What is Bounty Hunting?
Yes, you can be the Bobba Fett of cryptocurrency!
While these bounty programs are mostly used to reward developers for spotting vulnerabilities in code, they’ve expanded to not only offer general coding requests, but also marketing-like services, such as writing content and tweeting out links.
But bounty hunters also play an important, active role in helping bring criminals to justice who seek to disrupt the benefits digital currency brings.
How It Works
Source: HackerNoon
Whether you are tech-savvy or non-technical, bounty hunting provides numerous tasks that can be completed. All new cryptocurrency projects need marketing to help sell their coins during its ICO. Many of these projects choose to do their own marketing in-house or using a marketing agency. But they also add a “bounty program”.
A bounty program offers cryptocurrency in exchange for promotion, if the ICO turns out to be a success. In other words, payment is never guaranteed up and until the ICO closes. Each given cryptocurrency has its own percentage of their tokens reserved to be given for these bounty programs.
The program is broken down into two stages:
The first stage, pre-ICO, is marketed to prospective investors, including social media influencers, blog writers, and BitcoinTalk Signature bounty hunters.
The second stage, known as the post-ICO stage, which focus on the final touchups to the released blockchain. During this stage, bounty rewards are offered to translators, who help distribute it globally, by putting together translated documents on the development and marketing.
Bug Bounties
For any flaws detected in the blockchain, coders are rewarded, also known as the bug bounty. A bug bounty essentially pays independent researches who find and report vulnerabilities that could present as security risks to the platform and its users.
One of the most common vulnerabilities is the Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attack. Under an XSS attack, an individual or system injects malicious JavaScript code into a user’s browser.
Writing and Blogging Content
Traditionally, you will be asked to write about the project, somewhere around 500 words. Of course, this requires you to do your own research, from reading the whitepaper to researching and analyzing its niche market/demographic. The key here is actually doing research and conducting due diligence.
This is where you have the ability to get creative, weighing the pros and cons of the project.
Social Media Promotion
You will often see friends and industry colleagues taking to Instagram or Twitter, promoting a particular project and its ICO. Usually, Reddit, LinkedIn, or Twitter serve to be good platforms for news on upcoming and on-going ICOs.
A major tool for promoting ICOs and these projects is Telegram, where individuals are invited to groups related to business, crypto, or ICOs.
Bug Reports, Developer Bounties, Referrals
Traditionally, you will be asked to write about the project, somewhere around 500 words. Of course, this requires you to do your own research, from reading the whitepaper to researching and analyzing its niche market/demographic. The key here is actually doing research and conducting due diligence.
This is where you have the ability to get creative, weighing the pros and cons of the project.
Examples
One of the most commonly used websites for finding a bounty program is BitcoinTalk and Bounty0x. Users can look for and search various bounty projects, including programs like Telegram, Discord, and Slack are becoming increasingly popular amongst bounty hunters.
Bitcoin Talk
Bounty hunters incorporate the advertisement of a cryptocurrency on their BitcoinTalk account’s signature and post information about it.
BitcoinTalk is a cryptocurrency forum that is considered to be a major source of information related to blockchain, cryptocurrency, and of course, Bitcoin. If you’re new to the forum, it serves as a starting place where most new cryptocurrencies announce their establishment, important upgrades,, and events.
Are Some Tasks Too Dark?
They can be. At times, there can be something a bit exploitative about some of the tasks one is required to complete. If you aren’t familiar with the dark web, specifically The Silk Road, this is a good starting point.
But not all bounty campaigns are organized the same way. Often, participants may be asked to track their own tasks and submit weekly reports. As the completion of the bounty program depends on the success of an ICO, it’s possible that a bounty program could end without warning and participants never get paid.
In October 2020, the U.S. NSA released an advisory warning that twenty-five vulnerabilities are under active exploitation by Chinese government cyber operators. These vulnerabilities are well-known and have available patches and migrations.
For more information on the NSA’s findings, please click here.
ETH 2.0 and the Future of Bounty Hunting
In October 2020, Ethereum 2.0 introduced its bug bounty program. On its website, the program details the focus on both Eth2’s Phase 0 specs as well as specific software clients, like Prysm, Lighthouse, and Teku.
The anticipated launch window for Eth2’s Phase 0 ranges from early November 2020 to January 2021. This bug bounty program, according to Ethereum Foundation’s Justin Drake, is an essential next step ahead of the network launch.
With bounty programs offering both crypto and cash rewards, imagine if you could instead earn equity in a company for your social media post or completion of “x” number of tasks? Currently, blockchain bounty programs are beginning to offer these to social media influencers and thought leaders.