New Smart Contract Allows Reorganization on ETH Blockchain

On Sunday, a Solidity developer announces a new mechanism that allows the reorganization of transactions in the Ethereum blockchain. With this, Ethereum’s immutability has been questioned. 

The Solidity developer under username @0xbunnygirl announces on Twitter the “Request For Reorg” (RFR) contract.  This creates a way for past transactions to be reordered or undone when the network reaches a consensus.

Furthermore, the developer explained that the contract creates a mechanism that allows users to pay miners ‘to reorg’ the Ethereum blockchain. Replying to the same tweet, Bunny Girl revealed the inspiration behind this mechanism.

Through this new smart contract, developers can revert a hack. The Solidity developer further explained and set an example. Let’s say if an exchange was hacked, RFR helps incentivize miners to re-mine the block in which the hack transaction was originally mined. If the block was successfully re-mined without the transaction of a hacker, the miner can receive a reward from the exchange. 

However, some people view this reorg ability as a vulnerability and could be used for malicious purposes. In fact, the largest Ethereum mining pool called Ethermine shared a statement regarding this.  Clearly, it considered the reorg contract akin to an attack on the Ethereum network.

Notably, immutability is one of the biggest strengths of blockchain technology since then. However, there are people who disagree with this matter like Angela Walch,  a Research Associate at UCL Centre for Blockchain Technologies. For 5 years, she has been arguing that it is misleading to describing blockchain as ‘immutable’. While this immutability discussion is not over, one thing is certain: the chance of reorganization event is now stronger than ever.