Cryptocurrency mining in the browser unexpectedly rose from the dead / Sudo Null IT News

Overview of options and services for browser mining

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Cryptocurrency mining is a popular type of earnings that promises users high incomes. To organize a standard farm, for example, for litecoin or dog, you need significant investments to purchase equipment. If you don’t have a powerful computer and start-up capital, then mining bitcoins in a browser is an economical alternative. It will not enrich the owner of the equipment, but it will help deal with monetization operations.

Tried, tested and buried

Browser mining, as the name suggests, is a method of mining cryptocurrencies that takes place inside a browser using a scripting language.
It differs from the more well-known cryptocurrency mining system, where the user downloads and runs a special executable file. Browser mining first appeared in May 2011, when the innovative service BitcoinPlus.com first launched - when Bitcoin was cheap and mining was easy (not to be confused with another cryptocurrency known as Bitcoin Plus (XBC)). This service was remarkably similar in many ways to its modern reincarnation, Coinhive. It used JavaScript code for mining, and website owners could subscribe to the service and insert scripts into web pages to have visitors mine crypto for them. The big difference was that in 2011, as the name suggests, BitcoinPlus.com mined Bitcoin (BTC), while today's browser-based miners like Coinhive mine Monero (XMR), a new privacy-focused cryptocurrency. In 2011, before ASIC mining appeared (in 2013), Bitcoin was in its infancy, the difficulty of mining was low, and the cost of cryptocurrencies was even lower. It was almost possible to mine currencies using a home computer. While it was possible at the time to mine Bitcoin through BitcoinPlus.com, in practice it was largely useless. The rewards were paltry compared to the power and electricity required. Of course, this was before Bitcoin prices took off - in June 2011, the value of Bitcoin rose to a then-high of $30.

Due to a fundamental problem with profits from browser mining, the service soon disappeared. However, the idea was revived in December 2013 by a group of MIT students in the form of Tidbit, ostensibly touted as an alternative way for website owners to make money. Once again, this project did not survive long, because shortly after its launch, the New Jersey branch of the US consumer protection agency began investigating the new company on charges of illegal use of users' computer power. The result was a lengthy trial that was only fully completed in 2015.

The prospects for browser mining were very modest. The growing profitability problem was worsened by the increase in the number of ASIC miners. This process took Bitcoin mining away from home users and into the industrial realm, dominated by the massive mining rigs more familiar to us today. After the disappearance of Tidbit, the idea of browser-based JavaScript-based cryptocurrency mining largely died again.

But despite all these problems, key lessons have been learned. The goal of a service like Tidbit was never to use separate servers or powerful computers for mining. The true power of this service lies in scaling and harnessing the potentially enormous combined power of a large number of mid-hardware website visitors. More traffic means more profits, and sooner or later, someone had to come up with a better way to make browser mining work more efficiently on end users' computers.

How else can you increase your Bitcoin mining speed?

1. The easiest way is to increase the bitcoin mining speed slider in the lower left corner to the maximum, then the mining speed will increase. But, there is a side effect in the form of slowing down your computer. I recommend that when working on a computer, set the slider to 50% of the possible, and when you are not working on it, then to 100% or if you leave it running overnight.

2. Affiliate program to attract referrals . There is also an ENLARGE button at the bottom, click on it and you will go to the affiliate program page for attracting referrals.

There we are asked to invite new users to install CryptoTab using the unique link below (https://getcryptotab.com/1627095) to earn more bitcoins.

We will transfer to you 15% of the mining amount of the users you invite from our own mining capacity
We will also pay 10% of the mining of users brought by your users through their own links.
The affiliate network includes payments up to 10 levels of nested friends. The number of levels will be lower in the future, hurry up!
All income accrued through the affiliate program is paid out of our own mining capacity, and not by cutting the income of your friends.
The larger and more active your network of friends, the rapidly greater your income!
Get more than 1 BTC! Build your network and get worthwhile rewards!

As you understand, you won’t earn a lot of bitcoins by simple mining, but by involving your friends in this process you will increase your income many times over. Next, the system asks us to theoretically calculate the income from friends. I chose this way: I invited 5 friends and each of them invited 5 more friends, see what came out of it in the picture below.

Dawn of the Dead

Fast forward to September 2022, when the landscape of cryptocurrencies has changed dramatically compared to 2013.
In April 2013, there were very few types of crypto on the market, and its total capitalization was estimated at only $1.5 billion. The crypto market was limited and illiquid, which meant that even if you earn something, it is very difficult to convert it into fiat money and spend. This is in stark contrast to September 2022, when the market capitalization reached $166 billion, spread across more than a thousand different cryptocurrencies. In addition to the variety of coins, a variety of reward mechanisms for working with them has also appeared. Some, like Bitcoin, can be mined through proof-of-work (PoW) using power-hungry ASICs - although there have been attempts to change this through various offshoots of the project, such as Bitcoin Gold (BTG) and Bitcoin Diamond (BCD). ), designed for mining via GPU. Other cryptocurrencies like Monero, Ethereum (ETH), Ethereum Classic (ETC), and Dash (DASH) can be mined using commercially available GPUs, which can be found in many computers. There are currencies that are more suitable for CPU mining - Monero and Verium Reserve (VRM). The trading environment has also changed - it is now much easier to exchange fiat money and crypto, which makes the latter more useful and valuable.

It was against this backdrop that the Coinhive service released its scripts capable of mining Monero, which brings the idea of browser-based mining back to life.

Browser mining Cryptobrowser

Cryptobrowser is a browser that supports high-speed mining for Bitcoin. At the same time, the Cryptobrowser platform itself is created on the Google Chrome engine, which simplifies its use, the only difference is the ability to earn money. An excellent option for monetizing the time spent on the computer, in this regard, the project resembled the Globus-inter program, which pays for searching sites, but only better and more productive. At the moment, this is the most expensive mining.

News travels fast

Coinhive is promoted as an alternative to browser advertising.
The motivation is simple: users pay for content indirectly, through mining, when visiting a site, and site owners do not have to bother users with advertising, trackers and other usual paraphernalia. Users end up with cleaner, faster, and potentially less dangerous sites, and everyone is happy. What could go wrong? Soon after the service was released, hash calculation speeds began to increase rapidly. Hash counting speed is the number of hashes counted in total by all miners, measured as the number of hashes per second. This figure is usually measured in millions (MH/s). Hashing is a calculation of cryptographic parameters used to process transactions. Miners who participate in the general fund calculations receive their share of the income generated by the entire fund.

According to the Coinhive blog, hash calculation speed jumped from 0 MH/s to 3 MH/s in a couple of days, and then increased to 13.5 MH/s within a week. To make it clear, the overall speed of hash calculation for the entire network (the total amount of mining power of all computers involved in this) for Monero on September 20, 2022 was within 260 MH/s. The total capacity of the Coinhive pool reached 5% of this figure, which is quite good for such a short period.

Monero can be mined on both CPU and GPU, but Coinhive's in-browser mining service only works on CPUs, and this limitation seriously reduces potential earnings.

To maximize profits, the script is best placed on websites with high traffic, as well as on sites where the user stays on the page for a long time. According to one of the first users, the profit from mining on his site turned out to be much less than the profit from advertising.

To Coinhive’s credit, it is worth saying that the project recommends being transparent with website visitors and notifying users about mining taking place, and even better, offering users ways to participate in it. Unfortunately, despite good intentions, unscrupulous operators quickly adopted the idea of secret mining in the hope that users would not notice.

BrowserMine service

If you are looking for where browser mining came from, then pay attention to the BrowserMine resource. It was he who became the catalyst for a new wave of this type of cryptocurrency mining. Not surprising, because browsermine works for the user and everything here is used for his convenience. To gain access to the opportunity to earn cryptocurrency, you do not need additional invitations, completing special tasks or viewing ads.

To read: Review and setup of Claymore Dual Miner, examples of use and expert advice

The user receives a small gift for simply opening the page. All you need to do is leave the page open in the background insert and after that go about your business while the resource little by little collects more and more money into your account. But before using browser-based mining without investments, you should perform the following manipulations:

You need to move the slider to the right and increase the standard power, since the higher it is, the larger the amount earned in the browser will be,
The next nuance is the speed, which is measured in conventional units BMH/s (BrowserMineHash per second),
One more thing you need to know in order to mine directly in the browser: with an interval of 10 minutes, previously collected BMH will be converted into the local browser cryptocurrency BMC (BrowserMineCoin). True, the resource itself states that conversion occurs every half hour, but in reality this is not the case,
To withdraw bmc, you will need to collect at least 0.1 BMC,
BMC obtained through browser mining can be exchanged for any money at the user’s request,
The mining speed depends on how powerful the processor is. If you are looking for ways to increase the speed of browser mining, then first of all increase the performance of your processor. Although you can mine not only from a computer, but also using other devices that will complement each other’s work, increasing the overall power of the equipment,
The basis of the activity is in an open tab, which in no case should be closed, otherwise production will stop. At the same time, it is not necessary to stay on it, the main thing is that it is open. And for those who want to cheat and open several tabs at once, there is unpleasant news: nothing will work, since only one of the open tabs will work, the rest will simply stand in the background, and nothing will happen on them,

To increase your income, the user can use one little trick. Send your friends and acquaintances a so-called mini-miner, which will not take up much space and require a lot of power, but at the same time will allow you to increase your income, since it will mine coins from several computers. But there is a nuance: not everyone will agree to help you, so it looks good only in theory, but in practice it is not so easy to find helpers,
A fraudulent way to increase profits is to install a miner on a website. This is not a good idea, as you can ruin your reputation online, especially if the site is popular,
And if you attract people to register and engage in mining, you can get +8% of everyone’s profit, which is also a good addition to the general piggy bank,
BrowserMine will work perfectly only with the latest versions of browsers such as: Chrome, Opera, Firefox. But some browser plugins, in particular AdBlock, block BrowserMine. Therefore, pay attention to this and disable these plugins in the settings. And if it doesn't work, just use a different browser,
By the way, the system works on mobile versions of these browsers. Just keep in mind that BrowserMine on mobile devices drains the battery catastrophically quickly, so it’s better to have it connected to the electrical network for constant power supply,
To withdraw your earned money, you need to register and log into your personal account. If this is not done, the money will be transferred to the system.

In theory, everything looks more than promising, but miners should understand that using this resource implies a significantly increased load on the CPU, because increased computer power is needed. Because of this, the computer wears out faster. Naturally, not everyone will agree to sacrifice hardware for a small profit, which will not even half pay for the purchase of new equipment. Although you can reduce the load on your equipment. To do this, use the special setting in the upper right corner.

Start of stream

The first popular site to start using Coinhive was the torrent tracker The Pirate Bay.
The site's history has not been a smooth one, and since it is so popular (ranking 161 in the global site rankings with 290 million visitors in the last six months), it is constantly looking for alternative ways to monetize its voluminous traffic. His initial attempts at mining were quickly noticed by users who did not like it very much. At least in this case, the decision to use Coinhive was made by the site owners. The Pirate Bay was soon followed by another popular project - this time a miner from Coinhive was found on two Showtime sites. One of the sites involved provided streaming video, it had a lot of traffic and users remained on the page for a long time while the video was transmitted to the browser. Showtime is a paid service, so it’s quite strange that users were forced to pay twice for content. The scripts were quickly removed after discovery, suggesting they may have been placed there with malicious intent.

Reports soon followed of numerous other sites where Coinhive mining scripts were found. During the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States, the Coinhive miner was discovered in the LiveHelpNow widget used on many different sites that offers chat with customer support. The reason for this was that one of the CDN servers used by LiveHelpNow was compromised. As with Showtime, LiveHelpNow is a legitimate and profitable business, so it's unclear why it would risk the trust of its users to make a few extra dollars. So, the most likely option seems to be that the server was compromised by a third party, possibly working for the company.

Mining in the browser periodically appears in other places:

These scripts have already been seen in several browser extensions and plugins.
Fake support pages are embedded by miners to make even more money. The CPU load caused by mining can help convince the user that there is a problem and increase the chances of getting scammed.
People are even trying to mine on reserved domains - the kind that you occasionally end up with if you misspell the site name.

Browser Mining 2022 - Best Sites

There are now a lot of sites with browser-based mining of bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies, so I offer my selection, which includes the best and 100% paying sites with good reviews. Some of them are large systems for making money on the Internet and mining for them is just one of the tools for making a profit. Of course, I think it’s unlikely that you will be able to work on all of them at the same time, but to find a site that offers the best browser-based mining and the most profitable for your PC, it is quite possible that for this you will have to test more than one site and compare the income received from them. It is also worth taking into account fluctuations in cryptocurrency rates; if today one mining site may come out ahead in terms of profitability, then tomorrow, perhaps, it will be another. Therefore, having a large selection of browser-based mining sites is more of a plus than a minus.

Why is mining in the browser gaining momentum?

There are many reasons for the return of browser mining. Unlike previous failed attempts, recent developments in cryptocurrencies have made this activity more profitable. Let's look at some of the factors in more detail.

The emergence of privacy-focused cryptocurrencies

Privacy is important if you want to mine coins secretly without other people being able to trace them back to you. Monero, which entered the market in 2014, offers a high level of transaction privacy. Unlike other cryptocurrencies that use public transparent blockchains where transaction addresses are viewable by anyone, Monero works differently. By default, everything is hidden in it, including the transfer amount, sender and recipient. There is an option where wallet owners can selectively reveal information using a “view key,” but this feature is unlikely to be used by cybercriminals.

Ease of use

As mentioned, Coinhive provides a user-friendly and easy-to-use software package for people who want to get involved in Monero mining. All you need to do is add a few lines of code to your website code. There is no need to force visitors to download and install executable files.

The mining process can begin quickly and quietly, unless the processor is heavily overloaded, making mining easy to detect.

Profitability of mining on regular computers on a large scale

The price of Monero recently surpassed $300, and the total computing power of the network reaches 300 MH/s, so profitable mining is a large-scale game that requires careful cost estimation.
In the case of mining in the browser, its cost is borne mainly by visitors, due to wear and tear on the hardware and wasted energy. Scale is achieved by using sites with high traffic and long presence on the pages.

Coinhive currently pays out 0.000104 XMR ($0.025) per million hashes. If we take a PC user with an average Intel i7-7700K processor capable of processing 300 H/s, then he will need to spend 3333 seconds on the site, or 55 minutes, to calculate a million hashes. But if you can get 3,333 users to spend one second on the site, the result will be the same.

Even under optimal conditions, the number of hashes produced in each case will be small, but with distributed computer power, everything depends on scale, and it is collected from the world one by one.

Cryptocurrency growth factor

As we have already noted, the value of mining rewards is small, at least at first.
To better understand the situation, you need to look at the profitability of this activity in the long term and take into account the macroeconomic component. The value of cryptocurrencies like Monero is growing at an impressive pace. In 2022, the cost increased from $13 to $300. Under such conditions, where the value of Monero can increase greatly in dollar terms in a fairly short time, mining Monero can become attractive. A small number of coins mined today could be worth serious money in just a few months (or significantly cheaper, depending on the crypto-economics). Reflecting increased interest in crypto and its value, in recent months there has been a large jump in the number of miners we have discovered, both executable and browser-based.

Earnings on FreeBitcoin

Naturally, we could not ignore earnings on one of the most popular resources, FreeBitcoin, because browser-based mining on it is one of the most profitable on the network.

To get high earnings in browser mining on this resource, you need to go through a small procedure. It looks like this:

Log in to the main page of the service. To get here, you need to register. In order to register, enter your email address, password and ID of the user who invited you. After this, the system will create a new account,
When the registration procedure is completed, you will be invited to go to the MINING section. If you don’t see it right away, the link to this page is located in the top menu of the site,
When you are in the mining section, study the data presented there. In particular, the following values are shown here: YOUR HASH RATE is, as the name implies, the user’s hashrate, HASHES SOLVED indicates the number of already solved hashes available to the user, TOTAL MINING INCOME is an indicator of your income from mining for the entire time, in other words, it shows how much can you earn in a mining browser,
The next thing you need to pay attention to is the mining settings. There are only two of them here. The first is THREADS, that is, the number of processor cores that are used for mining. And the second indicator that you definitely need to check is CPU USAGE, which indicates the percentage of your processor being used. Typically, the system sets the maximum number of cores, and the processor is used at 100%. The load in this case is too high, so it is advisable to change these indicators,
When finished, when the settings that suit you are already set, press the START MINING button located at the bottom of the page. After this, mining will start.

By the way, it is very important that you cannot close the tab in which the browser is running, otherwise mining will stop. That is, you must always have a browser open on your screen.

To predict the possible result of browser mining, you can use a special calculator, as well as photos or videos on the Internet. But you shouldn't count on good results. The profitability of this type of mining is very conditional. People receive play money, as opposed to mining through special programs. The benefit is only for the person who owns this browser.

In addition, mining through a processor has long lost its relevance; only beginners use it to understand the principle of such activity. But here you can learn how to set up a mining program, which, again, will be useful for novice users.

Despite this, FreeBitcoin is a very popular service, so it wouldn’t hurt to try browser mining with it. At least the settings here are simple and fully demonstrate the principle of such activity.

Mine on the go

Stealth mining is not limited to desktop computers and servers. Internet-connected mobile devices are increasingly becoming its target. In recent years, we have seen an increase in mining on mobile phones. In 2016, we found 26 different Android apps involved in cryptocurrency mining. In 2017, we have already found 35 - 34% more.

The processing power of modern mobile phones can be comparable to that of low-end or mid-range desktop computers, which helps increase the value of mobile mining. But this process is always energy-intensive, which is why the biggest problem with mobile mining will be rapid battery drain as battery technology lags behind the growth of computing power. Mobile mining will inevitably be noticed due to excess heat and rapid battery drain, not to mention the speed issues that the device may experience.

Use CryptoTab on all your devices

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What does the future hold for us?

If we consider the cryptocurrency market as a whole, we can see that along with the multiple increase in the value of cryptocurrencies, the interest in malicious mining, both based on browsers and executable files, is also increasing.
And with increasing interest, more and more people are joining the activity, both miners and tool manufacturers. Coinhive, although the most famous project, does not own the entire market. Similar projects are emerging, such as Crypto Loot, or JSEcoin, which has been in beta testing since August 2022, and are also trying to grow.

Symantec has seen a significant uptick in mining activity in recent months, reflected in the number of malicious app detections. Despite the sincere desire of most browser mining projects to offer a real and potentially better alternative to traditional ways of making money, the sad reality is that this method can be abused, and in fact happens.

Increased user awareness and detection of this activity by security companies will trigger a new arms race between cybercriminals and defenders. Recent innovations in the malicious use of browser-based mining scripts, such as hidden pop-ups that launch the miner, are indications of this process. You can expect a wide range of malware distribution channels and detection evasion technologies to be used to help spread and prolong the mining process to maximize profits. As long as current factors work in favor of mining, we can expect interest in browser mining to maintain or even increase in the short to medium term.

Browser mining browsermine.com

Browsermine – pays for mining in browser mining in BMC. This cryptocurrency is local and is produced only on the browsermine website, i.e. while the site is running it is available, which is common with browser mining. When withdrawing, it is converted into regular rubles, which can be withdrawn to top payment systems, like hashto.cash.

How Symantec helps prevent browser mining

Symantec is closely monitoring the growing trend of browser mining.
As necessary, we are making changes to prevent unwanted cryptocurrency miners from running and stealing your computer's resources to enrich third parties. Website owners need to monitor the injection of mining scripts into the code of their website. Our networking solutions can help you spot this activity in your network traffic as your server communicates with visitors. In addition, a file system scan can show all files that may be associated with browser mining, which will help you detect and remove this unwanted content.

Symantec helps prevent theft of computer resources by protecting your computer at various stages of an attack.

Blocking network traffic associated with browser mining

Any mining software, whether file-based or browser-based, must be able to communicate with either the cryptocurrency network or a pool of miners to exchange data - that is, to prove the work has been done.
Without such a connection, it cannot obtain the data needed to generate hashes and becomes useless. You can also immediately block the downloading of mining scripts. Our network protection works on endpoints, gateways and in the cloud. All these solutions help create reliable protection against unwanted mining. Here are some of the network security signatures aimed at detecting browser mining:

Web Attack: PUA.JSCoinminer Download Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 6 Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 7 Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 8 Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 10 Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 12 Web Attack: JSCoinminer Download 13 Web Attack : JSCoinminer Download 14 Audit: JSCoinminer Download 3

How to Mine Bitcoins Using Google Chrome

Quick instructions for installing an extension for bitcoin mining:

To mine bitcoins using the Google Chrome Internet browser you need to install an extension on your browser using https://getcryptotab.com/1627095

2. Click + ADD CHROME AND EARN.

You will see an ADD TO CHROME , click on it and the extension will be installed in the Google CHROME browser (this extension can also be installed on Yandex Browser, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, etc.).

3. In the “ Install CryptoTab ” icon, click “ Install extension”

4. Click PROCEED - NEXT - NEXT. Next, click on the icon of this extension (in the upper right corner of the browser) and you will be taken to the Bitcoin mining page.

Not required steps, but recommended

5. Add CryptoSearch and improve Bitcoin mining! 6. Using CryptoSearch you reduce the minimum payout by 40 times and do not pay any commissions.

Further

7. Click to the right of ENTER ( Join icon VK , FB , Google+ and Twitter )

8. Login - Log in to your VK , FB , Google+ and Twitter . This is necessary so that if the extension is deleted, you can log into your account again and save the mined bitcoins.

9. The “ Crypto Tab ” application will receive: a public profile and email. address. Next Edit - Continue as 10. Now your Bitcoin balance and referral network will be automatically saved. 11. To receive payments, you must have a Bitcoin wallet address. 12. If you don’t have it, see FAQ

How to withdraw earnings

Platforms for specialized web mining made sure that users did not have unnecessary questions about how to withdraw earnings. Popular resources offer sending funds to the most well-known payment systems or to bank cards.

It is worth noting that you will not be able to receive cryptocurrency directly. Users’ resources are used to receive digital money, but they themselves accumulate an intra-system asset, which is later converted into classical money and withdrawn to fiat digital wallets/cards.

However, they always have the opportunity to visit one of the popular online exchangers, on whose sites they can quickly and anonymously buy digital money for fiat. It is worth noting that such resources always have good bonus programs and referral earnings systems that increase the profit for an individual client significantly.

Hidden browser mining – how to protect yourself?

The answer for those who google a question like “Hidden browser mining - how to protect yourself”: the Chrome browser will be the ideal protection against this type of cryptocurrency accumulation. Built into its structure is protection against excessive resource consumption by all possible sites. Thus, when pages that are too power hungry appear, the browser forcibly turns on energy saving mode for them.

In conjunction with other browsers, it is recommended to use AdBlock and Ublock browser permissions. Along with their main function (ad blocking), they will also do an excellent job of protecting against unauthorized mining of Monero or other cryptocurrencies through the browser.

Browser mining of other cryptocurrencies

Proxy-web

— (selectively pays) is a simple program that pays you for work on your device. It is a reliable source of income that does not contain viruses or other nonsense, works inconspicuously and pays into a convenient WebMoney wallet with a minimum wage of 100 rubles. Payments are also possible to Qiwi wallet and phone of Russian operators. The more time the Proxy-web program is running on your PC, the more you earn. Overall, an excellent option for additional monetization of your device.

Mine coinpot is a cryptocurrency wallet that can also be used for mining. The project offers mining: BITCOIN CORE, BITCOIN CASH, DOGECOIN, LITECOIN and DASH and for tokens. In general, the project is better known as a wallet for reliable Bitcoin and moon faucets.

leopays

(not reliable - the site is buggy and the idea is not promising) - on this site, the LeoPaysCoin cryptocurrency is awarded for using the site, which is essentially a private social network, where you can register only by invitation. Here you will receive rewards for simply using this site, for example, watching videos, developing your groups, for likes, for posts, comments, and even for the games that are there. Pays per peer.