Cardano (ADA) has lost its top position in network development activities. The blockchain network now ranks fifth among cryptocurrencies with the highest development frequency. And that is surprising. This shift comes despite recent updates touted by Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson. Santiment, a market intelligence platform, revealed the new rankings in a recent social media post. You might be wondering about the new king? Well, Hedera (HDAR) now leads the list. Chainlink (LINK) follows in second place. Optimism (OP) and Internet Computer (ICP) occupy the third and fourth positions respectively. The rankings were determined by counting primary non-redundant activities in each project. Santiment averaged this daily activity over the past 30 days to produce the results. The platform shared a chart depicting prices and market capitalization of the top 10 cryptocurrencies. Anyway, the Cardano network continues to pursue significant development projects. ADA is currently undergoing core tech optimizations to enhance efficiency and performance. The Mithril protocol team has released a "threat modeling explainer". They have also enhanced transaction certification and fixed verification bugs to improve scaling efficiency. Efforts to enhance network nodes and smart contract advancements are underway. Cardano has released a list of "Partners and Real World Integration" featuring over 12 global tier-one companies. A key development is the upcoming Chang hard fork. This upgrade is expected to introduce new governance to the Cardano ecosystem. It aims to improve overall functionality and performance. Despite losing the top development spot, Cardano maintains a significant presence in the blockchain space. The network's commitment to research-driven approaches and continuous advancement remains evident.

The Cardano blockchain successfully defended against a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on Tuesday. The network's robust mechanisms ensured continued stability and operation. All the operations, transactions and holdings are perfectly safe. The attack began on block 10,487,530. Then each malicious transaction executed 194 smart contracts of the REWARD type. And they spent 0.9 ADA per transaction. "They can send large transactions while spending the least possible amount," ElRaulito_cnft, CTO at Fluid Token, said. Philip Disarro, founder of Cardano development firm Anastasia, played a key role in neutralizing the threat. His public response on X appeared to halt the attacker's activities. Disarro stated, "DDOSer halted his attack after reading my tweet in an effort to protect his funds. Alas, they were too late and the pillaging of their funds is already in progress." He added, "Thanks for the free money moron. Truly iconic that the attacker who presumably wanted to damage the ecosystem actually ended up donating to the open-source smart contract development work we do at Anastasia Labs & funding Midgard." The Cardano community monitored the situation closely. Big Pey, a prominent content creator, reassured the community via X. "Someone tried to DDOS Cardano today. Barely anything happened, and the network didn't crash. ADA is resilient," he said. Jason Matias, founder of The Art of Selling Art, described the attack's visual impact. "This is what the DDoS attack on Cardano looks like right now. The grey gear icons are the spam transactions that someone is sending, creating larger, more difficult to process blocks," he noted. Cardano's extended Unspent Transaction Output (eUTxO) model was crucial in mitigating the attack's impact. Thanks to this model, that differs from account-based models used by other major blockchains, there is a possibility for independent processing of each transaction output. This architectural choice enhances scalability and security. It prevents transactions from interfering with each other, isolating potential issues. The network maintained high throughput and reliability under duress. Following the attack, the ADA price remained unaffected. It rose 5% in 24 hours, trading at $0.39.

**Blockchain technology lacks robust use cases to attract mainstream adopters. But that might change very soon. Cardano's sustainability lead, Alexandre Maaza, believes decentralized identity (ID) solutions is the key. He shared his views during a panel at the Web3 Corporate Innovation Day. Maaza stated that Web3 still needs a "killer, scalable use case" relevant to businesses and individuals. He suggested digital identity for people, products, data, and documents could fill this gap. Web3 decentralized IDs offer privacy-oriented solutions. They require minimal information for verification. Users can withdraw their data via seed phrases, as identities are stored in crypto wallets. Blockchain needs non-speculative applications to attract mainstream users. Maaza emphasized this point. He said millions of non-speculative blockchain representations could bring the technology to the forefront. Ton Foundation's Justin Hyun agrees. He believes onboarding the next 500 million users requires simple, usable apps. Hyun suggested blockchain-based Telegram Mini Apps as a potential "Trojan horse" for mass adoption. Hyun told Cointelegraph that abstracting complexity is crucial. Their goal is to onboard half a billion users by 2028. This requires blockchain interactions that are invisible to users. Decentralized ID development isn't profit-generating for most companies. However, it could save costs by preventing data breaches. Maaza explained this potential benefit. He noted that digital identity could be lucrative for data-harvesting businesses. For others, it's a cost center. Protecting customer data is crucial. Breaches can lead to significant damage control expenses. Cardano is developing a non-custodial digital identity wallet. Other blockchain networks are pursuing similar projects. The technology is still in its early stages. Some countries are exploring decentralized IDs. Istanbul is using Omchain's proof-of-identity (PoI) to enhance data privacy. This system operates without database queries during authentication.

Cardano founder, Charles Hoskinson, boldly predicts Cardano will flip Bitcoin and become the largest cryptocurrency in the world. Hoskinson thinks that the Cardano's ecosystem will allow ADA to flip BTC. And if he and his colleagues were to finish all the projects and fulfill their vision of Cardano, 'there would be no way to beat it.' According to Hoskinson, ADA is living up to what Satoshi Nakamoto started, but they aren’t stopping there. ADA will become a trillion-dollar ecosystem and leave all the competitors behind, Hoskinson thinks. And that will help ADA to change the political, social, and economic systems of the world. And the work is being done already to make this happen. Hoskinson says that various teams are currently working to onboard different governments onto the Cardano network. He mentioned the development of decentralized applications (dApps) built on the Cardano network. That will lead to the “next step,” which is what flips Bitcoin. He didn't mention what that next step would be. But he explained that, in his opinion, Bitcoin has “stalled.” And that would help Cardano to flip Bitcoin. By "stalled' Hoskinson means that like Yahoo and MySpace used to be, Bitcoin has the image of “big and successful.” Those brands faded out with time. The same will happen with Bitcoin. But people don't really use Bitcoin, Hoskinson says. And sounds like a grim verdict. The idea of Bitcoin being 'digital gold' doesn't impress Hoskinson so much. At some point Bitcoin will hit its cap once the flagship crypto is evenly distributed and everyone owns a bit of it. So unsurprisingly, Cardano founder claims that his platform with unique smart contracts could become much more useful that Bitcoin. One of the steps towards the "next step" to flip Bitcoin would be creating a transparent and impeccable voting system for every country worldwide. That would undoubtedly be more valuable than Bitcoin, Hoskinson claims.

Cardano, once heralded as a beacon of decentralization, is facing an unexpected threat: its own popularity among large holders. As greedy whales amass ADA, concerns about the token's centralization grow louder. This trend, if unchecked, could spell trouble for the very ethos Cardano was built upon. According to crypto analyst Justin Bons, whales now control a staggering 51% of ADA's circulating supply. These few, with their outsized influence, can sway market prices and potentially steer the project's direction. It's a worrying sign for a platform that prides itself on democratization. Recent data highlights the severity of the issue. According to Cointelegraph, ADA's price has already plunged by 30% in the past month. The centralization trend isn't just a theoretical risk—it's having real-world financial impacts. Smaller investors, who once flocked to Cardano for its inclusive promise, are feeling the pinch. Charles Hoskinson, Cardano's charismatic founder, hasn't shied away from addressing the problem. He emphasizes the network's ongoing efforts to enhance decentralization. However, the growing whale dominance raises questions about how effective these measures can be if the accumulation continues. Critics argue that Cardano's model, which rewards stake holders with more power, inadvertently fuels this centralization. The richer get richer, leaving the little guys in the dust. Ironically, a system designed to empower could end up disenfranchising many. If Cardano is to uphold its decentralized ideals, it must act swiftly. Otherwise, the project risks alienating its core supporters and undermining its foundational principles. The next steps will be crucial for Cardano's future—and for the broader crypto community watching closely.