017.

The GTX 1070 Ti released at $ 450 is sold at $ 1,100. In addition, the 6GB GPU of GTX 1060 is priced at $ 500 and the original price is $ 250. It is not a real "danger", but its influence is still enough to consider.

In 2020 and 2021, the demand for mining hardware and the shortage of global semiconductor chips increased the price. The transaction price of GPU was thousands of dollars higher than the recommended retail price.

Illegal cryptocurrency mining -how do cyber criminals invade your computer

Use the JavaScript command for encrypted mining

Basically, two types of illegal cryptocurrency mining must be distinguished. The most common method is to use encrypted mining program Coinhive, which is classified as "potential harmful procedures" by most anti -virus programs. Because it is based on JavaScript, it can be easily installed on the web page and is easily downloaded by most browsers. However, the legal situation is not clear. Information security expert Brian Krebs recently called the program as "one of the biggest threats facing network users". In fact, the plan's practice is extremely abandoned. Websites infected by CoinHive will force the device to excavate cryptocurrencies of their visitors -usually when the victims have not noticed or have no consent in advance. Some of them even use a complete CPU function, such as the Crypto Mining program contained on the Portuguese football star Christianonaro. But this method has a decisive disadvantage for Coinhive users: only when someone is actively active on the website, cryptocurrencies will be tapped. If they leave the site, the encryption mining process will be suspended.

How can I effectively protect myself from illegal cryptocurrency mining?

First of all: there is no "that" protection for illegal cryptocurrency mining, but combines different security solutions to combat unnecessary mining. On the one hand, it is important to understand how cyber criminals are illegally encrypted mining and what tools they use. Correct safety awareness is the basis of effective prevention. As a supplement, the anti -virus program should be installed on the computer and always maintains the latest -this is naturally applicable to all other programs and operating systems. If you want to download the software from the Internet, you should only download it through a trusted source. The famous download portal also provides software download, hoping to install other software during the installation process. Encrypted tubes.

In addition, spam may also include a link to a website contaminated by Crypto Mining Droppers. Because it is difficult to distinguish the well -processed spam from ordinary emails, it is specially recommended that the company uses the trusteent spam filter service. It is also recommended to pay more attention to surfing online. Due to the rarely identified pages of suspicious, malicious software infections, it is also recommended to use a network filter. This will reliably warn users' potential harmful content before calling the page. This can prevent encryption from mining malware, but also to prevent all other harmful content.

The above content is about the harm and danger of cryptocurrency mining. If you are undergoing cryptocurrency mining, you need to analyze how much these risks and hazards have on you, and you must reasonably avoid these dangers. If you are considering entering the cryptocurrency mining industry, then you must consider these risk factors and avoid these risks.

Is cryptocurrency mining harmful? The dangers of crypto mining