What Was the Primary Consequence of the DAO Attack on the Ethereum Blockchain?
The primary consequence was a fundamental split in the Ethereum community and the creation of two separate blockchains. To recover the stolen Ether, the majority of the community voted for a hard fork, which essentially reversed the malicious transactions.
The new chain, which implemented the fork, became Ethereum (ETH), while the original, unforked chain continued as Ethereum Classic (ETC).
Glossar
Ethereum Hard Fork
Disruption ⎊ An Ethereum hard fork represents a fundamental alteration to the protocol’s consensus rules, creating a permanent divergence from the previous blockchain state; this divergence necessitates all nodes to upgrade to the new software to remain compatible with the network, impacting the long-term viability of the original chain if consensus isn’t achieved.
Primary Consequence
Consequence ⎊ The Primary Consequence of a major protocol event, such as the Ethereum DAO hack, is the immediate and fundamental challenge to the core tenets of the decentralized system, forcing a definitive choice between immutability and financial pragmatism.
Ethereum Classic
AlternativeChain ⎊ This blockchain maintains a distinct ledger history and consensus mechanism separate from the main Ethereum network, having forked due to philosophical or technical disagreements regarding governance or protocol changes.
The Dao Attack
Exploitation ⎊ The Dao Attack, occurring in 2016, represents a critical event in the nascent history of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) and smart contract security, specifically impacting The DAO, an Ethereum-based investment fund.
Hard Fork
Disruption ⎊ A hard fork represents a radical divergence in a blockchain’s protocol, creating a permanent split and typically resulting in a new cryptocurrency.