Ethereum platform Krypton suffered a 51% attack, and its team said ETC is likely to be the next victim

The Ethereum platform Krypton (business includes transactions, wallets, mining and data) was recently attacked, losing 21,465 KR tokens, worth $3,000. The website has now resumed trading. The Krypton team suspects that this attack was just a test, and the attacker is likely to use the same method to attack other Ethereum blockchains, such as ETC.

How the attack happened

According to Krypton founder Stephanie Kent, the attacker used double spending to steal KR tokens from the Bittrex wallet. First, the attacker purchased enough hashrate from NiceHash (a service that provides rented hashrate), and then used the 4miners mining pool to obtain 51% of the mining power. Once they successfully held 51% of the hashrate, they stored the KR tokens in the Bittrex wallet and then rolled back the blockchain. In this way, they created the opportunity for double spending.

Following the attack, deposit and withdrawal services on both Bittrex and Yobit were temporarily suspended to prevent another attack on the network and exchanges that accept KR tokens.

Kent said:

The attack was likely a dry run, a proof-of-concept for attacking other Ethereum blockchains. Last week, another Ethereum platform, Shift, was also hit by a similar 51% attack. The main target of these attackers was the Ethereum blockchain, which is easier to fork and manipulate offline, and can be carried out in conjunction with a distributed denial of service (DDos attack).

Krypton has now resolved the issue of lost funds, and its community has purchased additional computing power to ensure network security. They also suggested that Bittrex increase its withdrawal time to 1,000 confirmations to prevent double spending from happening again.

Next goal

Krypton is the latest victim of an attack on Ethereum, and they predict that ETC’s high market capitalization will likely make it the next target. Two weeks ago, Ethereum token Shift also suffered a 51% attack, and now teams on both platforms are working hard to provide security.

However, it is still difficult to attack ETC because its computing power is better and is controlled by several different mining pools. Ethereum platform tokens are often attacked because they are easily manipulated offline, and some tokens have low computing power and are easily exploited.