Crypto PIVX Denies Vulnerability Allegations, Says Users’ Funds Are Safe

Developers of the private transactions cryptocurrency PIVX replied to crypto consulting firm Lunar Digital Assets regarding claims its blockchain was vulnerable to a bug. 

In a reply published on Aug. 13, PIVX developers addressed claims made by Lunar Digital Assets CEO Han Yoon. They argued that there has been no resurgence of attacks on its proof-of-stake (PoS) algorithm, and that neither PIVX nor its users’ funds are at risk.

According to the post, PIVX fixed its “fake stake” exploit in February, and its network stability and chain trust are not currently compromised. 

However, the post did note that there is something odd going on with the PIVX network with respect to low stake values. The statement explained that unusual behavior occurs in the case low stake values receive more rewards, but that it is not impacting coin or reward emissions.

The developers also derided Yoon for jumping to conclusions, saying that “the author of the article […] was informed of the investigation by PIVX, but chose to jump to false conclusions instead of waiting for the proper response.”

Lunar Digital Assets’ allegations

As previously reported by Cointelegraph, Han Yoon suggested on Aug. 12 that a staking vulnerability was exploited on PIVX and its forks. He noted that this bug was purportedly fixed by PIVX back in January but believed it’s being used again. This prior exploit made it so that attackers could receive “mathematically impossible” staking rewards via PoS chains.

Yoon also claimed that PIVX was aware of the exploit but was covering up the issue. However, Yoon said he wasn’t completely sure that PIVX was leaning on the exploit for their own gain, adding:

“I can not conclusively say with evidence that PIVX developers have been using their knowledge of the bug for their own benefits — let alone use it to exploit other chains. [...] The ‘fake stake’ exploit clearly has not been fixed for PIVX, so the question is, was it ever fixed? Or have the attackers developed a new method in carrying out similar attacks such as this one?”

Recently Cointelegraph also reported that a dusting attack occurred against Litecoin (LTC) on a major cryptocurrency exchange Binance.