Dogecoin Network Hit by Vulnerability, 69% of Nodes Crashed

A hacker exploited a major security vulnerability in the Dogecoin network on Dec. 12, crashing 69% of its active nodes.

Andreas Kohl, co-founder of Bitcoin sidechain Sequentia, identified himself as the hacker in a post on X. Kohl said he used an old laptop in El Salvador to carry out the cyberattack. The Doge network had 647 active nodes before the attack, but only around 315 remained functional afterward, according to data from Blockchair. At the time of publishing, 376 are currently functional.

This incident highlights the vulnerabilities in widely used blockchain networks like Dogecoin. The ability for a remote attacker to crash nearly 70% of the network's nodes with minimal effort raises concerns about the security of decentralized systems, experts said.

The Bug Was Found Days Ago

Industry players, including Coinbase, reassured users that the flaw’s overall impact is limited.

Despite the bug and node shutdowns, Dogecoin’s cryptocurrency DOGE has remained stable, trading at $0.04, a 1% decrease from Dec. 11. Over the past month, the cryptocurrency has seen a nearly 4% increase in value.

The exploit was publicly disclosed by an X account called “Department Of DOGE Efficiency” on Dec. 04. Despite the disclosure, it remained unpatched through Dec. 12. In the post, the account warned that the vulnerability, referred to as “DogeReaper” could allow anyone to crash any Dogecoin node remotely.

“It works similarly to the Japanese manga series ‘Death Note,’ where you write down the name of a person and that person immediately dies of a heart attack,” the post reads. ”DogeReaper is similar, where you write down the address of any Dogecoin node, and that node instantly dies of a Segmentation Fault.” The account added that if a malicious actor had uncovered the bug, they could have stopped the Dogecoin network for at least a few days.