In a decisive move to strengthen trust and resilience, the Shiba Inu team has initiated a comprehensive upgrade of its layer-2 network, Shibarium. The targeted changes centre on decentralisation, elimination of single-points of failure, and reinforcing security following prior exploit events.
RPC Migration & Network Resilience
The technical highlight of the upgrade is the retirement of Shibarium’s legacy public RPC (Remote Procedure Call) endpoint, with a full shutdown expected over the coming two weeks. livebitcoinnews.com+1
An RPC endpoint serves as the bridge between wallets, dApps and the blockchain. Without it, users cannot send transactions, check balances or interact with smart contracts.
By mandating migration away from a small set of public nodes, the team seeks to spread node infrastructure and reduce systemic risk. According to the development team’s engineering manager (identified as John Doe in the original announcement), the move “isn’t about restricting access but about encouraging a more resilient, decentralised infrastructure.”
Context: Why This Upgrade Matters
The upgrade comes after an incident in September in which the Shibarium network was momentarily paused to avoid data corruption risk following a compromised validator key. An attacker leveraged a short-term delegation of 4.6 million BONE (governance token) to attempt network control. BeInCrypto+2Bitget+2
While the breach did not stem from a protocol flaw, it underscored the importance of validator key management and the exposure of centralised node infrastructure. In response, the team introduced blacklisting of malicious validators and instituted a seven-day withdrawal delay for the Plasma Bridge. Bitget
More broadly, this RPC migration is part of a multi-layered defence posture: stricter node distribution, hardened bridge logic, and enhanced monitoring of suspicious activity.
Activity and Metrics: Strong, Despite Setbacks
Despite recent turbulence, Shibarium’s usage statistics remain robust. The network hosts over 30,000 deployed smart contracts and more than 272 million wallet addresses. To date it has processed in excess of 1.54 billion transactions.
In the past 24 hours alone there have been nearly 8,400 transactions involving around 300,000 active users. The BONE token displays lively on-chain behaviour, with more than 4.69 million total transfers recorded.
These data points suggest that user confidence and ecosystem activity remain elevated, even as the team takes measured steps to shore up infrastructure.
Market and Broader Implications
In parallel to technical operations, T. Rowe Price has filed an S-1 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for a potential U.S. spot ETF that would include Shiba Inu among other major cryptos such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana.
Despite such institutional interest, the Shiba Inu token slipped roughly 15 % by end of October — its first monthly drop since launch — and briefly traded near $0.0000087 amid broader crypto market weakness.
The timing of the upgrade may therefore carry additional importance: it signals that the Shiba Inu ecosystem acknowledges past vulnerabilities and is proactively reinforcing its foundations as it seeks to advance from meme coin status toward a dependable blockchain infrastructure.
What to Watch Next
-
Endpoint Migration Compliance: Users and dApp developers must update RPC endpoints ahead of the legacy shutdown deadline to avoid service disruption.
-
Bridge / Token Flows: With the old Plasma Bridge already reopened for BONE (following the hack) and new safeguards like blacklist functionality and withdrawal delays in place, monitoring any anomalous flows remains key. Pintu+1
-
Node Decentralisation Metrics: A healthier network architecture would show more independent nodes rather than reliance on a small cluster — subsequent network disclosures may illustrate progress.
-
Market Sentiment & Token Performance: The broader token performance (SHIB, BONE) will likely reflect the community’s response to these upgrades, the ETF filing news, and overall crypto market conditions.
Conclusion
The Shiba Inu team’s rollout of the Shibarium RPC migration and decentralisation upgrade represents a significant milestone in the project’s evolution. Having dealt with a serious security incident, the team is doubling down on infrastructure hardening, user-safeguards and ecosystem growth. While the price performance of SHIB and BONE remains subject to broader market forces, the foundational work being done may set the stage for greater institutional participation, increased reliability, and deeper ecosystem utility.
As always in crypto, the rule remains: “do your own research” before committing capital. Stable infrastructure is a good step — but it is not the only consideration for wise participation.