Bitcoin miners create invalid currency after a botched upgrade
Digital currencies are only as reliable as their software, and some Bitcoin users are learning this the hard way. Thanks to a "problem" with an upgrade that applies a new rule, some Bitcoin mining pools (namely, those that don't usually wait to validate their money) have been generating invalid data blocks. If you're using certain client apps, that could lead to making transactions that aren't really valid -- and mining operations that ran afoul of the change are losing income.
The community is fixing the problem by getting all miners to validate their coins, and some of the 'rogue' pools have sorted things out as of this post. Until everyone falls in line, though, your safest bets are to either use the latest versions of key clients (such as Bitcoin Core, which rejects invalid coins) or to run extra checks. The incident won't plunge the Bitcoin world into chaos for very long, but it does reveal the pitfalls of a virtual currency system where speed is the key to making cash -- it's tempting to skip useful safeguards in the name of profit.
[Image credit: AP Photo/Rick Bowmer]
