SOL price tumbles as Solana goes through DoS attack

• The fastest blockchain in the world suffered a cyber-attack, a denial-of-service, earlier on Tuesday. 
• Validators in the Solana network are preparing for a potential restart. 
• The network is gathering criticism for its centralized nature when compared to rival Ethereum.

Solana price has plunged since the announcement of the cyber attack on the protocol’s network; traders await further updates from the Ethereum-killer. 

Last transaction block was added on Solana over 3 hours ago; the network has hit a pause

Solana network is currently the target of a DoS attack. A Denial-of-Service attack is an attack meant to shut down a network and make it inaccessible to its intended users. It stops legitimate users from accessing the service and does not typically result in a loss of information or assets. 

The victim network does, however lose time in recovering from a DoS attack. The blockchain platform announced on Twitter that it was experiencing intermittent instability. After 45 minutes of persistent instability, the network informed users. 

Resource exhaustion was identified as the cause behind the denial of service. The Ethereum rival stated that validators, considered the backbone of the system, are preparing for a potential restart. 

Following Solana’s announcement, criticism over its centralized nature started pouring in. For over three hours, the network has not signed or approved any transaction on its blockchain. 

The criticism is targeted towards Solana’s semi-centralized structure, which the blockchain network relies on, for speed. The announcement triggered a downtrend in Solana price; it was trading at $159.81 at the time of writing. 

Larry Cermak, Director of Research at The Block, attributes the current outage to a highly anticipated Initial Dex Offering scheduled at 12:00 PM UTC. Excessive demand is identified as the leading cause of an outage like the one seen on the Solana blockchain. 

Earlier this week, FXStreet analysts evaluated Solana and noted that the altcoin hadn’t budged during the overall market crash and predicted a bullish target of $276 before the DoS attack incident.