Thirteen members of the Japan Cryptocurrency Business Association (JCBA) will suspend bitcoin deposits and withdrawals on August 1 in anticipation of a possible network hard fork.

Bitbank, Bitpoint Japan, Quoine, Fisco Cryptocurrency Exchange, Coincheck, Btc Box, Tech Bureau, GMO-Z.com Coin, Campfire Corporation, Bit Trade, Bitcrements Bitcoin Exchange, Tokyo Bitcoin and Minnano Bitcoin have agreed to halt bitcoin-related transactions on their respective platforms on August 1 at 00:00 Japan time.

In a statement, JCBA said if a fork occurs, “the first priority item as virtual currency exchange industry is protection of customer assets.”

“We examined several ways to deal with this technical fork by dealing with technical countermeasures at the virtual currency exchange trader, but it is difficult to predict the degree of confusion [caused] by the fork,” the association said.