The mining pool Qubic launched an attack on the Monero network, which turned out to be more of a PR campaign than a genuine threat. This was stated to ForkLog by Alex Petrov, co-founder and CIO of Hyperfusion.
Qubic significantly increased its visibility and token value, while the Monero network did not suffer any significant losses, the expert noted.
According to him, the main goal of the attack was to draw attention to both projects. Qubic launched a dual mining pool where users could simultaneously mine Monero (XMR) and the native QUBIC token. This allowed for a rapid increase in hash rate and promoted the pool through additional profitability from XMR.
The marketing strategy worked. Within a month, the price of QUBIC rose by 80%, and mentions of the project online increased more than ninefold.
“The effect and headlines created everything necessary: the price rose, interest grew, new users were attracted, and economic turnover increased,” Petrov noted.
Bluff and “Selfish Mining”
Qubic representatives claimed to control more than 50% of Monero’s hash rate, which theoretically allows for a 51% attack. However, data analysis and community reports showed this was an exaggeration.
In reality, Qubic’s share in the network was between 30% and 40%. To create the illusion of control, the pool used the tactic of “selfish mining”—hiding discovered blocks from the rest of the network to gain an advantage in finding the next block. As a result, external statistical services recorded distorted data, inflating the pool’s share.
Additionally, Qubic deliberately concealed its real metrics, appearing in statistics as an “unknown” pool.
“Qubic is lying, using manipulative tactics. They are trying to convince miners to switch to their pool using empty threats. As long as we, as a community, do not fall for this trick, Qubic will lose,” reads a popular post on Reddit dedicated to the situation.
Impact on Networks
The attack had virtually no impact on Monero’s operations. Transactions proceeded as usual, with no delays or censorship recorded. Users did not lose funds.
The only negative consequence was a temporary 10% drop in XMR’s price, which was offset by a 2-3 times increase in search interest for the coin.
For the Qubic pool and its miners, the attack proved costly. According to Petrov’s estimate, they lost 40-60% of their capacity due to “orphaned” blocks—work for which no reward was received.
The expert emphasized that conducting a successful and destructive attack on the Monero network is significantly more challenging than it might seem.
“51% is a theoretical percentage on paper. To block blocks, at least 75-80% of the hash rate is needed, and for transaction censorship, more than 90%. A double-spending attack is even more complex: besides a huge hash rate, the attacker needs significant funds in XMR and a victim to deceive. This is already beyond the realm of crime and technically dozens of times more difficult,” explained the Hyperfusion co-founder.
He also added that this situation once again exposed Monero’s longstanding issue—a high concentration of hash rate in two or three large pools. Redistributing capacity to P2Pool or smaller pools could enhance the network’s resilience.
Back in July, the platform Qubic, led by IOTA co-founder Sergey Ivancheglo, announced plans to capture 51% of Monero’s hash rate between August 2 and 31.