Attested Proof-of-Compute Mining Architecture

A-MPoC-SBA: Attested Merkle Proof-of-Compute with Stake-Bound Authenticity

Overview

This document outlines a next-generation mining architecture designed for secure GPU-based proof-of-compute networks. The system defends against:

  • fake or scripted miners

  • reverse-engineered clients

  • fraudulent compute proofs

  • stake spoofing

  • botnet-scale replay attacks

  • GPU identity impersonation

The architecture combines cryptographic attestation, stake-derived proofs, hardware-bound identity, and Merkle-based compute validation to form A-MPoC-SBA — a layered, tamper-resistant mining protocol.

1. Stake-Bound Seed Proof (SBA)

A miner cannot participate without presenting a stake-derived on-chain proof, reducing RPC load and eliminating fake staking states.

Stake parameters included in the proof

  • staked amount

  • tier / class

  • stake start time

  • locked/unlocked status

  • pool ID

  • challenge seed

  • block number

Contract-derived proof

The smart contract generates:

proofHash = keccak256(
    user,
    amount,
    startTime,
    tier,
    unlocked,
    seed,
    blockNumber
)

The miner:

  1. fetches this proof

  2. attaches it to the challenge response

The server verifies the proof without querying RPC, ensuring:

  • tiers cannot be spoofed

  • stake cannot be inflated

  • pool ID cannot be faked

  • miners cannot fake lock/unlock status

  • extremely low server overhead

This approach is cutting-edge and rarely seen in PoW/PoUW systems.

2. Merkle Proof-of-Compute (M-PoC)

Each GPU loop produces a digest. All digests are committed into a Merkle tree.

Miner submits

  • Merkle root

  • loop digests (raw or compressed)

  • Merkle branches / levels

  • total loop count

Server verifies

  • integrity of all loop outputs

  • honest loop count

  • compute duration validity

  • no skipped iterations

  • no forged GPU output

This provides verifiable compute integrity, preventing miners from falsifying GPU speed or fabricating workload results.

3. Embedded Private Key + HMAC Attestation

Every official miner includes a .pyd extension containing a hidden 32-byte private key, obfuscated into multiple fragments to resist extraction.

Each request contains

  • HMAC-SHA256 signature

  • timestamp

  • nonce

Security effects

  • prevents fake clients / scripts

  • blocks modified or reverse-engineered miners

  • stops replay attacks

  • mitigates DDOS via pre-HMAC verification

  • ensures only authentic miners receive challenges

This is similar to security practices used in enterprise GPU compute and AAA game anti-cheat systems.

4. Hardware-Bound Miner Identity

To prevent miner duplication and GPU impersonation, each compute proof is tied to hardware identity:

  • GPU UUID

  • persistent hardware fingerprint

Prevents

  • multi-spawn miner abuse

  • sharing one miner across many machines

  • GPU spoofing

  • botnet-style farm impersonation

Combined with stake identity, this forms a multi-factor miner authentication pipeline.

5. Challenge-Binding & Pool-Binding

Each challenge is cryptographically locked to:

  • the miner’s wallet

  • the stake state

  • the mining pool

  • the contract seed

  • the epoch block number

Properties

  • challenges must be freshly requested

  • cannot be precomputed

  • cannot be shared or cached

  • cannot be replayed

  • require stake + key + hardware identity

This eliminates precomputation attacks entirely.

6. High-Level Security Flow

A. Challenge Phase

  1. Miner signs request with HMAC (seed="challenge").

  2. Server verifies HMAC before generating challenge.

  3. Only authenticated .pyd miners receive seeds.

B. Proof Submission Phase

  1. Miner executes GPU loops.

  2. Builds Merkle tree over digests.

  3. Obtains stake-bound proof from contract.

  4. Signs final submission with new HMAC + nonce.

  5. Server verifies:

    • HMAC

    • stake proof

    • Merkle proof

    • timestamps

    • hardware identity

    • nonce validity

Any failure → immediate rejection.

7. Advantages Over Traditional Mining

  • Impossible to fake shares

  • Impossible to spoof GPU throughput

  • Impossible to farm rewards with scripts/bots

  • Stake state cannot be falsified

  • Eliminates RPC load for stake verification

  • Strong defense against DDOS on challenge endpoints

  • Protects against reverse-engineered miners

  • Ensures real GPU computation

  • Stops miner duplication / impersonation

This design meaningfully improves the security posture of decentralized proof-of-compute networks.

8. Summary

A-MPoC-SBA integrates techniques from:

  • blockchain staking verification

  • GPU verifiable compute

  • enterprise hardware attestation

  • cryptographic challenge binding

  • Merkle tree integrity proofs

  • anti-cheat security engineering

The architecture prevents the full spectrum of miner cheating vectors: from GPU spoofing and fake loops to stake manipulation and replay attacks.

It represents a modern, highly secure approach to hybrid proof-of-compute × proof-of-stake mining — and a substantial leap forward compared to traditional PoW or PoUW systems.

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