Bitcoin Cash (BCH), the third largest cryptocurrency in the world, has suffered from an enormous drop in hash rate over the last 24 hours, making a widely feared 51 percent attack a reality. After plunging by 36 percent in a single day, the BCH current hash rate is sitting at 3.372 Ehash/s.
On Sept. 3, Blockstream's Warren Togami addressed the issue, claiming that Bitcoin Cash is facing the risk of double spending because of its low hash rate.
Update: BCH now below 8% hashrate relative to BTC. https://t.co/HBR2tXyDh8
— Warren Togami (@wtogami) September 4, 2018
Real risk of double-spend causing exchange insolvency.
* 6 hours and 20 confs wasn't enough to protect against the BTG exchange theft.
* Vulnerable to single persons, intentionally or via hacked pool. https://t.co/lwsmne0YQE
At the same time, Bitcoin’s hash rate has increased by 10 percent. 6.6 percent of the BTC hash rate is required for the aforementioned attack.
Dan Burgin
Vladislav Sopov
U.Today Editorial Team