Public computers become miners? Some people earn 43,000 yuan in 4 months, and colleges and universities take action to rectify

Source of this article: Time Weekly Author: Zhou Mengmei

"Play games during the day and mine at night." Liu Xiaojun (pseudonym), a college student in Wuhan, told the Times Weekly reporter that his university has issued a "Notice on Comprehensive investigation and rectification of virtual currency "mining" activities" to locate the "mining" behavior on campus and block some key IPs.

The Times Weekly reporter did not complete statistics, recently, Xidian University, Harbin Engineering University, Yunnan University of Traditional Chinese Medicine and other more than ten universities issued a notice to check the school's computers, servers, and issued a guide to prevent "mining" Trojan virus.

The staff of many colleges and universities revealed to the Times Weekly reporter that the rectification of "mining" in colleges and universities is related to the higher departments' requirement that the education and sports system carry out virtual currency "mining" clearance operations.

Virtual currency "mining" refers to the process of issuing virtual currency by using computer hardware. In recent years, the soaring price of virtual currency has triggered the "mining" fever, and some university computer rooms have also become the hardest hit areas of "mining", and even become a tool for some people to make profits. Some illegal elements have used the "mining" Trojan virus to invade the computer systems of universities and enterprises, forming a security risk.

Campus "Miner"

"A senior earned tens of thousands of dollars by mining in the second half of 2021." Liu Xiaojun said that in August 2021, the virtual currency Ethereum came out of a round of high market. He uses a laptop to "mine", "earn dozens of yuan a day, the technical threshold of 'mining' is not high, and many students around are doing it part-time." ”

A number of colleges and universities have intervened to rectify the situation. On December 22, 2021, the Network Information and Technology Center of a university in Guangdong issued a notice saying that since November, the school has monitored the existence of "mining" activities in 214 network terminals.

Coincidentally, from September 6 to September 9, 2021, the relevant departments of Zhejiang Province set up a joint inspection team to raid 36 IP addresses of 20 state-owned units in 7 regions of the province, and checked and corrected a number of violations of discipline by using public resources to participate in virtual currency "mining" and trading. The inspection found that a university in Zhejiang found that a total of 6 IP addresses participated in the "mining" behavior, all of which used the public computer or personal computer of the laboratory to run the "mining" program software to actively "mine".

Image source: Visual China

"'Mining' will cause some loss to the laptop, and the high electricity bill will make the roommate dissatisfied." Some students therefore use the computers in the public computer room of the school laboratory to 'mine'. Liu Xiaojun revealed that some computer experts are still implanting programs in public computers in schools, invading the host, obtaining control of the host, and then implanting "mining" programs to make the computer passively "mining", which is more concealed.

This spot check also found that some staff of colleges and universities also had illegal "mining" situations. Jin Moumou, a temporary employee of a vocational and technical college in Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province, used the school premises, electricity, and network to "mine" virtual currency, and dug out a total of 2.4 ethers in 4 months, making a profit of about 43,000.

In addition, Ding X, the administrator of the computer room of the Vocational Education Center in Shangyu District, Shaoxing City, together with the labor dispatch personnel He X, used the office computer and purchased 3 "mining machines" to place in the information technology building, engaged in the activity of digging raven coins for a total of 111 days, and made a profit of 15,000 yuan.

On October 8, 2021, the Jiangsu Provincial Communications Administration issued an announcement that the total number of Internet IP addresses involved in "mining" in the province was found to be as high as 4502. From the perspective of IP address attribution and nature, about 21% of the affiliated universities and enterprises have been invaded and used to carry out virtual currency "mining".

"Virtual currency 'mining' makes money fast, but the cost is also high. Using public resources to mine, you can transfer costs. On January 12, Wang Lin (pseudonym), who has many years of experience in "mining", explained to the Times Weekly reporter that the main costs of "mining" are graphics card consumption and electricity expenses. High-performance "mining" graphics cards are expensive and hard to buy. Some universities and enterprises have high computer equipment configuration and can meet the requirements of "mining".

"In this way, there is no need to buy equipment at a high price, and there is no need to bear the electricity bill, and both costs are transferred." Wang Lin said.

Public computers become "black laborers"

The harm of the "mining" Trojan virus cannot be underestimated.

"In order to reduce costs, some criminals implant mining machine programs into other people's computers to mine and obtain illegal profits. This type of mining program that illegally invades the user's computer is called a mining Trojan. The "Brief Technical Analysis of The Mining Trojan" released by Harbin Institute of Technology and cert laboratory disclosed that the "mining" Trojan will affect the speed of the organization system of government and enterprises, occupy computer resources, and greatly interrupt the normal operation of business.

In addition, "mining" Trojans usually shut down firewalls, obtain administrator privileges, implant backdoors, etc., steal core business data, and launch other cyber attacks such as extortion.

The Times Weekly reporter understands that insiders actively "mining" is a minority, and more outlaws have implanted Trojan viruses, making public computers become "black laborers" and passive "mining", which is extremely difficult to detect.

The above-mentioned network information and technology center of a university in Guangdong announced that there are "mining" activities in the 214 network terminals that have been found, mainly related to the user's lack of awareness of network security and insufficient protection means to infect the "mining" virus.

Among the 78 units that were raided in Zhejiang, 32 units had passive "mining" situations due to infection with Trojans.

According to the "Collection of Typical Cases of Network Security Emergency Response (2021)" released by Qianxin, in the first half of 2021, the Qianxin Security Service team participated in and handled a total of 590 network security emergency response incidents, of which mining Trojans accounted for 18.8% of all malicious program types, ranking second only to ransomware viruses.

Since 2021, the regulatory authorities have continuously upgraded their efforts to rectify the "mining" activities of virtual currencies.

On May 21, 2021, the Financial Stability and Development Committee of the State Council held a meeting, emphasizing the resolute prevention and control of financial risks, "cracking down on Bitcoin 'mining' and trading behavior, and resolutely preventing individual risks from being transmitted to the social field.". This is seen as a clear crackdown on Bitcoin "mining" and trading at the national level.

In September of that year, the National Development and Reform Commission and others jointly issued the "Notice on Rectifying the "Mining" Activities of Virtual Currency", which requires strengthening the supervision of the whole industrial chain of the upstream and downstream of virtual currency "mining" activities. According to the incomplete statistics of the Times Weekly reporter, in 2021, in order to achieve the goal of "zeroing" in virtual currency mining, 15 provinces have carried out special rectification for virtual currency "mining".

Under the wave of rectification, it is no surprise that colleges and universities have increased the clean-up of virtual currency "mining" activities.

On December 13, 2021, Guizhou University clearly proposed that in accordance with the task requirements of the higher-level departments on "resolutely realizing the zeroing of mining activities in the education system", it is reiterated that no unit or individual may engage in virtual currency "mining" and trading activities in schools for any reason or with any equipment.

Entering 2022, the regulatory authorities have strengthened the rectification of virtual currency "mining" activities.

The National Development and Reform Commission published a document on its official website on January 10, listing the virtual currency "mining" activity as an "elimination industry". On the same day, the Jinan branch of the central bank issued a document warning against the risk of "mining", pointing out that it is necessary to fully understand the harm of virtual currency "mining" activities, improve the awareness and ability to prevent virtual currency "mining" Trojan virus attacks, and consciously resist any form of virtual currency "mining" activities.