{"id":43558,"date":"2018-04-11T03:19:19","date_gmt":"2018-04-11T10:19:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cryptoslate.com\/?p=43558"},"modified":"2026-04-25T18:50:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T17:50:27","slug":"monero-split","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cryptoslate.com\/monero-split\/","title":{"rendered":"XMR Identity Crisis: Monero Undergoes Five-Way Split"},"content":{"rendered":"

Monero<\/a>, the world's largest privacy coin<\/a> by market cap, underwent an emergency hard-fork as an active measure against miner centralization.<\/p>\n

Monero\u2019s latest Version 12 update marks a significant milestone for the currency. With the recent release of the BK-N miner from Baikal and the Antminer X3 from Bitmain, the core XMR communities stance against specified mining cards has seen its user base splinter into five separate currencies.<\/p>\n

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Monero is an open-source cryptocurrency that focuses on privacy, decentralization, and scalability.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These mining cards are implementations of ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuit), hardware geared towards the Crypotnight hashing algorithm, and offer a considerable performance advantage over CPU or GPU miners.<\/p>\n

Dedicated mining hardware brings massive amounts of hashing power into the hands of a concentrated group of users, disrupting the power dynamic within the XMR community and leading to a consolidation of power in the network.<\/p>\n

ASICs have existed for a long time in the cryptocurrency space. Companies such as Bitmain produce miners catering to a range of hashing algorithms including SHA256 and Scrypt.<\/p>\n

However, for the XMR community \u2014 which places a strong emphasis on decentralization \u2014 these cards cause significant concern, with many community members labeling such cards as a \u201cthreat.\u201d<\/h3>\n

The position of the Monero community on dedicated mining hardware stems from the origins of Monero itself \u2014 fueled by an ideological diversion from Bitcoin\u2019s development, Monero prioritizes privacy and an egalitarian mindset, opting for fair distribution of mining power throughout the network.<\/p>\n

Specialized Hardware Centralizes Mining Power<\/h2>\n

In an official post<\/a> released in February, the Monero team \u201crecognized that ASICs might be an inevitable development for any Proof of Work\u201d algorithm but maintains that XMR is committed to cultivating balance in its mining community, stating:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order to maintain its goal of decentralization and to provide a deterrent for ASIC development and to protect against unknown or undetectable ASIC development, the Monero team proposes modifying the Cryptonight PoW hash every scheduled fork, twice a year\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Related Story:\u00a0Ethereum Community Considers Hard Fork To Combat Bitmain\u2019s ASIC Miner<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The developers also endeavor to remind the community that adoption of the Cryptonight PoW function was adapted from the initial CryptoNote implementation to eliminate the disparity between CPU (majority) and GPU\/FPGA\/ASIC (minority) miners.<\/p>\n

Monero\u2019s official statement on the algorithm change also goes to great lengths to reaffirm the teams \u201csomewhat formal stance\u201d against ASICs, outlining their plans and reasoning as to why the developers will combat the current wave of Cryptonight-specific miners.<\/p>\n

\u201cCryptonight (Monero's proof-of-work system) intends to close the gap between CPU and GPU, FPGA, and ASIC mining by using a proof-of-work system that is memory bound over a moderate amount of memory. As a result, ASICs get significantly more expensive to build.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There have been many conversations<\/a> amongst Monero community members regarding how XMR should maintain their ASIC resistance, including transitioning their hashing algorithm to the Cuckoo Cycle. The feature list on Monero\u2019s latest Github<\/a> release, however, only states a \u201ctweaked PoW.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It appears that the recent update has already achieved its desired goal, as recent statistics<\/a> already show a greater diversification of power within the XMR mining pools \u2014 albeit at the cost of global hashing power.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hard Fork Spawns Five New Projects<\/h2>\n

Five new projects have spawned as a direct response to this hardline policy against specified Cryptonight mining cards, all of which are operating on the ASIC compatible Version 11 XMR code. These cards include:<\/p>\n