So, I recently got a notification from my ISP that I’d used over 1TB of bandwidth this month. Being surprised, I checked - my history shows that I’d generally be around 300GB monthly, some spiking to 500GB. Trying to track down where it was coming from, I looked at the bandwidth meter on my PC. ReddcoinQt was shown as having used over 1TB in the past 30 days! What’s going on? Has there been insane transaction data due to the spikes in Bitcoin? Something else? I’ve shut it down for now both to avoid going over my cap for this billing cycle as well as to figure out what’s happening. Any ideas?
I don’t know what the typical usage has been for ReddcoinQt since I’ve not had this issue before and don’t really monitor things though based on the log at my ISP, it’s clearly not been anywhere near 1TB in the past 12 months.
In the summer of 2019, the Reddcoin development team released an updated Redd Paper. The Redd Paper (.pdf) describes the evolution of unique staking algorithm of Reddcoin and new aspects to be implemented. The staking algorithm - Proof of Stake Velocity (PoSV) - was to be succeeded by the improved PoSV v2. If more interested in PoSV v2, you can read the Redd Paper, and these two articles: [1] - [2].
PoSV v2, the improved version, got actived on July 21, 2020. From that moment on, the older versions of Reddcoin Core (v1.x, v2.x) would stop functioning fully: to make new transactions and stake successfully, Reddcoin Core v3.x was needed.
Reddcoin Core v1 and v2 continue on an old chain of Reddcoin Core. Reddcoin Core v3 continues on the new (current) chain. You need to connect to Reddcoin Core v3 for correct blockchain data, the data usage will be normal. However, when you connect to old version, there will be a peak in the data usage.
So, connecting to v3 peers helps to download the correct blockchain and have a normal data usage. Users on old versions should update, but many still haven’t… By banning them for a year, you make sure you don’t connect to these v2 peers anymore.