Added some DoS limits, removed safe mode

4 messages BitcoinTalk Satoshi Nakamoto, davout, ribuck December 12, 2010 — December 12, 2010
Satoshi Nakamoto December 12, 2010 Source · Permalink

There’s more work to do on DoS, but I’m doing a quick build of what I have so far in case it’s needed, before venturing into more complex ideas.

The build for this is version 0.3.19.

  • Added some DoS controls

As Gavin and I have said clearly before, the software is not at all resistant to denial-of-service. This is one improvement, but there are still more ways to attack than I can count.

I’m doing a few more things, then I plan to pass the baton.

davout December 12, 2010 Source · Permalink

Can,you provide some more details ? Or a link to some documentation about these changes ?

ribuck December 12, 2010 Source · Permalink

I thought the idea of safe mode was to protect sites like MtGox from losing everyone’s entire balances in the event of a catastrophic exploit. Safe mode shuts down their transaction processing until they can work out what’s going on, and upgrade/patch if necessary.

For the sake of appearances, it’s better not to have safe mode turned on by default (because “remote tampering” of one’s software is not popular with many people). But why not have safe mode disabled by default, and provide an “-enablesafemode” switch for those who want it?

Previous discussion was here: Development of alert system and here: Version 0.3.11 with upgrade alerts

davout December 12, 2010 Source · Permalink
Quote from: ribuck on December 12, 2010, 7:50:54 PM

Previous discussion was here: Development of alert system and here: Version 0.3.11 with upgrade alerts

Thank you for the links! After reading the discussion, I wanted to say I like the idea of an opt-in safe mode, or remote kill switch.

@satoshi : what do you call a longer invalid block chain ? like a longer one but representing a smaller PoW ?