Monero Under Attack: Kraken Suspends Deposits

Kraken, in a public statement on August 15th, stated that “As a security measure, we have temporarily suspended Monero deposits following the observation that one mining pool has obtained over half of the network’s overall hashing capability. This level of control raises potential threats to the security and stability of the Monero network.”

Qubic, a project centered around blockchain technology and artificial intelligence, announced on August 11th that they had secured a majority share of the Monero network’s total hashrate. The project also claimed that they were able to alter six blocks within the chain, however, some members of the Monero community are skeptical of these claims.

The pool’s control has fluctuated; it briefly dropped to the seventh-largest miner at one point. On August 4th, Qubic experienced a denial-of-service attack (DDoS), a type of cyberattack where a server is overwhelmed by artificial traffic, preventing legitimate users from accessing it.

This attack caused Qubic’s hashrate to significantly decrease from 2.6 gigahashes per second to 0.8 GH/s, according to commentary from Sergey Ivancheglo, who claimed to be responsible for the alleged 51% attack.

Despite these challenges, Qubic’s mining pool recovered, eventually regaining its position as the dominant force within the Monero network.

A 51% attack occurs when a single miner or mining pool controls a majority of the network’s computational power, allowing them to potentially reverse recent transactions and even double-spend coins. This fundamentally compromises the reliability of the blockchain until a more balanced state of control is achieved.

On August 14th, BtcTurk, another crypto exchange, halted cryptocurrency withdrawals following the discovery of suspicious activity in its hot wallets. For more information on this event, read the complete coverage here.