BNB Chain to launch Pasteur hardfork on August 25

BNB Chain is scheduled to activate its Pasteur hardfork on the BNB Smart Chain mainnet at 02:30 AM UTC on August 25. The upgrade incorporates three key proposals—BEP-682, BEP-695, and BEP-675—designed to enhance security, validator governance, and network throughput.

Technically, the upgrade aims to strengthen cross-chain bridge security by preventing duplicate validator signatures from being counted multiple times during asset transfers. It also introduces stricter validator key management, ensuring that old consensus keys lose authority once new ones are rotated. Additionally, internal testing indicates the upgrade could increase transaction capacity from 1,237 to 2,324 transactions per second (TPS) by optimizing block preparation.

In a separate regulatory development, Binance has implemented transaction freezes across 16 cryptocurrency platforms, including HTX and EXMO. These restrictions are in response to new sanctions from the US and EU aimed at preventing the circumvention of regulations regarding Russia and Iran.