# Ethereum Classic

Ethereum Classic (ETC) can be said to be the second most important token bearing the name of “Ethereum” in the crypto market. It started out as the Ethereum hard fork, from which it inherited its focus on decentralized applications (dapps) and smart contracts development and deployment. Back in 2016, a hacking incident which shook the Ethereum’s DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) created the rift in the ETH community. Some developers wanted to repair the damage with the help of a hard fork, while the rest stuck to their guns with the existing platform. The latter faction created what is now existing under the name of Ethereum Classic. Based on its shorter block times, ETC prides itself on offering lower transaction fees. Smart contracts on the ETC platform are developed on the Sputnik Virtual Machine, with dapps being supported by the Emerlard Software Developer Kit. Unlike Ethereum, ETC kept the Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism, which some point to as being a guilty party in a 51% attack which took place in early 2019.