Ethereum: What prevents a node from receiving a solved solution and claiming it as its own work?
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The Eternal Puzzle: Preventing Node Mistakes on Ethereum
For as long as Ethereum has existed, the decentralized nature of its blockchain has raised a fundamental concern that malicious nodes could hijack the consensus process and claim previously solved blocks as their own work. In this article, we’ll delve into the mechanics of the relay process and explain why another node can’t simply create a solution and claim it as their own.
The Relay Process: Decentralized Proof of Work
When a new block is added to the Ethereum blockchain, it’s not just a simple aggregation of transactions. Instead, it requires a lot of computing power to validate it. Here’s how the relay process works:
- Verification: Each node verifies the new block, checking its integrity and ensuring that all transactions are valid.
- Hashing
: The validated block is divided into smaller blocks called hashes, which contain a unique identifier for each transaction in the block.
- Transaction Verification: Each transaction in the block is verified to ensure that it is valid and complies with Ethereum rules.
- Block Refactoring: If a block contains more than 2^64 (16 exabytes) of transactions, its entire contents are refactored into smaller blocks called “headers”.
- Header Verification: Each header is divided into smaller blocks, which are further subdivided into a single block called a “block”.
- Hashing:
- Validation: Verify that each block contains at least 32 unique transactions and that all headers in it comply with Ethereum rules.
- Hash Creation: Create a SHA-256 hash of the entire block.
The Node Forgery Problem
Now let’s look at why another node can’t simply create a solution and accept it as their own work. Here are some of the main reasons:
- Random Number Generation: During the hashing process, nodes generate random numbers for their own hashes. This ensures that no node can predict the outcome of each block.
- Computational Infeasibility: Creating a proper blockchain requires enormous computing power. Even with modern hardware, solving complex mathematical problems like Ethereum’s Proof of Work (PoW) algorithm would be impossible for most nodes.
- Block Refactoring: When a block is split into smaller blocks during the transmission process, each node must verify and refactor its contents individually. This makes it very difficult for a malicious node to create a convincing solution that can fool multiple nodes at once.
Result: Decentralized Verification Process
To sum up, the decentralized nature of Ethereum, combined with the generation of random numbers and the computational impossibility of solving complex mathematical problems, ensures that only legitimate nodes have access to the blockchain. Any attempt by another node to create a solution would be detected by various means:
- Node consensus: other nodes verify a new block before it is accepted into the network.
- Hash verification: each hash is verified by each node individually, making it impossible for a single node to create a valid solution.
- Block refactoring detection: When blocks are fragmented during refactoring, this process makes it difficult for a malicious node to create a convincing solution.
To sum up, the design of Ethereum ensures that the consensus process is secure and resistant to node spoofing attacks. The decentralized nature of blockchain, combined with the computational impossibility of solving complex mathematical problems, provides a robust security mechanism that protects the integrity of the network.
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