Overview
- A critical KAWPOW header bug allowed invalid blocks to be accepted starting with the first known bad block at height 4,487,776, with the flaw traced to an unchecked nHeight field that let blocks skip full ProgPoW verification.
- The first invalid block appeared on Friday, Aug. 7, and attacks continued for days before pools and developers identified the exploit and began recovery efforts.
- Major pools 2Miners and RavenMiner, which control a majority of Ravencoin hashpower, are mining a replacement chain from block 4,487,775 that excludes the exploited branch and could trigger a roughly three-day deep reorganization if it accumulates more valid work.
- 2Miners published an emergency node patch that rejects blocks with mismatched header heights and adds a checkpoint at 4,487,775, but upgraded nodes must replay about 4.49 million blocks and 28 million transactions on first restart, a process that can take many hours.
- Exchanges including Upbit, Bitget and Bitvavo have suspended RVN deposits and withdrawals and traders pushed the token to record lows as users and services treat confirmations after block 4,487,775 as potentially reversible while the network stabilizes.