Sequentia co-founder crashed 69% of DOGE nodes by exploiting fatal flaw

Andreas Kohl, co-founder of Bitcoin sidechain Sequentia, claimed responsibility for the collapse of 69% of the Dogecoin network by exploiting a critical vulnerability called “DogeReaper.”

On December 12, the DOGE Efficiency Department, the @EfficiencyDOGE

Data from private blockchain search engine Blockchair revealed that Dogecoin had 647 active nodes before it was hacked. Only 205 nodes remained active when the vulnerability was discovered and reported by @EfficiencyDOGE. At the time of this writing, the network had recovered slightly, reaching 373 active nodes.

Andreas Kohl, co-founder of Bitcoin sidechain Sequentia, claimed that he was responsible for the Dogecoin hack. He said he took down the network using a computer located in El Salvador.

“Records show that 69% of the Dogecoin network was disabled by a single ThinkPad in rural El Salvador,” Kohl wrote, quoting the @EffeciencyDOGE post showing the crash.

In a separate post, Kohl credited researcher Tobias Ruck with discovering the vulnerability that caused nodes on the Dogecoin network to crash. The vulnerability is called “DogeReaper” and has the power to bring down the entire network if given the opportunity. The @EfficiencyDOGE account shared a public disclosure post with a video and detailed instructions on how to exploit the critical vulnerability.

“DogeReaper is a critical vulnerability in Dogecoin that allows anyone to remotely bring down any Dogecoin node,” @EfficiencyDOGE wrote.

The account explained that the vulnerability works like “Death Note” in the popular Japanese manga of the same name. The plot centers around a cursed notebook in which the main character writes a person’s name and that person immediately dies.

With “DogeReaper” the concept is very similar, all the hacker has to do is type in the address of the Dogecoin node that the hacker wants to bring down and that node will instantly die due to Segmentation Fault.

Since the addresses of Dogecoin nodes are public, the account stated that “anyone can take down the entire Dogecoin network in an instant.”

“If a malicious actor had found this bug instead of us, they could have shut down the Dogecoin network for at least a few days with no transactions or blocks,” the account said.

It appears that Kohl’s hack had little to no impact on the Dogecoin price. According to Crypto.news data, DOGE increased by 3.1% in the last 24 hours of trading, reaching a transaction volume of 7.3 billion dollars.

DOGE’s last 24-hour trading price chart, December 12, 2024 | Source: crypto.news.

Additionally, the account claimed that Tobias Ruck and RoqqitDev had sent multiple disclosures to the network and major exchanges to prevent people from exploiting the vulnerability.

After receiving the information, Binance promised to fix the vulnerability “this week.” Coinbase reviewed the report and rated the severity of DogeReaper as “low,” then marked the ticket with an “informative” status and awarded Ruck $200.