Last week, a new fork of the bitcoin blockchain was brought to our attention here at BitcoinX.com. Under normal circumstances, we likely wouldn’t report on a relatively unknown hard fork like this — one of many to come, given the relative success of the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) fork — but in this case we really couldn’t avoid talking about it. You see, this new fork calls itself BitcoinX (BCX).
To be absolutely clear: BitcoinX.com is in no way associated with the BCX fork. As far as we know, the shared name is a complete coincidence.
So what is this new bitcoin fork that has borrowed our brand name? Who is behind it, and what do they hope to accomplish with the project? At the moment, it’s still a mystery. We’ve reached out to the BCX developers, but have yet to hear back. That said, the BCX website and social media accounts do offer some insight into the project.
As the site states:
BitcoinX is a fork of the Bitcoin blockchain at block 498888. With the all new features, BCX will be able to achieve more than ever. Combining zero-knowledge proof, smart contract, DPOS consensus enables BitcoinX network to become more reliable, environmental-friendly, much easier to use with greater efficiency. Therefore, BCX can build ideal Bitcoin network that truly fits the future society.”
There’s not much to glean from this description, but the project’s roadmap does offer a few additional details. Although the fork took place on Dec. 12, features like replay protection, SegWit compatibility, and Lightning Network support aren’t slated for release until Jan. 15th of 2018. Other proposed features, like zero-knowledge proof and smart contract capabilities are given only rough estimates for release in 2018. According to the site’s two-question Q&A section, the initial BTC to BCX issuance will be 1 BTC：10000 BCX, with a total supply of 210,000,000,000 BCX. Save for one or two other minor pieces of information on their social media, this is the extent of what’s currently known about the BCX fork.
What the site doesn’t say, however, may be more interesting than what it does. For instance, there’s no mention of the project’s development team, financial backers, or technology partners. There’s also no whitepaper or technical documents explaining how BCX will differ from bitcoin, or how it compares to other forks like Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin Gold. There is a list of supported exchanges, but at the moment none of these seem to support BCX directly, and instead offer trading on BCX futures. In fact, there’s not even a contact email address on the site for people looking for more information.
For many people, this lack of information may raise some red flags. Another point of concern is that BCX’s origins seem to be very recent, with the earliest mentions coming from a Twitter account with the handle @bcx_org, but using the screen name “SatoshiNakamoto.” This account was on launched on Dec. 5, 2017, with the official @bcx_team account appearing two days later. At a minimum, the use of bitcoin/blockchain creator Satoshi Nakamoto’s name in association with this project is problematic, even if there was no malicious intent. Much like borrowing the BitcoinX brand name — which has been used by this site since 2011 — it suggests that the people behind the BCX project aren’t terribly concerned with due diligence or accountability. That’s not a great sign for bitcoin fork that aims to be, as @bcx_org put it, “the TRUE Bitcoin.”
Not surprisingly, the BCX project appears to have generated relatively little interest from the greater cryptocurrency community. The project’s Facebook page is currently set to private, and its Reddit page has almost no interactions. Things are slightly better on Twitter, although their claimed 7,800 followers does prompt some skepticism, particularly given that their most popular tweet only has 25 likes.
Will the BitcoinX fork prove to be a major player on the cryptocurrency world? Only time will tell. Win or lose, we just want to make it clear that we have nothing whatsoever to do with it.
