Wednesday, December 4, 2024

Reporting the Interchain

Binance dual wields validators on Cosmos Hub

Centralized exchange Binance appears to have two validators running on the Cosmos Hub, prompting a possible governance proposal to remedy centralization implications.

According to Mintscan.io data, Binance has two validators: “Binance Node” is the number six validator for ATOM and “Binance Staking” fills the 14 spot. Worries of centralization have been expressed on social media with one Twitter user, Lobo, alluding to Binance’s dual validators as a Sybil attack on the Cosmos Hub. Lobo put up a poll on Twitter asking if Sybil attacks are tolerated on the Atom Hub.

The poll response is overwhelmingly “Big no go” with the lion’s share percentage of votes.

A discussion under the Tweet covered many topics, such as centralized exchange Huobi also running two validators, possible systemic risk of centralization, increasing the validator set to 1,000, and putting up a governance proposal to remove Binance’s second validator.

At the core of Lobo’s argument is that smaller validators get pushed out of the active set by bigger validators running more than one validator.

Replying to Lobo, Cosmos ecosystem validator, Jacob Gadikan, said he hopes ATOM 2.0 passes and has put thought into this problem across other Cosmos chains.

“Exchanges shouldn’t have voting power even if they have many delegations,” Twitter user Chain of Secrets said. “They should be banned from governance.”

Cosmos News reached out to Binance and received an automated response. Any comment will be added to this story.

Justin Werner
Justin Wernerhttps://cosmosnews.zone
Justin Werner is Founder and Publisher of Cosmos News, a trusted source of local news and information for the Cosmos ecosystem. He is also a community leader, entrepreneur, and dedicated advocate for transparency and accountability in local government.

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