GHash.IO promises to establish 40% hashrate limit to prevent ‘51% attack’

The popular Bitcoin mining pool GHash.IO – famous for raising concern about a possible ‘51% attack’ on the Bitcoin ecosystem twice in the last year – has promised that in the future it will “not exceed more than 39.99% of the overall Bitcoin hashrate”.

The news was revealed during a recent summit organized by GHash.IO. The event, held after the last CoinSummit London conference, addressed the threat of ‘51% attacks’ against the Bitcoin network. The so-called ‘51% attack’ might happen if one single entity ends up controlling more than half of the computing power used to mine Bitcoin and using that power to block transactions or double spend, among other actions.

Back in June, the mining pool grazed the 50 percent hashrate mark for the second time in less than a year, creating a new wave of panic in the community. As soon as the problem was solved, GHash’s hashrate declined and is currently around 30 percent.

According to a GHash spokesperson, quoted by Techcrunch, there is now a 39.99% cap that should be respected by the pool’s managing team from now on. This means GHash.IO – operated by the related exchange CEX.IO, which is also connected to a huge hosted mining operation – agreed not to reach the 40 percent limit, remaining comfortably away from the 51 percent mark.

The pool’s CIO, Jeffrey Smith, said that temporary ways to mitigate the risk of an attack are the right thing to do right now.

“None of the existing technical solutions against the 51% attack threat is able to solve the problem in a long-term perspective, taking into account interests of existing mining pools, individual miners and Bitcoin community. Thus, Bitcoin adherents should focus on temporary acts until the lifetime solution is found”, he said, quoted by Coindesk.

To make sure the promise is kept, GHash.IO is creating a committee that should keep an eye on the situation, but which will also try to find a technological solution for the ‘51% attack’.

According to a statement released by the mining pool, “the committee will drive closer communication and cooperation between developers working on the Bitcoin protocol and solving the 51% issue, and businesses, highly interested in expanding the industry and promote Bitcoin to a broader audience”.

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