Coinbase and Kraken halt trade in ethereum classic for the time being

Coinbase and Kraken have stopped trading the ethereum classic. A hack attack caused double transactions to appear in the blockchain of the crypto currency. This means that the transfer of ethereum classic was not possible.

According to Coinbase and Kraken, a so-called 51 percent attack took place. Sun attack is carried out by a group of miners that holds more than half the hash rate of a cryptic currency. This means that they have half of the computer power needed to run the cryptic currency properly. Once a group has that control, it is possible to prevent new transactions from getting a confirmation. This allows them to stop payments for users and to reverse transactions that have been completed. This means that coins can be issued twice.

Trade Shut Down

In the case of ethereum classic – a spin-off from the well-known ethereum – this attack allowed the hackers to reissue sun 88,500 to the ETC. That’s worth almost $440,000. According to Coinbase, this was first detected in the course of 5 January, and in the following days there were eight similar attacks on this particular cryptic currency.

For this reason, it was decided to halt all trade in these products. According to safety researcher Mark Nesbitt, Coinbase is looking into the possibilities of resuming trading. We will communicate to our customers what they can expect from us when it comes to ETC.

Incidentally, it is not only Coinbase that is stopping the trade in ethereum classic. Squatting, formally known as Payward Inc., does the same thing. As a result of this specific attack, this company has also decided to halt all trade in ETC for the time being. We will monitor the situation and resume trading in the ETC as soon as we think it can be done safely.