Bitmain SC mining machine was attacked, SIA core developers launched an attack

Cryptocurrency chip manufacturing giant Bitmain is in trouble again as its ASIC chips for the decentralized storage protocol Siacoin have been targeted by competitors.

According to foreign media CoinDesk, a startup called Obelisk has proposed codes, and the purpose of these codes is to abolish Bitmain’s siacoin ASIC mining machines.

“This will enable the Sia community to implement the ability to fork Siacoin and render non-Obelisk-made Siacoin ASIC miners on the forked chain ineffective,” the Obelisk founder wrote.

This news is worth noting as Bitmain is currently aiming for one of the largest IPOs in history.

As described in the investor document, Bitmain’s mining business is not limited to Bitcoin, but also involves Siacoin. As the current overlord in the field of digital currency mining, Bitmain currently also supports Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Dash and Ethereum.

Despite this, SiaCoin's current total market value is only US$170 million, which makes it the smallest portion of Bitmain's investment portfolio.

It is reported that Obelisk was founded by David Vorick, a core developer of Siacoin. It is a community-funded ASIC manufacturer that was defeated by Bitmain in the past, which also caused conflicts in the Siacoin community. In fact, the code of Obelisk is essentially designed to remove competing ASIC miners, however, it has not been activated due to concerns that it may cause a split in the blockchain.

Yet according to Vorick, the mood at the grassroots appears to be shifting as more conflicts of interest arise.

“As of now, all Nebulous (the company that employs Sia’s core developers) and Obelisk employees are supporters of this fork,” he said in the email.

According to the email, the code will be released in the coming weeks. In addition, the mining equipment developed by Obelisk itself is almost complete and the company expects to start shipping it this week.

It is reported that such incidents are not without precedent. As early as the beginning of this year, the well-known privacy digital currency Monero executed code to abolish Bitmain's ASIC mining machines.

The following is the full email:

plan

Dear Obelisk Customers,

Mining machine production is currently underway, the firmware is almost complete, and we expect to ship it this week. Our team, board of directors, and legal advisors have all agreed to share this plan.

First, we will use the expected mining revenue to compensate the first batch of customers. Since we missed the initial estimated shipping date, we will use the mining revenue to compensate all first batch customers. As of now, it is about 90 USD per SC1 miner and 250 USD per DCR1 miner. This policy will also apply if we miss the shipping date of batches 2-5.

We will start paying customers compensation after the fifth shipment. Obelisk will estimate your expected mining revenue based on the hashrate of 800 GH/s for a single SC1 and 1500 GH/s for a DCR1. Compensation will be calculated in USD, assuming you convert your mined coins into USD every day and your electricity costs are 0.

In the coming weeks, we will develop a more complete compensation guide and publish our official calculations so that they can be reviewed by the community. After Obelisk delivers the fifth batch of miners, Obelisk will conduct an audit based on its financial situation, which may take several months or longer to compensate all customers.

Secondly, we will be releasing an alternative algorithm to SC1 in the coming weeks. This enables the Sia community to implement the ability to fork Siacoin and invalidate all non-Obelisk manufactured Siacoin ASIC miners on the forked chain.

SIA core developers are currently considering the proposal from community member FaustianAGI and will release an official response soon. As of now, all employees of Nebulous (the company that employs SIA's core developers) and Obelisk are supporters of this fork.

There are still many details to be worked out, but we promise to provide more information in the coming weeks. We will spare no effort to fulfill your order and will keep you updated as we progress.

The Obelisk team.

What do you think?