Monero (XMR) is a cryptocurrency that focuses on secure and anonymous transactions, which it achieves by utilizing innovative technology such as ring signatures and stealth addresses. With currently the highest market cap out of the privacy coins group, the upcoming MoneroV (XMV) hard fork has understandably caused quite a stir up in the community.
The price of XMR has spiked 30.12% in the past week, with investors buying up Monero in anticipation of receiving free XMV coins. But what is MoneroV all about? Is it worth buying into the hard fork to receive your free coins? We take a closer look at the project below in a bit more detail, as well as why some are labelling MoneroV a scam.
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What is MoneroV About?
MoneroV is much the same as Monero, but there are a couple of key differences. Firstly, unlike Monero, MoneroV has a fixed supply of 256 million XMV with 158 million being released during the fork. Secondly, the website also claims that ‘MoneroV will implement new protocols that will solve the scaling problems facing Monero and other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.’
The site also states that owners of Monero will be airdropped 10 XMV for every XMR, with the hard fork and drop occurring at block number 1529810 on roughly May 3rd. Sounds great, right? Everyone loves ‘free coins’, but many within the community are warning users to stay away from the MoneroV scam.
What is the MoneroV Scam All About?
Despite the claims on the website, the finer details of the project remain very thin. There are also several red flags picked up by the community that indicate the MoneroV hard fork is likely a scam. These include:
- Date of the Fork – Every 6 months or so the Monero developers update the protocol through a scheduled hard fork. Due to 100% consensus, no new coins are generated. The next update will address issues of mining centralization and is scheduled for March. It is suspicious that the MoneroV hard fork has been scheduled for the same date and it is likely this was done to cause confusion in the community.
- No Exchange Support – In the FAQ on MoneroV website it states that no exchanges have so far announced support for the XMV. If it was viewed as legitimate, would exchanges not support it?
- No Support from My Monero – It also says on the FAQ that the My Monero web wallet will support the hard fork. However a recent blog post from the My Monero team states explicitly that they will not support any non-native hard forks. They also go on to state that they see MoneroV as a hazard to users – more on this below.
- Private Keys Needed to Claim MoneroV – Currently, the only way to claim your coins after the fork is by entering your private keys into the closed-source MoneroV wallet, with the team claiming they will only release their compiled wallet after the fork. This is a big red flag for a couple of reasons, both of which are detailed by the Monero team. Firstly, the wallet could be recording all private keys entered allowing all your XMR to be stolen. Secondly, it could also be used to expose details about the anonymous Monero blockchain, allowing the attackers to expose Monero user identities.
- Premine – MoneroV has a 10% premine, which is often identified with pump and dump scams where the developers hype up a hard fork in order to profit from it.
- Anonymous Team – Whilst much of the Monero team are anonymous, a project with this many uncertainties cannot get away with having no accountability.
We are of the opinion that there are far too many red flags surrounding this project to buy into it, and would advise readers not to divulge their Monero private keys with any unknown entity. Furthermore, in an interview with Bitcoin Manager, Monero’s Justin Ehrenhofer stated how he believed the purpose of fork was to damage the Monero network:
“Given that they are purposefully going forward with a possible Monero exploit that damages their network even more than it damages Monero, this team is incredibly unlikely to truly care about the value of privacy their claim to represent. Thus, the people behind MoneroV are likely scammers or attackers. In any case, this is an attack on the Monero network.”
What Can Monero Users do to Protect Their Privacy?
It would appear that this is definitely one to stay away from, but if Monero users want to help the network stay secure and private after the fork, it is recommended that they churn. This is basically a method of increasing privacy by sending your entire balance to yourself.
