Bitcoin.org, the website that hosts the bitcoin code, returned to life after a distributed denial of service attack (DDoS) blocked the site in the early hours of Saturday morning.
A Distributed Denial of Service hack at Bitcoin.org
The website hosts the Bitcoin Core, the most popular software version of the bitcoin code. To be clear: Bitcoin's blockchain was not affected by the attack, as opposed to the website hosting a copy of its open source code.
While the site was inaccessible, Bitcoiners spread the software to newcomers who wanted to download the code via a torrenting service, an open source marketplace for data sharing.
The client of Bitcoin Pro includes a "magnetic link" (a random alphanumeric string) that can be manually shared to download Bitcoin Core from services such as uTorrent and BitTorrent.
From this link, the user can locate the hash where Bitcoin Core is stored on these services and download the software. Called a "Distributed Denial of Service", a DDoS attack occurs when a person or group uses multiple devices to spam a server or system with requests for data, obstructing its bandwidth and generally making the website being accessed inaccessible. aim.
DDoS attacks are common as Bitcoin hits new price records
Bitcoin.org is now live again. Cobra, a pseudonymous developer who collaborates in the maintenance of Bitcoin.org, explained that DDoS attacks are not uncommon during a rapid rise in cryptocurrency prices and that this specific attack may not end anytime soon.
“Basically, we've been hit with a large DDoS, which is a fairly common occurrence around ATH (all-time highs) and bull markets. It has brought us down for a while, but for now we are back on our feet, although we may periodically have problems depending on how long the hackers keep attacking ”.
Bitcoin's price continues to rise, setting a new all-time high of $ 24.122,67 on Saturday. The cryptocurrency's record price comes two days after breaking the $ 23.000 price mark for the first time, with an intraday rise of more than 12%.
With the latest price hike, bitcoin's year-to-date percentage earnings have grown to over 225%. Cobra revealed that the attack's IP address is Russian, but no one can guess where the hackers actually are.
This is because, in addition to hackers using privacy tools such as virtual private networks (VPNs), most of them launch DDoS attacks remotely from malware-infested devices, explained the independent researcher known as 6102. A DDoS attack against a distributed network such as a blockchain - called a sybil attack - has never occurred on the Bitcoin blockchain.
