Solana Foundation defends decentralization amid patch coordination claims

Solana Foundation’s executive director, Dan Albert, argued at a Korea Blockchain Week (KBW) 2024 roundtable that the ability to coordinate a patch does not mean that the Solana network is centralized, pushing back against recent claims that the network is not decentralized. 

On Aug. 9,  Solana validator Laine shared the details of a critical vulnerability that they believe could’ve halted the network. The validators coordinated the patch behind the scenes, claiming that an attacker could reverse engineer the vulnerability and take the network down if it leaked. 

Because the patch was distributed quietly and coordination happened behind the scenes, some questioned the network’s decentralization. 

Solana exec says patch coordination does not mean centralization

Answering a question at the KBW 2024, Albert explained that a patch was deployed due to a security vulnerability. The Solana executive confirmed that the bug could have “potentially caused a liveness issue on Solana mainnet.”

Solana’s Dan Albert (left) at the Korea Blockchain Week 2024. Source: Cointelegraph

However, Albert argued that being able to coordinate a fix to the bug does not mean that the network is centralized. The Solana executive said: 

“Regarding your question of decentralization, I think it’s important not to confuse centralization with the ability to coordinate. There are 1,500 block-producing nodes all over the world that are operated by almost as many individuals.”

Albert admitted that some companies run multiple nodes. However, the patch coordination was due to the Solana Foundation’s ability to talk to the node operations, which he described as people who are active in the community and ecosystem. “We’ve spoken with them on occasions for other things,” he added. 

The executive director also said that, ultimately, these validators decide which software they run. Albert said the patch was open-source, and they’ve never asked anyone to run closed-source binaries. 

“The ability to communicate with them, or some of them, voluntarily, is not to be confused with centralization,” Albert reiterated.

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Not the first centralization accusation 

This is not the first time the Solana network has been accused of being too centralized. In 2022, a community member argued that the network is centralized, with a few having the influence to shut it down and restart it. A community member compared Solana to “another version of the traditional system.” 

However, Solana-based decentralized finance (DeFi) firm Unstoppable Finance pushed against the accusations. The protocol said that Solana’s validator count is higher than that of other blockchains, arguing that it is more decentralized than people think. 

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