Telegram Open Network Faces Outage Amid Memecoin Frenzy

According to Cointelegraph, the Telegram Open Network (TON) has halted the validation of new transactions and has not produced a new block for over three hours. The TON-based community platform Tonk Inu reported on Aug. 28 that the network outage was due to heightened market activity surrounding the newly launched memecoin, DOGS. The last approved transactions on TON were recorded in block 45341899, with no new blocks produced since then, as per TON network tracker Tonscan. Cointelegraph reached out to TON for comments on the outage but did not receive an immediate response. Tonk Inu suggested that the outage was likely caused by an unusually high volume of network activity driven by market enthusiasm for DOGS, a memecoin launched on Aug. 27. The token saw over $1.7 billion in trading volume within the first 24 hours and reached a peak market capitalization of $891 million. The price of DOGS peaked at $0.0014 four hours after launch before dropping to $0.0012, according to CoinMarketCap data. The launch of DOGS follows an official rebrand by the TON Society on Aug. 26 to support Telegram creator Pavel Durov, who was recently detained in France. The TON Society updated Toncoin’s logo and profile pictures to the Resistance Dog symbol, which dates back to 2011 when Durov posted a picture of his dog in defiance of orders to silence liberal thinkers on his platform. The dog has since become a symbol of free speech and resistance. The TON Society also launched an “Open Letter Mini App” on the messaging platform, urging French authorities to release Durov and allow Telegram to protect freedom of expression and privacy for its users. The petition had garnered 1.48 million signatures at the time of writing. Pavel Durov was detained by French authorities on Aug. 24 under a search warrant for alleged violations related to the encrypted messaging platform. Since his arrest, TON’s native token has dropped 24% and is currently trading at $5.22, down 1.7% on the day.