The Sui (SUI) blockchain, a decentralized layer-1 network renowned for its swift, smart contract execution, experienced a significant disruption on Thursday, Nov. 21.
SuiVision, the protocol’s explorer, indicated that the network’s block production stopped at 9:15 am UTC. No new blocks were produced until over two hours later, signaling a technical issue.
This unexpected downtime raised questions about the reliability of the Sui blockchain platform to become a notable competitor with established networks like Solana (SOL).
Unprecedented Outage and Market Participants’ Reactions
After acknowledging the outage, the Sui Foundation attributed it to a glitch in the transaction scheduling system. This vulnerability stopped transaction processing by crashing validators, which are essential nodes in the network’s functionality.
Furthermore, the disruption immediately impacted the SUI (the network’s native cryptocurrency), with its value plummeting by approximately 11%, as reported by CoinGecko. However, the crypto has experienced a slight retrace, but it’s still down 3.9% at the time of writing.
Major crypto exchanges reacted quickly to the disruption, particularly South Korea-based Upbit. Upbit momentarily halted SUI withdrawals and deposits, citing network problems.
According to the firm, this action was essential for safeguarding ongoing transactions and preventing other issues.
The Token’s 24-hour Price Chart. | Source: CoinGecko
Root Cause and Resolution
Blockchain security specialists such as ExVul (a Web3 security firm) remarked that the leading cause of the outage was a denial-of-service (DoS) problem caused by an integer overflow in the network’s node infrastructure.
The network’s Foundation and its community of validators responded rapidly to remedy the problem. The Foundation revealed that the network has been restored, and block production could restart.
In its official statement, it praised the work of its validators, emphasizing their prompt and coordinated response. Nevertheless, the outage highlights the challenges developing blockchains face in maintaining uptime and stability.
While the outage lasted, industry experts questioned Sui’s ability to accomplish its objective of competing with more established blockchains and whether it would continually struggle with addressing technological flaws. Despite the skepticism, the network has seen its total value locked (TVL) surge to $908 million over the past two months.
It is worth noting that this was the network’s first major outage aside from the frequent setbacks on its testnets. With bullish momentum in the broader crypto market, analysts have predicted a strong rally for SUI and other altcoins.