Found vulnerability in ASIC miner firmware for Bitcoin mining Antminer S15

A few weeks ago, Bitcoin Core developer James Hilliard discovered a vulnerability in the ASIC miner firmware Antminer S15 , produced by the Chinese company Bitmain. A Twitter user named 00whiterabbit subsequently created an exploit based on the facts established by Hilliard, and Hilliard himself posted a video with evidence of the bug's performance. This writes Bitcoin Magazine.

Hilliard is ready to provide Bitmain with information about the vulnerability, but only if it complies with the requirements of the popular license for GNU open source software, which the company is currently violating.

"Bitmain firmware is generally pretty buggy, " Hilliard said.

For the health of the Bitcoin network, it is important that Bitmain be able to fix these bugs. ”

Hilliard, best known as the author of the BIP 91 bitcoin improvement proposal used to activate SegWit, discovered a vulnerability when he studied the updated firmware file on the Bitmain support site. He claims that the bug can affect not only the latest firmware version of the most powerful Bitner miner for mining Bitcoin using the SHA256 algorithm , but also other software versions.

“I can say with a great deal of confidence that there are other vulnerabilities in this firmware. It is very poorly developed in terms of security, ” he added.

The described vulnerability allows root access to the device. In theory, all the necessary operations can be carried out even remotely, knowing only the miner's IP address, and then reprogramming it in order to establish the necessary settings for the cracker.

For example, with its help, you can change the address of the Bitcoin wallet to which the cryptocurrency is sent, completely stop mining or install your own firmware.

In practice, however, an attacker is unlikely to find an unprotected miner. To protect yourself, users simply configure firewall properly or use a strong password. In addition, to create an individual firmware attacker will need to gain access to the original software code.

"A more serious problem is that the Bitmain firmware as a whole contains many bugs ," explained Hilliard.

So, at the beginning of 2017, an anonymous cybersecurity expert discovered a vulnerability, which was later called Antbleed and allowed to remotely disable Antminer devices. The problem affected not only the owners of the miners themselves, but also the Bitcoin network as a whole, since it could suddenly lose half of its computing power.

"By right, Bitmain should open the code of its firmware," Hilliard said, noting that the company's software is based on the cgminer program he developed himself, which supports the open source policy. – But Bitmain doesn't seem to care about copyrights. Unfortunately, closed-source firmware has a negative effect on the Bitcoin network, as it may be hiding something like Antbleed. This is one of the risks of centralization. ”

The reason why Bitmain refuses to disclose the code of its software and violates the principles of GNU is not quite obvious. Hilliard suggests that the company does not want users to set up their own equipment, depriving it of a possible source of income. Others admit that in this way Bitmain protects its devices from intruders who may try to find vulnerabilities in them for mercenary reasons.

Hilliard, however, does not lose hope that the situation may change:

“In the past, they published a code that looked like a real one, presumably under public pressure. Maybe it will turn out now? "

Publication date 02.02.2019
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