Cardano Triumphs: Swift Action Thwarts Major DDoS Attack Effortlessly

On Jun 27, 2024

Cardano is a popular Proof-of-Stake (PoS) Crypto network that is known for its highly stable potential to fight against network load. Charles Hoskinson is the founder of this crypto blockchain. In 2017, Hoskinson launched Cardano blockchain, following 4 years of hard work.

On 25 June 2024, Raul Antonio, CTO of Fluid Tokens, reported a DDoS attack on the Cardano network starting at block 10,487,530. The attacker sent transactions executing 194 “REWARD” smart contracts, spending just 0.9 ADA per transaction to overload the network and attempt to steal staked ADA.

On Block 10,487,530, an attack on the Cardano network began.
🐛 Each transaction executes 194 smart contracts.
🐛 The attacker is spending 0.9 ADA per transaction.
🐛 They are filling each block with many of these transactions.
🐛 The smart contracts used are of type REWARD.
In… pic.twitter.com/QUVm0pq0Q8
— elraulito (@ElRaulito_cnft) June 25, 2024

The attack failed midway thanks to the swift actions of Philip Disarro, the founder and CEO of Anastasia Labs, a Cardano-focused development platform. Disarro quickly identified the attack strategy and shared an effective countermeasure on X (formerly Twitter). His prompt response played a crucial role in protecting the Cardano network and preventing the attacker from successfully stealing staked ADA. This incident highlights the resilience and quick-thinking of the Cardano community in defending against security threats.

The attack stopped after the attacker saw Disarro’s tweet and tried to protect their funds. However, it was too late because Disarro and other developers had already started recovering the stolen ADA.

Update: DDOSer halted his attack after reading my tweet in an effort to protect his funds. Alas, they were too late and the pillaging of their funds is already in progress.
Thanks for the free money moron.
Truly iconic that the attacker who presumably wanted to damage the…
— phil (@phil_uplc) June 25, 2024

Despite the Cardano blockchain functioning normally, some stake pool operators experienced higher loads and slight delays in transaction times, as reported by Intersect, a Cardano membership group.

Update on the spam attack attempted today ⬇️
We want to thank the community for quickly mobilizing to help support us in identifying the source of today’s spam attack on the Cardano mainnet. To complement the community effort to resolve the issue, we have coordinated a technical…
— Intersect (@IntersectMBO) June 25, 2024

Intersect claimed that the attackers were not only planning to steal staked funds; instead, they aimed to halt the Cardano blockchain network.