Hoosat Network — HTN — Scam Leak

Hoosat Network, also known as HTN Coin, is a small crypto project by a Finnish developer with big stories. Let’s dive right in.

The Hardfork Fail:

The Anonymous Network is the only project I know of (and I follow many) that completely failed a hardfork on the mainnet. After releasing their latest hardfork, all nodes crashed due to memory overflows, causing RAM usage to spike uncontrollably until the node or the computer itself failed.

The obvious question is: why was there no proper testnet to catch this? Apparently, there was no realistic decentralized testnet. The lead developer only tested locally. It’s important to note that the developer merely tweaked a few values to change from 1 BPS to 5 BPS after the parent project moved from 1 to 10 BPS.

Anonymous Network therefore failed at following a fork, which is unprecedented in crypto history. They only use the Go node of the parent project; apparently, a Rust implementation is too much work or beyond the developer’s skillset.

Comparing Rust and Go:

Go:

• Entry: Very easy → ideal for beginners and rapid development
• Memory management: Garbage-collected → simpler, but can cause some overhead
• Concurrency: Easy with goroutines
• Audience: Widely used, practical, beginner-friendly

Rust:

• Entry: Challenging → ownership, borrowing, and lifetimes require experience
• Memory management: Manual → full control, maximum safety, but complex
• Performance: Very high, often near C/C++
• Audience: Developers who need low-level control, performance, and security

Why some blockchain projects switch from Go to Rust: Rust provides stronger safety, higher performance, and better resource control — critical in complex systems. Go is like an “automatic car”: easy to drive, great for quick results. Rust is like a “manual sports car”: harder to handle, but with more control and power.

Why some projects stay on Go: Anonymous Network continues to use Go because the complexity of Rust is beyond the team’s skills.

Development Timeline and Team:

The network has been on mainnet for nearly two years. The lead developer claims the team has five developers — not a small number. Yet, in the first 1.5 years, no in-house development occurred. Later, they released a mining software — something a single experienced developer could implement in 2–4 weeks.

What the other developers were doing during this time is unclear. A review of GitHub and the roadmap shows that all progress was based on copying the parent project. Ledger support, the explorer, wallet modules — all were directly copied, with minor cosmetic changes.

The team even highlighted a roadmap milestone boasting about changing the visual style of the explorer — essentially just CSS tweaks. After two years, they still haven’t developed independent explorers, web wallets, or modules.

Misleading Claims:

The project claims five developers but produced minimal original work. Investors may be misled into thinking a larger team was actively developing. Large claims are made publicly, while real progress consists almost entirely of copies from the parent project.

Manipulation and Aggressive Behavior:

The lead developer strategically manipulates perception to appear competent and trustworthy, making claims about competitors while engaging in questionable practices internally. Allegations of team members’ involvement in aggressive online behavior have circulated in community channels.

The depth of mismanagement and poor governance is evident. The lead developer positions themselves as superior, while the project shows consistent reliance on copied work and minimal original contribution.