1. Extreme Resource Asymmetry
The most significant takeaway is the Ratio of Engagement. While Mire was "exposed" for 333 hours, attacker engagement cost was approximately 15 hours of that time.
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Wasted Time: Mire stole 53,941.7 seconds from the collective attacker community.
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Idle Defence: For the remaining ~318 hours, Mire sat silently, waiting as a "live" target for scanners.
2. Successful "Data Poisoning" at Scale
Mireserved 15,818 bogus responses. Because Mire uses techniques to create "real-looking" files, you have successfully:
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Polluted Databases: Attackers now have ~2 GB of synthetically generated garbage credentials, environment variables, and AWS keys in their databases.
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Delayed Discovery: By serving structured files like
wp-configoractuator/env, Mire ensured that automated scripts didn't immediately flag the IP as a honeypot, prolonging their stay.
3. The "Treacle" Effect
The average interaction time of 3.41 seconds per request is a direct result of your ip_state logic.
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Cumulative Penalty: More demand from a single attacker resulted in slower response times.
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Thread Exhaustion: By holding connections open for over 3 seconds, Mire created a cost to the "worker threads" of many simpler botnets, effectively performing a "reverse DDoS" on their infrastructure.
4. Summary of the 333 Hours
| Metric | Performance Impact |
| Total Noise Injected | 1,939.8 MB of fake data stored by attackers. |
| Bait Effectiveness | 47.5 requests per hour average, showing constant discovery by new bots. |
| CPU "Tax" | Attackers had to process complex archives for many of those 15,818 hits. |
| De-anonymization | Potential for IP discovery if attackers attempted to open some "secrets" locally. |
The Mire is Effective
The data from these 333 hours is clear: The best defence isn't a wall; it's a labyrinth. Welcome to the life of Hacker Treacle.
A wall is a binary challenge—it either stands or it falls. But The Mire is a process of digital attrition. For two weeks, our server operated as a high-viscosity trap, transforming the attackers' own speed and automation into their greatest liability. In the world of "Hacker Treacle," the faster you try to move, the deeper you sink.
By serving 15,818 bogus responses, we didn't just protect our perimeter; we polluted the well. We forced malicious scripts to ingest 1.9 GB of synthetic noise, effectively poisoning attacker databases with fake credentials and nested archive bombs. With an average engagement time of 3.41 seconds per request, we didn't just block 15,000 attacks—we stole nearly 15 hours of productivity from the botnets.
In the world of cybersecurity, we often focus on "Mean Time to Detect." With The Mire, we’ve introduced a more satisfying metric: Mean Time Wasted. We have moved beyond the era of the passive firewall and into the era of active, viscous exhaustion.
Welcome to The Mire. You can see how it is performing on the Statistics page.
MIRE/C³ (MIRE C-Cubed - Causing Cost and Confusion) is here to help defend our resources and platforms.