<blockquote>
  <p>While blockchain.info provides a hashrate distribution, it is aggregated at the pool level while I would like to know more about how the hashrate is distributed among the pools' servers.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>That is not possible to ascertain with certainty. When a Bitcoin block is mined, there is no way to determine which node/pool mined it. Block explorer sites like blockchain.info look at the coinbase data in coinbase transaction to <strong>possibly</strong> link the block to a particular pool. For example, if you look at the last mined block <a href="https://blockstream.info/block/00000000000000000010c3808ffda2153a658ab7935f631c3a5a0016e3c317d1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">594,041</a> the coinbase transaction has the coinbase data as: </p>

<pre><code>037910091a4d696e656420627920416e74506f6f6c39331400332020d34beafabe6d6d38d664d05278d5312fc43b4a47d259012d94db2c113f41e0ee36a6711161138004000000000000006cbf008036030000
</code></pre>

<p>The first byte <code>0x03</code> indicates to push the next three bytes on to the stack. Then bytes <code>0x791009</code> indicate the block height (594041 in this case) in little-endian. Then if you look at the bytes <code>0x4d696e656420627920416e74506f6f6c</code> it represents "'Mined by AntPool" in ASCII. This is what the explorers use to say that the block was actually mined by Ant Pool. Nothing prevents me from mining a block tomorrow with the coinbase data that points to a particular pool when in reality it has nothing to do with them. The block explorer sites will use this false data to show on their websites that the block was actually mined by that pool name that I sneaked in.</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Several aggregator websites, including blockchain.info, maintain low-latency connections to a thousands of nodes and record the IP address of the first connected node to relay each block</p>
</blockquote>

<p>This data is also unreliable. I can run VPN, mine a block and relay it to the network with an IP address located thousand of kilometers away from my actual location. Moreover, you can run Bitcoin full node on tor which would completely obfuscate your identity.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-09-11T21:45:28.440Z
Thank you @Ugam Kamat. That was very helpful.
Apod
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-09-09T19:21:06.153Z
2019-09-09T19:21:06.153Z
Ugam Kamat
<p>I would like to map the hashrate distribution geographically, which would require knowing the IP address of the winning miner for each block.</p>

<p>According to the <a href="https://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/coinscope/coinscope.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">paper by Miller et al</a>
several aggregator websites, including blockchain.info, maintain low-latency connections to thousands of nodes and record the IP address of the first connected node to relay each block. Is this information provided somewhere? While blockchain.info provides a hashrate distribution, it is aggregated at the pool level while I would like to know more about how the hashrate is distributed among the pools' servers.</p>

<mining-pools><hashpower>
How to determine the geographic distribution of the hashrate?
Apod
# How to determine the geographic distribution of the hashrate?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2019-09-09)

I would like to map the hashrate distribution geographically, which would require knowing the IP address of the winning miner for each block.

According to the [paper by Miller et al](https://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/coinscope/coinscope.pdf)
several aggregator websites, including blockchain.info, maintain low-latency connections to thousands of nodes and record the IP address of the first connected node to relay each block. Is this information provided somewhere? While blockchain.info provides a hashrate distribution, it is aggregated at the pool level while I would like to know more about how the hashrate is distributed among the pools' servers.

**Tags:** mining-pools, hashpower


---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2019-09-09. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

> While blockchain.info provides a hashrate distribution, it is aggregated at the pool level while I would like to know more about how the hashrate is distributed among the pools' servers.

That is not possible to ascertain with certainty. When a Bitcoin block is mined, there is no way to determine which node/pool mined it. Block explorer sites like blockchain.info look at the coinbase data in coinbase transaction to **possibly** link the block to a particular pool. For example, if you look at the last mined block [594,041](https://blockstream.info/block/00000000000000000010c3808ffda2153a658ab7935f631c3a5a0016e3c317d1) the coinbase transaction has the coinbase data as:

```
037910091a4d696e656420627920416e74506f6f6c39331400332020d34beafabe6d6d38d664d05278d5312fc43b4a47d259012d94db2c113f41e0ee36a6711161138004000000000000006cbf008036030000

```

The first byte `0x03` indicates to push the next three bytes on to the stack. Then bytes `0x791009` indicate the block height (594041 in this case) in little-endian. Then if you look at the bytes `0x4d696e656420627920416e74506f6f6c` it represents "'Mined by AntPool" in ASCII. This is what the explorers use to say that the block was actually mined by Ant Pool. Nothing prevents me from mining a block tomorrow with the coinbase data that points to a particular pool when in reality it has nothing to do with them. The block explorer sites will use this false data to show on their websites that the block was actually mined by that pool name that I sneaked in.

> Several aggregator websites, including blockchain.info, maintain low-latency connections to a thousands of nodes and record the IP address of the first connected node to relay each block

This data is also unreliable. I can run VPN, mine a block and relay it to the network with an IP address located thousand of kilometers away from my actual location. Moreover, you can run Bitcoin full node on tor which would completely obfuscate your identity.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thank you @username_1. That was very helpful.  

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