Cornell University researchers propose solution to selfish mining attack

According to btcmanager, two research scientists at Cornell University, Cyril Grenspan and Ricardo Perez-Marco, published a new research paper that proposed a new perspective on the theory of selfish mining. The paper, titled "On the Profitability of Selfish Mining," explores the relationship between this attack vector and time.

The two hypothesized that the length of the attack duration directly affects its profitability. The paper states, "Although the total hash power of the network remains the same, the new difficulty is smaller than it should be and the block verification time decreases. Therefore, the income per unit time of the selfish miners is improved and makes the attack profitable." "Our idea is to include the number of orphan blocks in the difficulty adjustment formula. This can be achieved by indicating the miners who have uncles in the blocks they mine, and these miners communicate this data by including their header and peers. Signaling from only honest miners is sufficient."