The robustness of the Monero (XMR) blockchain was recently put to the test in the face of an experimental 51% attack. Following this procedure, its community is proposing an overhaul of its Proof of Work consensus mechanism.
Monero vs. Qubic: a failed 51% attack, but…
The number of blockchains currently available reflects the varying degrees of effectiveness and usefulness of the innovations they offer. In this field, some have decided to focus more specifically on protecting privacy, such as the well-known Monero and its XMR cryptocurrency.
This popular feature was recently put to the test by the founder of the Qubic blockchain, Sergey Ivancheglo (CFB on the X network), as part of a 51% attack planned for early August. This threshold was not reached, even though the Qubic mining pool ultimately succeeded in reorganizing a few blocks on August 17.
Faced with this mixed picture, Monero’s highly committed community has clearly decided to take action to make its Proof of Work blockchain more resistant to this type of attack. This is particularly important given that the Qubic mining pool currently still controls 2.16 gigahashes per second (GH/s) of its hashrate, or almost 35% of the available computing power.
A tense situation largely fueled by Sergey Ivancheglo on the X network. Indeed, the founder of the Qubic blockchain claimed earlier this week that the situation described by Monero developers was ultimately more critical than announced.
The folks at Monero accuse the Qubic pool of falsifying its hashrate. For some reason, Qubic’s information matches the mined blocks. I suspect that some Monero developers are running their own pools and inflating their hashrate to make the situation seem less serious than it really is.
Sergey Ivancheglo
Many proposals to consider
In this context, Monero developers are working hard to come up with different solutions to strengthen the security of its blockchain. These changes could involve, for example, a policy based on the selection and/or geographical distribution of the mining equipment involved, or a switch to a merged system allowing XMR to be mined in parallel with other Proof of Work cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.
Other developers are also looking into the possibility of adopting the ChainLocks solution implemented by the DASH cryptocurrency. This is a very ingenious way of preventing a possible reorganization of its blocks by combining a network of masternodes with its classic Proof of Work consensus, in order to create an additional layer of security.
According to Joel Valenzuela, a key contributor to the Dash DAO structure, this attack by Qubic represents “a fascinating experiment that essentially exploits the weaknesses of mining-based security models, particularly in economic terms, and more specifically for ASIC-resistant blockchains,” in order to promote public access to mining while avoiding the risk of centralization.
It’s not certain that the Monero community will be as enthusiastic.
