Emergency Hard Fork Underway at Core DAO Following Validator Reward Exploitation
The blockchain network confirms the situation is under control and emphasizes that the upcoming upgrade will maintain network continuity without reversing any confirmed transactions.
An emergency hard fork is being orchestrated by Core DAO following an incident where validators extracted CORE rewards that exceeded the blockchain's designated issuance parameters.
According to an update from Core, the situation has been brought under control and "malicious validators" are no longer able to extract excessive rewards. The organization clarified that the forthcoming fork would represent a forward upgrade, meaning the network would not experience a rollback, nor would any transactions that were previously confirmed be reversed.
The announcement came after Core issued an earlier status report on Monday, disclosing that a limited number of validators had accumulated rewards substantially higher than what the protocol was designed to issue. The organization stated that the incident's scope was confined to reward issuance mechanisms and emphasized that user assets remained secure, promising to release a technical postmortem analysis.
Multiple cryptocurrency exchanges implemented restrictions on CORE transfers in the period surrounding the incident. Coinbase took action to pause both sends and receives on the Core network, while Korean exchanges Bithumb and Coinone halted deposits and withdrawals, referencing suspected or verified security issues.
Additionally, Bitget moved to suspend CORE deposits and withdrawals, attributing the decision to wallet maintenance activities, while LBank suspended deposit functionality due to what it characterized as requirements from the project.
Core has refrained from disclosing the specific amount of CORE that was issued beyond intended limits, the duration of the unauthorized activity, or whether any of the excess tokens made their way into circulation. The organization also has not provided details about the vulnerability that allowed the validators to acquire the additional rewards. Nevertheless, Core has committed to publishing a technical postmortem.
Cointelegraph reached out to Core for additional information but had not received a response by publication.