Author: Mike Hearn 2014-04-23 07:55:30
Published on: 2014-04-23T07:55:30+00:00
a benefit in accepting Bitcoin, because it provides access to a large and growing market. However, the recent Finney attacks as a service launched by BitUndo have raised concerns over the security of Bitcoin transactions. Finney attacks involve a miner secretly working on a block containing a double spend, which they pay for and then broadcast the block. In a simpler variant of this attack, a modified wallet is used to make purchases as normal, but always submits a double spend to the service. N% of the time where N is the percentage of overall hash power the dishonest miners have, the money is returned minus their fee.The use of such attacks renders Bitcoin much less useful, particularly for real-time transactions which are important for purchases of food and drink. Despite its woeful security, many merchants still see a benefit in accepting Bitcoin due to its access to a large and growing market. If Bitcoin cannot support real-time transactions, its popularity could decline.
Updated on: 2023-06-08T20:56:17.843161+00:00