Is your computer system Secretly Used for Mining?

What’s mining Trojan?

Mining Trojan refers to the mining program implanted in the computer for mining without being known by the user.

The mining Trojan appeared in 2013 for the first time, and the mining Trojan attacks reported in 2017 showed explosive growth.

Type of mining Trojans

There are three types of mining Trojans.

I. Mining Trojan Botnet

Botnet refers to a huge puppet network created by hackers by invading other computers and implanting malicious programs to infect more computers. Each computer in the botnet is a hacked node that can launch attacks. The hacker invaded the computer and implanted the mining Trojan, and then tried to infect other computers to create a botnet in the end.

2. Webpage Mining Script

The browser is one of the most frequently used software. When a user accesses a webpage by a browser, the browser is responsible for parsing the content, resources, and scripts in the web page before presenting the parsed result to the user.

When a mining script is implanted in a web page, the browser will parse the content of the mining script and execute it, which will make the browser occupy a large number of computer resources for mining.

The running mining script will slow down or even crash the user’s computer and seriously affect the normal use of a computer.

There are many kinds of webpage mining scripts, such as Coinhive, JSEcoin, resedoper, LMODR.BIZ, MineCrunch, MarineTraffic, Crypto-Loot, ProjectPoi, etc. Most of them are open-sourced, so it’s easy for some webmasters or invaders to implant mining scripts in web pages.

3. Other mining Trojans

Unlike the active attacks adopted by Trojan botnets and webpage mining scripts, some mining Trojans require users to run an executable Trojan program for mining.

Many of such mining Trojans are profit-inducing. Some hackers disguised the mining Trojans as a game plug-in, activation tool, and other applications “urgently needed” by users, while other hackers focus on some application programs, such as the hook-up software and VIP video player in Internet cafes, which seems to be able to bring directly or indirectly benefits for users.