Hello /r/moneromining – I am hoping we can have a discussion on ways a mining pool can increase transparency and offer provable rewards for mined blocks. Let's put our differences aside and talk about how we can improve pool mining for everyone.

In particular, this discussion is about a concept called Block Reports which is where a CSV file is generated by the pool for every block mined. These reports show every share submitted for that block (or PPLNS round.) Combining each block report together will show every share submitted to the pool, ever.

Each share is identified by keccak_256(username salt) where each user has a secret salt generated on registration. For pools without user accounts, the hash of the XMR address could suffice. By allowing users to identify their own shares, they can calculate their percentage of the block reward, as well as their hashrate during the period of the block. Additionally, users may group together and share their username and salt with each other to get a more complete picture of the pool. Note that sharing your username and secret salt allows others to determine your hashrate and earnings.

Points of discussion:

• Given these share dumps, what are the ways a pool could still skim hashrate or reduce rewards to its miners?
• Are there any other database dumps that could prevent the above?

Thank you in advance for keeping things civil, and I look forward to a healthy discussion!

P.S. Ad corner: Join us on RagerX Monero Mining Pool where we have been the first CryptoNote pool to implement the above, and will keep pushing for ultimate transparency!