Nvidia Hackers Start Selling ETH GPU Mining Drivers: Report

Nvidia hackers start selling ETH and GPU mining drivers that are custom and can unlock the hash rate limiter on the GPU’ graphics cards as we can see in today’s latest Ethereum news.

The hackers behind last week’s Nvidia data breach claim to have customized drivers that unlocks the limitations on the GPU manufacturer’s graphic cards that prevent them from being used to mine cryptos. As per PC Mag, the LAPSUS$ hacking group sent messages to the public chat room offering a customized driver for sale which is capable of unlocking the hash rate limiter on the RTX 3000 GPUs. The hackers said:

“If someone buy us the LHR, we will provide ways to fuck LHR without flashing anything. Without flashing = big money for any miner developer.”

The hackers offered to provide even more documentation and source code for the hash rate limiter. The hackers also dumped a 19GB archive that purports to contain source code for the NVidia GPU drivers that they claim any developer can comply with. The group demanded that NVIDIA issue a software update to consumers that will remove the hash rate limiter from the cards and even threatened to leak a folder containing details on the company’s hardware.

During last week’s hack, Nvidia encrypted a machine being used by LAPSUS and the hackers claim that the attempt failed and that they have the data but at the time of the hack, Nvidia issued a statement saying:

 “Our business and commercial activities continue uninterrupted. We are still working to evaluate the nature and scope of the event and don’t have any additional information to share at this time.”

The Nvidia hackers started selling the driver only after the company introduced the limiter on its graphics cards in an effort to make them less desirable for the miners and to restrict their use to PC gamers. BTC miners moved on to more powerful ASIC minters but GPU mining is still viable for miners of ETH and other proof of work cryptocurrencies. Nvidia even launched a dedicated mining processor and after the sales outperformed the expectations, they tailed off and by Q4 2021 they dropped to $24 million.

In its filing, Nvidia reiterated the commitment to limit GPU mining saying:

“Nearly all desktop NVIDIA Ampere architecture GeForce GPU shipments are Lite Hash Rate to help direct GeForce GPUs to gamers.”