Ripple CTO Breaks Silence on Recent XRP Ledger Network Halt: Details

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As a seasoned crypto investor with over a decade of experience under my belt, I have learned to navigate the volatile and often unpredictable world of digital currencies with a calm and analytical mindset. The recent incident on the XRP Ledger, while concerning for some, has not shaken my faith in Ripple’s technology or its team.

David Schwartz, the Chief Technology Officer at Ripple, has spoken about worries related to a recent event affecting the XRP Ledger. During this episode, certain nodes either stopped functioning temporarily or failed to advance on the network for a short while.

Following the occurrence, Bill Morgan, an ardent XRP supporter and lawyer, inquired about the meaning behind the developers’ description of XRPL as “halted” instead of just “down.” He drew a parallel between this latest event and previous difficulties encountered by Solana.

The key question is whether or not the system continues to generate accurate transaction records. If it does, then it can be considered as still operational. However, regardless of any technical arguments you may present, if there’s no way to confirm that a payment has been processed permanently, the system isn’t particularly useful.

— David “JoelKatz” Schwartz (@JoelKatz) November 26, 2024

Schwartz indicated that the key point is whether or not it continues to generate accurate records. If it does, one could argue that it hasn’t gone down. However, he added that if there’s uncertainty about whether a transaction has been completed irreversibly, then the system’s utility becomes questionable.

Timeline of events: What happened?

At 2:45 PM on November 25th, as a researcher closely following the developments of the XRP Ledger (XRPL), I noticed a concerning tweet from Wietse Wind, a well-known XRPL developer. His tweet suggested that the XRPL might be experiencing issues, stating, “The XRPL is currently partially down. We see all Full History servers operated by us and others are offline, and Ripple’s cluster is also reporting no current ledger.

In a subsequent announcement, Wind mentioned that node operators were experiencing issues such as their nodes freezing or failing to move forward: “It appears the ledger has become stable, and nodes are resuming operation on a fresh consensus ledger.” He also noted, “It seems that ledger 92346896-92347095 could not be recovered.

In a recent announcement, Wind mentioned that XRPL nodes were experiencing downtime, irrespective of their function – full history, current ledger, pathfinding, or submission – and promised to initiate inquiries to determine why they had stopped functioning.

40 minutes after the initial report, Wind shared an update stating that the XRP Ledger appears to have self-healed and no ledgers appear to be missing: “The majority of nodes are now in agreement on a consensus ledger and resuming the process. Full History nodes are fully syncing again, implying all ledgers might have been preserved. In other words, it seems like the network has recovered independently. As for the Full History nodes, they’re still catching up, but otherwise, things are returning to normal.

Regarding the recent event, Brad Chase, the Vice President of Engineering at RippleX, stated that they are currently looking into the underlying issue and are working diligently on a resolution. He also assured that further details will be disclosed once more information becomes available.

In a recent communication, Chase advised XRP Ledger node operators and validators to promptly upgrade their systems to the latest 2.3.0 rippled version. He mentioned that since the problem at hand is complex, further insights into its origin may become available only after the network has been corrected to ensure safety.

Additional details on the specifics of the incident was not yet available at press time.

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2024-11-26 18:47