Privacy-Centric Coin XMR Splits Into Four Different Monero Protocols | Technology – Bitcoin News

On April 6 the privacy-centric cryptocurrency monero (XMR) forked the protocol in order to make the digital asset’s mining ecosystem egalitarian. However, the hard fork has led to the birth of four monero-based blockchain branches all claiming to be the “original monero.”

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The ‘ASIC Scare’ Creates Four Separate Monero Projects

The digital currency monero (XMR) is a public blockchain network created in April of 2014. Unlike litecoin and many other altcoins, XMR is not a clone of the original bitcoin codebase. Monero was built using the Cryptonote protocol; a codebase designed by a cryptographer who called himself Nicolas van Saberhagen. Saberhagen’s proof of concept turned into a slew of Cryptonote coins that utilized the Cryptonight proof-of-work hash algorithm like bytecoin, boolberry, and monero. However, just recently the Chinese mining operation Bitmain Technologies launched its Antminer X3 series, which hashes the mining protocol Cryptonight. A few other mining manufacturers such as Halong Mining and Baikal revealed ASICs that process the algorithm as well. 

In light of this situation, the monero developers and community decided it was best to hard fork the
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