tl;dr
Hacker, Andreas Kohl said he exploited a vulnerability in Dogecoin's blockchain, causing the majority of its nodes to crash. We have since found his claim to be false.
UPDATE: Unfortunately, it looks like a lot of news sources got it wrong, including me. The vulnerability was first reported two weeks ago and plugged! I was able to search some monitoring sites and see that the network has over 14K nodes and all is well with the world! I apologize for the mistake.
A hacker exploited a vulnerability in Dogecoin's blockchain, causing the majority of its nodes to crash. The number of active DOGE nodes decreased from 647 to 205, but some have since recovered, with 331 active nodes currently.
Andreas Kohl claimed responsibility, stating that he took down 69% of the network using an old laptop from rural El Salvador. The exploit had minimal impact on DOGE's price, which is currently trading at $0.413, a 4.7% decrease in the last 24 hours.
New data from blockchain explorer Blockchair reveals that a hacker took advantage of an exploit in Dogecoin’s (DOGE ) blockchain, causing the majority of its nodes to crash. Earlier this week, a Dogecoin monitoring platform noticed that the number of DOGE nodes dipped from 647 to just 205, a decrease of about 69%. “Our monitoring made us aware that the vulnerability appears to have been exploited, and almost 69% of the Dogecoin network has crashed. Blockchair shows the number of public nodes. Before, it was 647, and at the time of writing it is just 205.” However, according to Blockchair, some DOGE nodes have since recovered as there are currently 331 active nodes around the world at time of writing.
In a recent thread on the social media platform X, Bitcoin (BTC ) sidechain developer Andreas Kohl says that he was the one who took down most of the DOGE network using an old laptop. “I used a publicly disclosed vulnerability to take down 69% of the Dogecoin network from an old thinkpad in rural El Salvador.” According to Kohl, most DOGE users didn’t even notice . “Only nodes that weren’t on the latest version were affected – which was the majority of the network, excluding CEXs (centralized exchanges) and most other major custodians – hence why most doge users never noticed, not that many understand self-custody.”
News of the exploit had little impact on the price of DOGE as the meme asset is trading for $0.413 at time of writing, a 4.7% decrease during the last 24 hours.