S2025:E18
While the decentralised nature of Distributed Ledger Technology systems suggests the absence of a central authority, it does not eliminate the possibility of supernodes within the network. To investigate this, we collected peerlist data from TCP flows, validated our connection inference algorithm, and mapped the Monero network’s structure, achieving high accuracy that improves with longer observation periods.
This study is the first to uncover connectivity patterns in Monero’s updated peer protocol, providing visual and structural insights into its topology. A key focus is an interconnectivity among the 14 highest-degree nodes and their immediate neighbours.
With a reasonably accurate approximation of the network structure, simulating an Eclipse attack becomes feasible. Furthermore, overlapping neighbours among supernodes enable attackers to reduce the number of unique connections required, making such attacks more cost-effective.