Overstock.com Inc (NASDAQ: OSTK) and
Coinbase fixed a serious glitch in their bitcoin payment system that could have potentially been exploited by Overstock shoppers,
according to independent journalist Brian Krebs.
In a blog post, Krebs said the
issue stemmed from Overstock’s decision to support Bitcoin Cash payments starting back on Dec. 19.
Security firm Bancsec found that Overstock.com has been providing bitcoin wallet addresses for customers paying in bitcoin.
However, up until recently, Overstock was also erroneously accepting Bitcoin Cash payments as bitcoin payments, even though the
value of Bitcoin Cash is much lower than that of bitcoin.
As a result of the glitch, Krebs was able to buy a $78 motion sensor light on Overstock with only about $12 worth of Bitcoin
Cash. In addition, when Krebs asked Overstock to refund his purchase, he was returned $78 in bitcoin.
“A dishonest customer could have used this bug to make ridiculous sums of bitcoin in a very short period of time,” Krebs
wrote.
After contacting both Overstock and Coinbase, Krebs found that neither company would admit to the mistake. However, the problem
is now fixed, and Coinbase said it was only an issue for a three-week period.
“To our knowledge, a very small number of transactions were impacted by this issue,” Coinbase told Krebs in a statement.
“After working with the researcher to confirm the finding, that method of payment was disabled while we worked with our
cryptocurrency integration partner, Coinbase, to ensure they resolved the issue,” an Overstock.com spokesperson said.
Overstock shares traded lower by 1.6 percent on Tuesday. The stock gained 424 percent in the past six months.
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