What is cryptojacking? And how does it work?
Another person can use your computer’s memory, processor power and electricity to generate funds in the form of crypto currency tokens for someone else. All of this can happen without our having the slightest idea about it. This whole process is known as ‘crypto-jacking.
Creating new coins by solving mathematical problems is the process termed as mining. This whole process involves finding a solution for complex sums, which initiates when a transaction takes place in the blockchain network. The main objective of this intentional complex process is to record and register the transactions information in the blockchain ledger of the said crypto coins.
The first person to successfully complete the transaction gets a digital coin as a reward. But for the mining process, people have to buy costly computer parts and electricity to effectively complete the transaction faster than others. Therefore people have found out other ways to profit more by paying less, saving their computing power and electricity in the process.
Different types of cryptojacking
Cryptojacking is of two types. Through one method using malware attacks, people are tricked into downloading mining software on their computers. This is an easy process, but there is another type of cryptojacking that is more effective than the previous one. Crypto mining codes are attached to an advertisement network, and the legitimate businesses can easily work as the aggravator without knowing about it.
Is crypto mining bad?
The process of crypto mining is not illegitimate. Even cryptojacking can be used in legitimate ways, informing the users that they are going to use the electricity and computing power of the said computers. For example, a website named Salon has two ways to earn revenue, one they tell their visitors to allow advertisements and secondly, with the visitor’s consent, allow the website to conduct cryptocoin mining for reading their articles. Moreover, UNICEF charity has adopted this process where it asks people to offer their computing power for mining crypto coins as a part of a charity. This process can be legitimate if the person gives full information on the mining process, saying how much processing power and electricity will be required to continue the process.
But there are various sites that do not inform people about what is happening and conduct the activity illegally. Some sites are also part of various illegitimate and criminal activities. The problem has become so severe that Google announced that it would ban all the websites that have mining codes embedded in them regardless of it being legal or illegal.
