Starting October 18, 2026, Jump Crypto requires researchers to burn 1 SOL for every bug report submitted to the Firedancer validator client program. The tokens are permanently removed from circulation, and the fee applies to all submissions, including duplicates. This policy aims to reduce the volume of AI-generated spam that previously overwhelmed the engineering team.
To offset the new cost, the team has temporarily doubled standard bounty payouts until November 20, 2026. Reports concerning the Alpenglow consensus mechanism, which launched on mainnet on October 21, 2026, are eligible for triple the standard rewards. Critical security flaws in the Alpenglow voting system could result in payouts of up to $300,000.
The decision follows a public audit contest held from April 9 to May 9, 2026, which received 809 submissions from 162 researchers. Only 127 findings were unique, with nearly half of all reports identified as duplicates. The backlog reached 299 open reports, many of which appeared to be AI-assisted, prompting the shift to a paid submission model.
