<p>A sort of. Not a cryptographic signature, but each miner is incentivized to use one of its own BTC addresses as recipient of coinbase (reward) transaction. This links the block to the miner, with the same strength each UTXO is linked to its owner (I want to stress that there isn't native identity concept in bitcoin's blockchain, so we can say that the attribution allowed by core methods is already implemented)</p>
<p>Can you elaborate on signature (maybe stronger one) advantages, from your POV? Thanks</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-04-07T12:45:44.270Z
Having the blocks signed would give more information about the miner than just the reward recipient (since the miner could choose to reward somebody else).
So say somebody wants to track the most active miners, looking at the signatures would be more revealing than looking at the reward recipient.

Even though miners could create new key pairs on the spot for each block mined, we would know for sure that the miner possesses the private key corresponding to THAT public key. Whereas with just the reward recipients, we cannot know for sure.
Fred
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-04-07T13:45:25.130Z
anonymity is usually considered a needed here (or at least a good property to have), it is not clear to me what greater benefits would be made by losing anonymity to the miners, more info is not always better
leevancleef
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-04-07T15:38:04.083Z
Regarding anonymity, not much will change with respect to the original concept, and I agree that more info is not always better. I just wanted to be sure that blocks were not signed, because one could make a case of why they should be (or should have been) signed.
Fred
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-04-07T12:32:02.793Z
2021-04-07T12:32:02.793Z
baro77
<p>To my understanding, at no point in the Bitcoin Whitepaper does it say that blocks are signed by the miner. However, one could see the advantage of having blocks signed.</p>
<p>Thus I wonder if in the implementation of Bitcoin, blocks are signed by miners? Or maybe I missed it in the Whitepaper?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>

<mining-theory><signature>
Are Bitcoin's blocks signed by the miner?
Fred
# Are Bitcoin's blocks signed by the miner?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-04-07)

To my understanding, at no point in the Bitcoin Whitepaper does it say that blocks are signed by the miner. However, one could see the advantage of having blocks signed.

Thus I wonder if in the implementation of Bitcoin, blocks are signed by miners? Or maybe I missed it in the Whitepaper?

Thanks!

**Tags:** mining-theory, signature


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2021-04-07. Score: 3

A sort of. Not a cryptographic signature, but each miner is incentivized to use one of its own BTC addresses as recipient of coinbase (reward) transaction. This links the block to the miner, with the same strength each UTXO is linked to its owner (I want to stress that there isn't native identity concept in bitcoin's blockchain, so we can say that the attribution allowed by core methods is already implemented)

Can you elaborate on signature (maybe stronger one) advantages, from your POV? Thanks

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Having the blocks signed would give more information about the miner than just the reward recipient (since the miner could choose to reward somebody else). So say somebody wants to track the most active miners, looking at the signatures would be more revealing than looking at the reward recipient.  Even though miners could create new key pairs on the spot for each block mined, we would know for sure that the miner possesses the private key corresponding to THAT public key. Whereas with just the reward recipients, we cannot know for sure.  
> **username_2**: anonymity is usually considered a needed here (or at least a good property to have), it is not clear to me what greater benefits would be made by losing anonymity to the miners, more info is not always better  
> **username_0**: Regarding anonymity, not much will change with respect to the original concept, and I agree that more info is not always better. I just wanted to be sure that blocks were not signed, because one could make a case of why they should be (or should have been) signed.  

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