4 ms·

Who stands to gain from repeatedly DDoSing Mt. Gox?

olalonde 14y ago
Other Bitcoin exchanges.
fchollet 14y ago
Speculators. Slowing down exchanges drives the price of BTC down. So the plan is to start a massive DDoS, stop it, buy BTC at a lower price, and sell it again when the prices went back to their previous levels.
pemulis 14y ago
The two most obvious culprits would be: 1) People trying to make the price of bitcoins drop, so that they can buy low and sell high. (This possibility is called out in the article.) 2. Criminals trying to extract a ransom from Mt. Gox, which is losing a lot of revenue and trust every minute their site is down.
- rubinelli 14y ago
  I think (2) is more likely at this point. There's only so much a market will take before it tanks and stays down for months. This kind of market (along with porn and gambling) is a great target for botnet controllers trying to make a buck.
willlll 14y ago
People who want it to go back to its original function of a magic the gathering online exchange
- ConceitedCode 14y ago
  Is that really how it started? What prompted the change?
  - willlll 14y ago
    Yes. http://web.archive.org/web/20070817170606/http://mtgox.com/gwt/mtgox.php http://web.archive.org/web/20070817170606/http://mtgox.com/g...
    - idupree 14y ago
      A couple years after 2007, it appears mtgox.com was being a fantasy game (possibly inspired by Magic The Gathering but not the same) http://web.archive.org/web/20090812073342/http://www.mtgox.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20090812073342/http://www.mtgox.c...
  - dustcoin 14y ago
    The original owner of mtgox had the domain name lying around. As far as I know, even the original mtgox bitcoin exchange shared no code with a card exchange.
jvm 14y ago
Nobody's mentioned it, but their competitors would be the big obvious winners. I don't know if I think they are the likely culprits, but Mt Gox has a major network advantage right now over its competitors which is surely being drained by these attacks.

Other Bitcoin exchanges.

Speculators. Slowing down exchanges drives the price of BTC down. So the plan is to start a massive DDoS, stop it, buy BTC at a lower price, and sell it again when the prices went back to their previous levels.

pemulis 14y ago

The two most obvious culprits would be: 1) People trying to make the price of bitcoins drop, so that they can buy low and sell high. (This possibility is called out in the article.) 2. Criminals trying to extract a ransom from Mt. Gox, which is losing a lot of revenue and trust every minute their site is down.

rubinelli 14y ago
I think (2) is more likely at this point. There's only so much a market will take before it tanks and stays down for months. This kind of market (along with porn and gambling) is a great target for botnet controllers trying to make a buck.

willlll 14y ago

People who want it to go back to its original function of a magic the gathering online exchange

ConceitedCode 14y ago
Is that really how it started? What prompted the change?
- willlll 14y ago
  Yes. http://web.archive.org/web/20070817170606/http://mtgox.com/gwt/mtgox.php http://web.archive.org/web/20070817170606/http://mtgox.com/g...
  - idupree 14y ago
    A couple years after 2007, it appears mtgox.com was being a fantasy game (possibly inspired by Magic The Gathering but not the same) http://web.archive.org/web/20090812073342/http://www.mtgox.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20090812073342/http://www.mtgox.c...
- dustcoin 14y ago
  The original owner of mtgox had the domain name lying around. As far as I know, even the original mtgox bitcoin exchange shared no code with a card exchange.

jvm 14y ago

Nobody's mentioned it, but their competitors would be the big obvious winners. I don't know if I think they are the likely culprits, but Mt Gox has a major network advantage right now over its competitors which is surely being drained by these attacks.