Virus on ASIC (Antminer) - how to detect and cure

Virus on ASIC (Antminer) – how to detect and cure

Cryptocurrencies have always beckoned hackers with their impregnability, but hot interest has still forced them to find ways to cheat the system. Thus, since 2019, viruses began to appear on users’ devices and asics, transferring namain remuneration to the addresses of fraudsters.

Often users introduce malware on their own devices by downloading firmware and extensions or buying unverified used hardware. But sometimes even new asics shipped from China are pre-infected.

How to detect the virus?

If you suspect your ASIC of “cheating”, you should check the address of the wallet to which the bounty arrives. In some cases, pool spoofing can be detected using the WinSCP program by entering the ASIC address, root name and password.

WinSCP: https://winscp.net/eng/index.php

What to do if you have detected a virus?

On some ASIC models, you can simply reset the IP address and install the official firmware. However, this is time-consuming, requires at least 2 GB of memory and does not work on all devices. You can also “cure” the ASIC with a simple utility, like Win32Disklmager, by doing some manipulations with the board.

In any case, to avoid a virus, you should keep the situation under control and regularly check the address of the vorker. The virus threatens not only to lose 50% of the rewards of cryptocurrency mining by the device, but also to spread to all the asics connected to the network.

Win32Disklmager: https://win32diskimager.org/