Bitcoin Gold
hard forked from the bitcoin blockchain on October 24, 2017. The stated purpose of the hard fork was to change the
proof of work algorithm so that ASICs (
Application-Specific Integrated Circuits) which are used to mine bitcoin cannot be used to mine the Bitcoin Gold
blockchain in the hopes that enabling mining on commonly available graphics cards would allow mining from a home PC. According to
Mashable the launch was criticized for being hastily put together and for including a developer pre-mine. During the attack, 388,000 BTG (worth approximately US$18 million) was stolen from several cryptocurrency exchanges. Bitcoin Gold was later delisted from Bittrex, after the team refused to help pay some damages. In July 2018, Bitcoin Gold changed mining algorithm to one that requires more memory to further discourage ASIC mining. Bitcoin Gold suffered from 51% attacks again in January 2020. In July 2020, the version 0.17.2 was released as an emergency update in order to elude a long attack chain originated a few days before. == References ==