Mintpal hacked (VeriCoin)

[Wulfcastle]

Read this in the VRC thread and had to post it here :

Here's another thought: What if the devs didn't agree to a rollback? Do you really think Mintpal could pay back 2 million dollars? What if they just closed up shop and took off with everyone's coins? What would you all be saying then?

Now that really is an interesting point. What if the VRC devs didn't agree to fork VeriCoin and save investors money, how would MintPal be able to pay back $2M worth of damages, would it be Gox 2.0 - Revenge of the Altcoins?

Anyway MintPal have handled this situation so badly to the extent that Cryptsy seems safe again. But in all seriousness, there is no really trusted exchange anymore, that accolade went to MintPal whom have lost it with this fiasco. Furthermore all the "major" alt-coin exchanges barring Crypty (which is even worse) have been hacked. Poloniex was hacked a while ago, Bittrex the same and now MintPal.

[1714534030]

1714534030

[1714534030]

1714534030

[1714534030]

1714534030

[smalltimer]

also interesting: mintpal didn't even go into maintenance mode after the "attack". They were able to write a statement and continue business as usual without even one minute of downtime. Nothing was shut down (besides vrc), not a second. Is that what you'd expect to happen after their wallets for btc, ltc were attacked and 8mln vrc stolen? I also have serious doubts about this whole story.

[Wulfcastle]

also interesting: mintpal didn't even go into maintenance mode after the "attack". They were able to write a statement and continue business as usual without even one minute of downtime. Nothing was shut down (besides vrc), not a second. Is that what you'd expect to happen after their wallets for btc, ltc were attacked and 8mln vrc stolen? I also have serious doubts about this whole story.

Exactly, there was not a single minute of downtime. You'd think that they'd at least halt all trades and temporarily shut down the exchange to inspect the hack and stop it from happening again or at least secure all their hot wallets to minimize attack vectors, but no everything just remained as it was.

Their official statement was basically this : "Well we got hacked, we don't know how, but there's no reason to believe it will happen again. Just go about your business as usual"

[Luror]

People stating that nobody will lose money over this are naive. If the fork goes through then yes people will get their VRC refunded to them but ask yourself this question:

What will happen once the BTC/VRC market is reopened on the various exchanges?

The answer is simple, the majority of people are going to dump all of their VRC for BTC and those who are too slow are going to be left bagholding severely devalued VRC. They will be the real losers if the hard fork goes through.

I personally have no stake in VRC (and never will now). The precedent being set by the VRC devs makes the coin worthless from my point of view. It's not the responsibility of coin devs to protect the interests of coin exchanges.

Every single transaction can be traced back to it's very origin in a blockchain. A better option would have been for Mintpal to step up and compensate their customers out of their own BTC for their now imaginary VRC and if the VRC devs wanted to roll out a hard fork, the extent of which should extend to some kind of global warning if the coins that have been received originate from the malicious transactions. This would make the stolen coins worthless and easy for an exchange to confiscate should they be transferred to one.

+1

[mr_random]

I suspect the theft is larger than Mintpal are letting on. In terms of, other coins were stolen too. But the damage was limited because they were using proper cold storage for the other coins, so they only lost a small percentage of customer funds. If they don't announce it, they won't get a flood of people panicking and taking all their coins off the exchange.

We've all seen what's happened with mtgox. You can't trust these exchanges to tell the truth when it comes to hacks.

It doesn't make sense to me that only Vericoin was stolen. It makes more sense that many coins took a hit, but only Vericoin got hit hard because of no cold storage and everything being in the hot wallet.

That's my opinion anyway, obviously I have no proof so take it how you want.

[bitwho]

also interesting: mintpal didn't even go into maintenance mode after the "attack". They were able to write a statement and continue business as usual without even one minute of downtime. Nothing was shut down (besides vrc), not a second. Is that what you'd expect to happen after their wallets for btc, ltc were attacked and 8mln vrc stolen? I also have serious doubts about this whole story.

Exactly, there was not a single minute of downtime. You'd think that they'd at least halt all trades and temporarily shut down the exchange to inspect the hack and stop it from happening again or at least secure all their hot wallets to minimize attack vectors, but no everything just remained as it was.

Their official statement was basically this : "Well we got hacked, we don't know how, but there's no reason to believe it will happen again. Just go about your business as usual"

yeah. it was down for maintenance for me. please do your research before talking FUD

[smalltimer]

also interesting: mintpal didn't even go into maintenance mode after the "attack". They were able to write a statement and continue business as usual without even one minute of downtime. Nothing was shut down (besides vrc), not a second. Is that what you'd expect to happen after their wallets for btc, ltc were attacked and 8mln vrc stolen? I also have serious doubts about this whole story.

Exactly, there was not a single minute of downtime. You'd think that they'd at least halt all trades and temporarily shut down the exchange to inspect the hack and stop it from happening again or at least secure all their hot wallets to minimize attack vectors, but no everything just remained as it was.

Their official statement was basically this : "Well we got hacked, we don't know how, but there's no reason to believe it will happen again. Just go about your business as usual"

yeah. it was down for maintenance for me. please do your research before talking FUD

i was online at that time and i didn't notice any downtime. I was using their site and all that happend was the vrc-market was removed after the tweet popped up. That is what i experienced. I was able to withdraw my coins and all.  

[smalltimer]

look at the charts. Trading was going on all the time:

https://bitcoinwisdom.com/markets/mintpal/cloakbtc

there was no downtime as bitcoinwisdom clearly shows

[flipme]

Heres a picture of the internals of your favorite altcoin exchange

[smoothie]

I suspect the theft is larger than Mintpal are letting on. In terms of, other coins were stolen too. But the damage was limited because they were using proper cold storage for the other coins, so they only lost a small percentage of customer funds. If they don't announce it, they won't get a flood of people panicking and taking all their coins off the exchange.

We've all seen what's happened with mtgox. You can't trust these exchanges to tell the truth when it comes to hacks.

It doesn't make sense to me that only Vericoin was stolen. It makes more sense that many coins took a hit, but only Vericoin got hit hard because of no cold storage and everything being in the hot wallet.

That's my opinion anyway, obviously I have no proof so take it how you want.

This is my guess as well. Time will tell if that was true.

Most of the VRC supporters have resorted to slurs, insults, and personal attacks if you post on the "official" VRC thread.

[Spoetnik]

Read this in the VRC thread and had to post it here :

Here's another thought: What if the devs didn't agree to a rollback? Do you really think Mintpal could pay back 2 million dollars? What if they just closed up shop and took off with everyone's coins? What would you all be saying then?

Now that really is an interesting point. What if the VRC devs didn't agree to fork VeriCoin and save investors money, how would MintPal be able to pay back $2M worth of damages, would it be Gox 2.0 - Revenge of the Altcoins?

Anyway MintPal have handled this situation so badly to the extent that Cryptsy seems safe again. But in all seriousness, there is no really trusted exchange anymore, that accolade went to MintPal whom have lost it with this fiasco. Furthermore all the "major" alt-coin exchanges barring Crypty (which is even worse) have been hacked. Poloniex was hacked a while ago, Bittrex the same and now MintPal.

they have prob made 2 million dollars in Votes so far..
their reputation for draining us dry for paid votes is legendary BEFORE the alleged VRC hack..

i also think its unlikely they were hacked and are lying about it or even worse just idiots running an un-secure exchange.

nap time is over babies..
we don't need rinky dink clowns in crypto trying to half ass it.. it's 2014 and we need professional services.

Screw em and screw VRC i won't touch either one ever !

And i never used GOX either because the writing was on the wall looooooong before they shut down.
problem is we have delusional moron fanboys cheerleading crap coins and services.. blind to reality.
Ya wanna be dumb and kiss ass go for it.. lemme know how that works out for ya.

And i would be saying Mintpal is within their right to close shop and walk away the coins if they wanted to..
After all this is an unregulated market so tough fucking titty cry babies.
Wanna be able to call the cops ? Then i suggest you all start voting for regulations..

I say congrats to Mark from GOX he made off with all your money and your all morons if you didn't see it a year or two in advance.
You all wanna keep screeching Free Market and defending the sleaziest of shitty clone coins posted daily ?
well suck it and quit being little bitches about it. and realize Mark taught you guys a life lesson.. don't be a moron.

Just cross your fingers you can convince the next dev to fork the coin lol
Because the hacker got away and he WILL try again lol
Hope you got the big box of bandaids from Costco (rather than fixing the core problem)

[Wulfcastle]

Read this in the VRC thread and had to post it here :

Here's another thought: What if the devs didn't agree to a rollback? Do you really think Mintpal could pay back 2 million dollars? What if they just closed up shop and took off with everyone's coins? What would you all be saying then?

Now that really is an interesting point. What if the VRC devs didn't agree to fork VeriCoin and save investors money, how would MintPal be able to pay back $2M worth of damages, would it be Gox 2.0 - Revenge of the Altcoins?

Anyway MintPal have handled this situation so badly to the extent that Cryptsy seems safe again. But in all seriousness, there is no really trusted exchange anymore, that accolade went to MintPal whom have lost it with this fiasco. Furthermore all the "major" alt-coin exchanges barring Crypty (which is even worse) have been hacked. Poloniex was hacked a while ago, Bittrex the same and now MintPal.

they have prob made 2 million dollars in Votes so far..
their reputation for draining us dry for paid votes is legendary BEFORE the alleged VRC hack..

i also think its unlikely they were hacked and are lying about it or even worse just idiots running an un-secure exchange.

nap time is over babies..
we don't need rinky dink clowns in crypto trying to half ass it.. it's 2014 and we need professional services.

Screw em and screw VRC i won't touch either one ever !

And i never used GOX either because the writing was on the wall looooooong before they shut down.
problem is we have delusional moron fanboys cheerleading crap coins and services.. blind to reality.
Ya wanna be dumb and kiss ass go for it.. lemme know how that works out for ya.

And i would be saying Mintpal is within their right to close shop and walk away the coins if they wanted to..
After all this is an unregulated market so tough fucking titty cry babies.
Wanna be able to call the cops ? Then i suggest you all start voting for regulations..

I say congrats to Mark from GOX he made off with all your money and your all morons if you didn't see it a year or two in advance.
You all wanna keep screeching Free Market and defending the sleaziest of shitty clone coins posted daily ?
well suck it and quit being little bitches about it. and realize Mark taught you guys a life lesson.. don't be a moron.

Just cross your fingers you can convince the next dev to fork the coin lol
Because the hacker got away and he WILL try again lol
Hope you got the big box of bandaids from Costco (rather than fixing the core problem)

I don't see myself using MintPal again after this fiasco. The trading volume is dropping like a rock. Secondly I think this entire story is complete b/s. There have been many exchanges hacked before and they've given adequate information as to how the hacks have taken place either to rebuild trust or to prevent other exchanges from falling prey to similar attack vectors. MintPal in their "official statement" basically said "Oh well, we got hacked, we're not sure how it happened, but we don't think it'll happen again"

There's another plausible theory I dug up on Reddit :

If a hacker could have injected any withdrawal why didn't they take the bitcoins, darkcoins or litecoins? The official story is complete bullshit.
This was a problem with the new vericoin wallet, that is why the rollback included a rollback on the wallet version.

Basically some people suspect there was a problem with the VeriCoin wallet, which is true seeing as the wallet versions were also supposedly rolled back (I'm guessing that this means released features in the wallet are now non-existent)

[Hueristic]

Antonopolis bailing because the door of transparency is closing is a huge RED FLAG, as I see it.

I didn’t quit bitcoin, I quit the foundation, there’s a difference. I’m as committed as ever to bitcoin, more so in fact. Sheeesh!

[adhitthana]

Were they able to roll back the transactions only because so little time had passed?
Would they have been able to roll them back a week or a month?

[TsuyokuNaritai]

A big red flag people seem to have missed from Mintpal's announcement. Even though they admit their fault...

Investigation has shown that due to an error on our part users who had not refreshed the page since the market was suspended were still able to enter orders successfully.

We did have COLD storage setup for VRC, however in this instance, due to an error for which only we can be accountable, we had transferred far fewer coins than was required, resulting in a large proportion of coins being left in the HOT wallet.

...they still basically say that if Vericoin hadn't agreed to the rollback, then rather than eating the loss themselves they'd have passed it to holders of Vericoin on their exchange.

The VeriCoin that you hold on the MintPal exchange will be unaffected thanks to the VeriCoin developers. As we previously announced, the VRC developers have worked tirelessly to perform something never before done by a cryptocurrency and rollback the blockchain in order to reverse the two malicious transactions. This was not done out of a desire to save MintPal, but rather a desire to save your coins.

[Bobsurplus]

WTF, I only found one real article on this situation so far and they seem to praise VRC for the rollback.

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/news/mintpal-gets-hacked-pos-vericoin-hardfork-result/2014/07/13

Cryptocoinsnews is now dead to me!

[XbladeX]

WTF, I only found one real article on this situation so far and they seem to praise VRC for the rollback.

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/news/mintpal-gets-hacked-pos-vericoin-hardfork-result/2014/07/13

Cryptocoinsnews is now dead to me!

I have to agree...

[freedomno1]

i know almost nothing about the inner mechanic of crypto so forgive me if this sounds dumb but if most vrc users don't agree with the reset what is to stop them staying with current chain and that taking over as the authentic vrc? will their wallets stop syncing or something?

A network needs to have over 50% of the network to support a new chain and the miners must make a consensus for it to switch.
A similar thing happened in Bitcoin and its called a fork the shorter chain is abandoned and the longer chain is kept but if the miners disagree then I guess nothing could really be done about it.
https://bitcoin.org/en/alert/2013-03-11-chain-fork

http://bitcoinmagazine.com/3668/bitcoin-network-shaken-by-blockchain-fork/

Basically if I read it correct the devs reverted it to previous the mintpal transaction and then had a new client accept from that block onwards.

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/news/mintpal-gets-hacked-pos-vericoin-fork-result/2014/07/13

Mintpal was in control of 30% of existing VeriCoin, all of which was stolen by a yet unidentified hacker. Mintpal has emphasized to its users that they are still processing withdrawals for all other coins; however, they have not revealed the exact vector of the attack. Mintpal and other VRC exchanges have worked directly with VeriCoin developers to come up with a seemingly satisfactory solution for all parties involved (except the hacker): VeriCoin is going to fork. By forking, VeriCoin can, in effect, reset their blockchain to just before the security breach at Mintpal. In this way, all the VeriCoin that was stolen is put back in control of Mintpal, who will then reimburse their own VeriCoin holders and traders manually. Outside of exchanges, all VeriCoin transactions that occurred after 2AM EST 7/13/14 will be erased in this “theft reversal process.”

From the perspective of VeriCoin investors, a fork is indeed preferable to an unknown and presumably malicious entity being in control of 30% of a Proof of Stake (PoS) altcoin. In contrast to Proof of Work (PoW) altcoins, PoS altcoins such as VeriCoin generate new coins by “staking” existing coins. The “staking” process replaces the mining process as the consensus mechanism; however, all of the existing pressures in the Bitcoin mining world translate to PoS in some way, shape, or form. As such, a single entity controlling 30% of the total supply of VeriCoin is equivalent to a single entity controlling 30% of the Bitcoin mining network and is more centralization than most digital currency enthusiasts are able to stomach. Mintpal’s breach reveals that 30% of the total supply of VeriCoin was being held on MintPal, and not being staked and used for anything besides trading. Instead of holding VeriCoin on a centralized, and thus vulnerable, exchange, VeriCoin developers reminded VeriCoin investors in their statement that “staking your VeriCoin in the wallet is the best decentralized solution.”

[gustav]

[...] Mintpal was in control of 30% of existing VeriCoin, all of which maybe was stolen by a yet unidentified hacker. [...]

fixed it for you

[usahero]

I agree with rollback. These coins are like playmoney. I don't take them very seriously.