v28.1 and v28.2, Cosmos Labs Korea as Hub maintainer, USDC on Injective, delegation program changes, and Cosmos KMS
The following is a recap of the September 16, 2026 Cosmos Hub validator call. These calls occur once per month, and recaps like this one are posted on the Cosmos Hub forums following each call.
This month’s call was pushed back one week. Going forward it stays on the second Wednesday of each month at 9:00 AM ET, on the same meeting link, with reminders sent ahead of each one. The call covered the v28.1 and v28.2 upgrades, an introduction to Cosmos Labs Korea as the new steward of Cosmos Hub maintenance and upgrades, the USDC migration on Injective, two approved changes to the delegation program, and Cosmos KMS. Last month’s recap is on the forum.
Chain upgrades: v28.1 is out, v28.2 is next
Thank you to everyone who coordinated on v28.1. As of the morning of the call 179 of the 180 validators in the active set were running it.
v28.2 is next. It goes to testnet first and then to a mainnet proposal, which is likely to be expedited, with both targeted for later this week. The mainnet upgrade is expected the week of September 21.
Cosmos Labs Korea now stewards Cosmos Hub maintenance and upgrades
Grace Yu, managing director of Cosmos Labs Korea (CLK), introduced the team on the call. CLK is a trusted coordinator. CLK is a newly formed entity under the ICF based in Seoul. Its portfolio includes Skip:Go, Mintscan, and, as of two weeks ago, stewardship of Cosmos Hub maintenance and upgrades, which covers workflows that Hypha previously handled apart from testnet administration, which stays with Hypha per proposal 1043.
Emails from cosmoslabs.kr and repositories under the cosmoslabskr GitHub organization are trusted sources for Cosmos Hub upgrade information and coordination, and CLK will keep reinforcing the legitimacy of those channels over the coming months.
Verification now starts at release. Every binary now ships with its SHA-256 checksum and GPG signature the moment it is published. This is a procedural change already in place.
There is one durable place for validators and node operators to reach us: nodes@cosmoslabs.io. CLK has built an updated contacts database of node operators and their service types. For extra cover, join the email notification list, send your validator name, valoper address, and the name of your primary operations contact to nodes@cosmoslabs.io. Only company or organizational email addresses can be added to the list; personal email addresses cannot be added at this time.
What is not changing is the handling of private binaries during disclosure. While a private security disclosure is open, the binary stays private. Once the disclosure date passes, the release goes to the repo as normal. CL is also exploring standing up a security council with broader cross-chain and ecosystem representation, so that co-triage and sign-off on disclosure procedures are shared across the community rather than resting on Labs alone.
USDC on Injective: guided migration is live
The guided migration from USDC.n to native USDC.inj is live through Skip:Go, with USDC.n as the origin asset and USDC.inj as the destination. It is a two-transaction flow today, one on the origin chain and one on Injective, and users only need gas on the origin chain. If a user has no INJ, Skip:Go covers the second transaction fee and deducts a small amount of USDC. The one-click experience is expected in October. Please try it out and let us know what you think.
Delegation program: the September 30 snapshot and two approved methodology updates
The next delegation snapshot is on September 30. Mainnet snapshots now follow standard calendar quarters, the same schedule Hypha uses for testnet participation scoring, so the snapshot dates are always known in advance. Range will calculate the last block of September 30 as the snapshot height, which will be published, with the data expected back in early October. The aim is to execute delegations faster and more predictably. Testnet participation is calculated next, and results will be shared through the normal program channels.
The Cosmos Hub Testnet also has a new home at cosmoshubtestnet.com. It is still operated by Hypha, and only the domain changed. Use the public testnet to rehearse upgrades and coordination before mainnet. v28.2 lands there first.
Two methodology updates have been approved for the next calculation. The core thresholds remain objective and pass/fail; what changes is the measurement window.
Governance history is now a rolling 12-month window rather than a lookback to cosmoshub-4 genesis in 2021. Counting from genesis penalized operators who vote on every proposal today but had a validator presence years ago with little voting, and the only way out was a new validator identity. With a rolling window, recent behavior counts, historical credit expires, and there is no incentive to reset.
Active-set presence is now 90 of the past 100 days rather than 90 uninterrupted days. A large delegator leaving can push a validator near the bottom out of the set, and an operator who brings in more stake or reaches out to delegators and gets back in is demonstrating that they want to be in the set. The rule now distinguishes that from sustained inactivity while still requiring at least 90 percent of the window active. The purpose is resilience, not a weaker expectation for validator participation. We would like to hear what validators think of this change.
Range keeps its proposal-level voting-eligibility calculation, and the quarterly process is unchanged: Range data, internal QA, then the final delegation set. Range will implement and test the two formulas against the next snapshot window, the program criteria and Range methodology article will be updated to match, and the final snapshot height and execution timing will be communicated through the normal program channels.
Validator tooling: Cosmos KMS
Cosmos KMS is a remote signer built in-house by Cosmos Labs and actively developed and supported by our team. Keys can live in a file, an HSM, or a managed KMS. It is a single-signer architecture that can connect to multiple nodes but does not shard a key across signers the way Horcrux does, and one signing authority helps prevent accidental equivocation across validator hosts during failover and migration.
Cosmos KMS can integrate with HSMs such as AWS KMS. That was a feature request while it was being built, and we would like to hear from any operator using AWS KMS on whether the integration is valuable.
For anyone switching signers, test on testnet first. On mainnet, shut down the existing signer before starting the new one. Missing a few blocks is acceptable and far better than risking a double-sign event. Confirm blocks are being missed, then bring up Cosmos KMS.
Q&A themes
No questions were raised on the CLK update or the delegation changes during the call. Follow-up questions on the upgrade process can go to nodes@cosmoslabs.io.
Feedback on the upgrade has been appreciated, security is being taken seriously, and validators are encouraged to keep the feedback coming.
Next steps
The next validator call will occur on October 14 at 9:00 AM ET. If you are an active set validator and have not yet joined the channel, message @totalspud or @robomcgobo on Telegram for an invite.