Swiss Stock Exchange Chairman Sees ‘Upsides’ To Launch Of Crypto Franc The chairman of Switzerland’s stock exchange SIX Romeo Lacher thinks there are “a lot of upsides” to releasing a crypto version of the Swiss franc. Speaking to the Financial Times Sunday, Feb. 25, Lacher said the organization would be “very supportive” of such an initiative, adding that he “doesn’t like cash.” “ An e-franc under the control of the central bank would create a lot of synergies - so it would be good for the economy,” he said. Switzerland has adopted an increasingly positive narrative in cryptocurrency and Blockchain integration at the national level, despite the reluctance of its banking sphere to endorse Bitcoin itself. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) continued this tone, saying there was “no need” for a so-called “e-franc” at present, following Lacher’s comments. During January’s World Economic Forum in Davos, SNB chairman Thomas Jordan argued that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies should be regulated similarly to legacy assets and subject to strict controls. “ You can’t, on the one hand, heavily restrict cash and on the other hand permit fully anonymous instruments that to a great extent can be used for all manner of transactions,” he decided. Lacher meanwhile shares caution around the future of ICOs in particular. “ My worry is that until recently, the value of cryptocurrencies has only been in one direction: up,” he continued. “After the first ICO to collapse, there will be burnt fingers.” Switzerland nonetheless continues to be the prime incubator for ICO funds, contributing the largest amount of cash relative to the number of ICOs launched of any country in the world, new data reports. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/swiss-stock-exchange-chairman-sees-upsides-to-launch-of-crypto-franc
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Cryptocurrency Scammers Hijack Verified Twitter Accounts to Trick Users Cryptocurrency scammers are currently using Twitter to take advantage of naïve investors looking to make some easy money. Often, the scammers pose as influential community members and promise those that send them a specific cryptocurrency a reward a number of times greater than the initial donation. Now, they even started hijacking verified accounts to look more credible. To legitimize the move, these scammers then add fake replies to the tweet asking for donations. These replies usually claim they’ve received the funds and thank the person. These scammers are usually easy to spot, as they use recently created accounts, with usernames with extra letters, and without a blue checkmark, only Twitter can give its users. "The amount of people falling for these scams is insane. The address the scammer is using currently has $20,000 worth of $ETH in it. #Twitter should do something, and please always look for the little blue badge #Ethereum @VitalikButerin" - @FranciscoMemor | https://twitter.com/FranciscoMemor/status/964947280951472136According to Buzzfeed News, scammers recently managed to create a fake, verified Twitter account for Tron Foundation, the organization behind TRON (TRX). To do this, they seemingly hijacked the account of Literacy Bridge, a nonprofit based in Seattle that’s focused on “improving the health, income & quality of life for the world’s most underserved communities.” After taking over Literacy Bridge’s verified account, the scammers changed its profile picture, pinned a tweet just like the one the real Tron Foundation has pinned, and changed the handle to “tronfoundationl” – notice the extra “l”. Using the fake account, the scammers then replied to a tweet posted by Justin Sun, Tron’s founder, asking for donations. The tweet, according to Buzzfeed, received over 200 likes and retweets, presumably thanks to the blue checkmark. Some Twitter users noticed the change and quickly spread the word. "Apparently somehow this fake acct got verified by @Twitter @TwitterSupport Seems like Twitter doesn’t care except the amount of growing fake users. @justinsuntron @Tronfoundation #trx #tron $trx #scam #fraud #FakeAccount @SupraMan1989 @Dr_strange1 @DigitalLawrence @Brad2pointO" -@CrYp7RoN_KnYghT | https://twitter.com/CrYp7RoN_KnYghT/status/967130755737374720Geoff Goldberg, a Twitter user who frequently calls out spam accounts, spotted the fake Tron Foundation. Speaking to Buzzfeed News, he stated: “I saw it was a verified account so immediately was intrigued. To me, it was clear it was a scam, given that I have been encountering these for quite some time. But to others, given the verified account, I could totally see people falling for it.”
After BuzzFeed and the Tron Foundation reported the fake account, it got taken down. This, however, wasn’t an isolated incident. Hackers seemingly managed to hijack another verified Twitter account belonging to a luxury menswear design team in London, going by “adaxnik.” After hijacking his account, the hackers then spoofed Justin Sun’s account. "Some individuals and groups have counterfeited TRON official account and published untrue information lately. Please identify our official accounts carefully based on the following picture, thank you for your cooperation and strong support. @Tronfoundation @justinsuntron" - @Tronfoundation | https://twitter.com/Tronfoundation/status/966597806138957824At press time, Tron’s founder seemingly has two verified accounts on Twitter. One of them is trying to help users stay safe and expand Tron’s reach. The other one claims there’s a Tron airdrop on the way, and is sending users a link to a fake website I wouldn’t dare click on. Twitter may have a share of the blame as well, as it’s supposed to remove verified accounts once their username changes. At the end of the day, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, who recently got his Twitter account verified, makes things clear: "DON'T TRUST ANYONE ASKING FOR OR OFFERING MONEY ON TWITTER. DON'T TRUST ANYONE ASKING FOR OR OFFERING MONEY ON TWITTER. DON'T TRUST ANYONE ASKING FOR OR OFFERING MONEY ON TWITTER." - @CZ_Binance | https://twitter.com/cz_binance/status/965188831807913984Source: https://www.ccn.com/cryptocurrency-scammers-hijack-verified-twitter-accounts-trick-users/
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Cryptocurrency Market Struggles at $500 Billion, But Fundamentals are Strong Major cryptocurrencies have struggled to sustain their upward momentum secured earlier this week, on February 23. Bitcoin has fallen below the $10,000 mark again, while Ethereum’s native cryptocurrency Ether has struggled to spike above $900. BitcoinEarlier this year, the dominance index of bitcoin reached an all-time low at around 32 percent. Throughout the recovery period in February, the dominance index of bitcoin, which measures its dominance over the global cryptocurrency market, rose significantly, to around 39 percent, as most cryptocurrencies in the market followed the price trend of bitcoin. While bitcoin has performed better than Ethereum, tokens, and other major cryptocurrencies in the market in the past month given that it has increased by nearly two-fold since dipping to $6,100, it has been extremely volatile.  After the initial bear cycle and slump in January, analysts expected the price of bitcoin to start recovering to its previous levels by late February. But, bitcoin has continued to move in between the $9,500 and $11,000 range, without major buy volumes or rallies to push its price to $12,00 and potentially to early January levels in the $14,000 to $15,000 range. Many traders have expressed their concerns over the short-term performance of bitcoin, primarily because of its low volume and the sudden spike in the daily trading volume of Tether, a US dollar-backed cryptocurrency, which traders on major cryptocurrency trading platforms like Binance use to hedge the value of major cryptocurrencies. Adam Back, a bitcoin expert and the CEO at blockchain development company Blockstream, noted that while technical analysis may demonstrate a highly volatile future for bitcoin, technical developments and fundamentals point toward an optimistic future for bitcoin.
“Sounds like chartism/tea-leaves over fundamentals: tech investment, scaling progress, infrastructure development pace & ecosystem collaboration, institutional financial products, retail investment products, all at all-time high. I take opposing view: fundamentals are strong, long bitcoin,” said Back. This week, the largest bitcoin wallet platform and cryptocurrency trading platform Coinbase announced the integration of Segregated Witness, a transaction malleability and scaling solution, along with transaction batching, following the implementation of SegWit by another leading cryptocurrency exchange in Bitfinex. On February 23, the Coinbase team stated that SegWit has already been rolled out to 25 percent of customers, which exceeds more than 3 million users. Emphasizing the potential of second-layer scaling solutions like the Lightning Network, Coinbase wrote, “new technologies which require SegWit, like the Lightning Network, have the potential to significantly increase the usefulness of Bitcoin as a payment network and benefit customers. We currently have a dedicated full-time software engineer working on open source contributions to the Lightning Network.”
Major ImprovementsBy fundamentals and technical developments, Back likely referred to SegWit, Lightning, and other potential privacy solutions like Bulletproofs, which are being actively developed by bitcoin developers in its open source community. Hence, while the entire cryptocurrency market remains highly volatile both in its upside and downside, its price trend does not accurately portray the magnitude of developments and increase in user activity of major cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and Ethereum. Source: https://www.ccn.com/cryptocurrency-market-struggles-500-billion-fundamentals-strong/
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Northern Ireland Property Developer To Accept Bitcoin As Payment Option Hagan Homes, one of Northern Ireland’s biggest residential property developers, will now be accepting Bitcoin (BTC) as a payment method, the Belfast Telegraph reported Feb. 22. Jamesy Hagan, the managing director of Hagan Homes, said there is both an increasing international interest in working, living, and investing in Northern Ireland, as well as a “significant growth in the use of Bitcoin worldwide:” “Our acceptance of this new channel reflects our willingness to respond to the market.”
The Belfast Telegraph writes that Hagan Homes is reportedly the first house-building firm in the Republic of Ireland to accept BTC payments. Hagan did recognize the challenges in accepting Bitcoin as payment. He noted the current volatility in the crypto markets, with BTC’s price going from $20,000 to $7000 in the span of just a few months: “Of course, there are some risks to using Bitcoin for payment due to the cryptocurrency’s volatility, but buyers and sellers are finding creative ways to deal with these challenges [...] By incorporating the learning from our peers into our approach we can embrace this innovation.”
Bitcoin payments for properties have already taken place in cities across the US, as well as in the United Arab Emirates and Indonesia. Blockchain technologies have seen a rising use in real estate as well, with the city of South Burlington, Vermont implementing a pilot Blockchain program in Jan. 2018 to record real estate transaction. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/northern-ireland-property-developer-to-accept-bitcoin-as-payment-option
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Culprits Apprehended In Alleged Icelandic Bitcoin Miner Theft Icelandic information technology service Advania has confirmed with their security footage that the police have apprehended the right two men for the three burglaries at data centers in Iceland last December and January, local news outlet Visir reported Feb. 21. Visir had earlier reported that there were three burglaries in total, from a period of Dec. 5, 2017 to Jan. 16., 2018, and that 600 graphics cards, 100 power supplies, 100 motherboards, 100 memory discs, and 100 CPU processors had been taken from a house in the municipality of Reykjanesbær. The burglars also broke into data centers in the municipality of Borgarbyggð, with a total of 600 PCs stolen from both places. Advania announced that the thieves had broken into a new building under construction in Reykjanesbær in mid-January, but that the building had fortunately been well-covered with security cameras. Advania told Visir that what was stolen was “not a device that stores data and there was only a financial loss,” but that they cannot specify what kind of equipment was stolen due to the ongoing investigation. Several of Advania’s data centers are designed specifically for Bitcoin (BTC) mining, and Iceland as a country has become a hotspot for crypto miners drawn to the naturally cold climate and access to renewable sources of energy. According to local news outlet Ruv, police have been monitoring energy consumption for abnormal increases after the theft, for the stolen computer equipment reportedly can be used to mine BTC, an energy-heavy process. It is not yet known if the equipment still remains in Iceland; Ruv reports that the two men currently in custody have not been cooperative with the police. The total amount stolen from all three burglaries is estimated at 200 million krónur, or $1,990,000. Eyjólfur Magnús Kristinsson, CEO of Advania Data Centers, said that either a quarter or a fifth of that total value had been stolen from Advania. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/culprits-apprehended-in-alleged-icelandic-bitcoin-miner-theft
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Overstock CEO Puts ‘Millions Of Dollars’ Into Unknown Coin, Compares To Bitcoin
Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock, which was the first major retailer to accept Bitcoin (BTC) back in 2014, has said that he is “not really interested in cryptocurrencies per se,” but revealed a little-known Blockchain project his company has invested “millions of dollars” into in an interview with Business Insider Friday, Feb. 23. When asked if he’s interested in “everything cryptocurrency” or “really interested in the Blockchain [sic]”, Byrne prefaced his answer by saying he is “really letting something big out of the bag”, going on to reveal both Overstock’s and his personal interest in a virtually unknown Blockchain project called Ravencoin, which launched very quietly on Jan. 3, 2018. The Ravencoin project’s single blog post, published Nov. 1, 2017, opens with a sentence designed to peak the interest of a Game of Thrones-loving crypto investor: “In the fictional world of Westeros, ravens are used as messengers who carry statements of truth.”
The post goes on to describe Ravencoin as “a use case specific Blockchain, designed to efficiently handle one specific function: the transfer of assets from one party to another.” Ravencoin was first mentioned on Bitcointalk.org on Jan. 14, 2018 in a post that described its Jan. 3 launch as containing “very little info regarding the future of the project,” but that “since then, several community members have learned that there is an active development team on this coin.” Byrne told Business Insider that Overstock has put “millions of dollars into teams” for Ravencoin, stating confidently, “[w]e think this coin actually has quite a future.” Byrne then compared Ravencoin to leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin, saying: “It's Bitcoin, but a thousand times more energy efficient.”
In his interview with Business Insider, Byrne follows the project’s 4-page whitepaper in identifying the problem of the rising expenses of BTC mining and its centralization around ASIC production and cheap electricity. Byrnes claims that Ravencoin solves said problems by being “ASIC resistant” and “redemocratiz[ing] mining,” going on to describe the current concentration of industrial-level mining in China: “Anyone can download this software, and you don't have an advantage by having this big mining warehouse in China.” A four day old post on the /r/cryptocurrency sub-Reddit titled “What are your thoughts on Ravencoin?” further highlights the relatively unknown status of the project: “This coin is very new and also implements a brand new algorithm, X16R. Surprised that there's not a single mention of it in this subreddit, even though thousands of miners are already mining this coin. Is it being kept secret to keep mining difficulty down?”
Only one person has responded so far, the day it was posted, saying: “Never heard of it until now.” Byrne also told Business Insider that because Overstock was the first major corporation to accept BTC as far back as 2014, the company deserves credit for keeping Bitcoin relevant: “I like to think that we saved that community [Bitcoin] about five years in their adoption cycle.” In early January of this year, a glitch with Overstock’s payment system inadvertently allowed customers to pay with Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) interchangeably for a three-week window before the mistake was caught, charging customers in BTC or BCH at a 1:1 ratio and thus giving BCH holders a massive, unintentional discount. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/overstock-ceo-puts-millions-of-dollars-into-unknown-coin-compares-to-bitcoin
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Coinbase Informs 13K Affected Customers Of Imminent Data Handover To IRS US-based cryptocurrency exchange and wallet service Coinbase sent an official notice Friday, Feb. 23 to approximately 13,000 of its customers whose information it is legally required to turn over to the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The IRS had initially asked Coinbase in July 2017 to hand over even more detailed information on every one of its then over 500,000 users in an attempt catch those cheating on their taxes. However, another court order in Nov. 2017 reduced this number to around 14,000 “high-transacting” users, which the platform now reports as 13,000, in what Coinbase calls a “partial, but still significant, a victory for Coinbase and its customers.” On Friday, Coinbase told the around 13,000 affected customers that the company would be providing their taxpayer ID, name, birth date, address, and historical transaction records from 2013-2015 to the IRS within 21 days. Coinbase’s letter to these customers encourages them “to seek legal advice from an attorney promptly” if they have any questions. Their website also states that concerns may also be addressed in Coinbase’s Taxes FAQ. The ongoing legal battle between Coinbase and the US government dates back to November 2016, when the IRS filed a “John Doe summons” in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. On Feb. 13, personal finance service Credit Karma released data showing that only 0.04 percent of their customers had reported cryptocurrencies on their federal tax returns so far this tax season. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/coinbase-informs-13k-affected-customers-of-imminent-data-handover-to-irs
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Bitcoin Exchange Coinbase Launches SegWit Compatability Coinbase has announced that the site will now be implementing SegWit on Bitcoin deposits and withdrawals. The transition is being implemented over the coming week and should improve transaction speeds and lower fees. SegWit was introduced August of last year through BIP 141 (Bitcoin Improvement Proposal), however, Coinbase was slow to adopt the technology. The lack of implementation of the technology was increasingly frustrating for Coinbase users, who launched a petition calling for the exchange platform to prioritize SegWit implementation over other upgrades. The petition noted that the Bitcoin community is “overwhelmingly in support” of SegWit, and was signed over twelve-thousand times. Segregated Witness or SegWit was a major improvement to the Bitcoin protocol. By redefining the structure of blocks, (with one block changing from 1MB to become four million units) it became possible to greatly reduce the space taken on the blockchain by transaction and witness data. The change allowed more transactions to be stored in each block, making the blockchain more efficient and cheaper to use. Coinbase is not alone in recently adopting the technology. Last week the Bitcoin Core wallet upgraded to allow SegWit Transactions, which was followed by an announcement from Bitfinex that they too were now utilizing SegWit on Bitcoin transactions. Bitfinex were clear of the advantages of the protocol upgrade, stating in their blog post: “We are delighted that through this implementation we can provide our customers with bitcoin withdrawal fees that are up to 20 percent lower, as well as faster-than-ever transaction speeds.”
Coinbase was not so jubilant regarding the upgrade, but they did offer a clear warning to users not to confuse Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash deposit addresses. This is because following the change to SegWit the exchange is no longer able to retrieve funds. “While SegWit should help reduce fees, once we begin rolling out this change, if you incorrectly send Bitcoin Cash (BCH) to a Bitcoin (BTC) address, your funds will not be recoverable. Sending the incorrect digital assets to a deposit address will result in permanent loss. “
With Coinbase adopting SegWit it is expected there will be a significant increase in the speed of the Bitcoin network, as the exchange represents a huge proportion of transactions. Sergej Kotliar, CEO of mobile top-up service Bitrefill, noted that the number of unconfirmed Bitcoin transactions plummeted at the same time that Coinbase was experiencing an outage, which suggests that Coinbase transactions were a heavy load on the network. The veracity of this claim has not been confirmed, but many are welcoming Coinbase’s adoption of SegWit regardless, hoping for both a faster and cheaper service. Source: https://www.ccn.com/bitcoin-exchange-coinbase-launches-segwit-compatability/
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Elon Musk Reveals Personal Crypto Holdings The billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla told Twitter followers that he, in fact, has never purchased cryptocurrency, and only holds a small amount of Bitcoin gifted by a friend. The tweet was made in response to scam posts on Twitter claiming to be Mr. Musk requesting Ethereum. It’s an issue that has plagued the Twitter network, with scammers impersonating blockchain figures such as Vitalik Buterin in attempts to steal users cryptocurrency. Twitter users are warned to never send cryptocurrency to anyone claiming to be hosting a giveaway or event. Whilst the businessman may not own cryptocurrency, it was reported in 2016 that he was not against the technology. When appointed to Trump’s team of advisers he declared that Bitcoin was, in fact, a “good thing”, although he did not elaborate in great detail. Last year Musk was center of attention in the cryptocurrency space. In November there was heavy speculation that he was, in fact, the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto, creator of Bitcoin. Believers of the theory cited his mastery of C++ (coding language used by both SpaceX and Bitcoin), his passion for solving global problems, and his silence on the issue as evidence. It was also hypothesized that as Satoshi’s original Bitcoin (worth $8b in November) have not been touched, Musk, valued at $19b being the creator made sense – he didn’t need the money. The theory didn’t hold up for long, however, with Musk again taking to Twitter to claim no involvement with cryptocurrencies. The real identity of the creator of Bitcoin will likely remain unknown unless Satoshi wishes to reveal their true identity. It’s a scenario that becomes more unlikely with every passing year. Elon Musk’s lack of involvement with cryptocurrency is interesting, as decentralized technology firmly aligns with his professed aspirations for a better human society. Whether his involvement will change as blockchain technology develops remains to be seen. Source: https://www.ccn.com/elon-musk-reveals-personal-crypto-holdings/
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Bank Of China Files Patent For New Blockchain Scaling Solution The commercial, state-run Bank of China, not to be confused with the People’s Bank of China, the country’s central bank, has filed a patent with the Chinese State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) for a solution to scale Blockchain technology systems, according to local news outlet tech.ifeng. The bank originally applied for the patent on Sept. 28, 2017, with a Zhao Shuxiang indicated as the patent’s inventor, but SIPO only released news of the patent on Feb. 23, 2018. The patent contains a method for compressing Blockchain data that seeks to solve the problem of storage space in new blocks without compromising on traceability and immutability. As described in the patent, the amount of data stored in in new blocks would be reduced in the following way: when a full-size node receives a compression request from a client, it compresses transaction data from multiple blocks into a single “data block”, which would then be temporarily hosted on a different data storage system. This data would then be run through a hash function with the data block hash value, and the compression transaction would map the relationship between the compressed block, the data block, and the compression event, which would all be recorded on the Blockchain. While China has been one of the stricter countries globally in terms of cryptocurrency regulation, having banned Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) and foreign exchanges from operating within the country, the South Korean Finance Minister spoke earlier this month of a need to cooperate with China in the sphere of Blockchain during a meeting with the governor of the People’s Bank of China. Earlier this week, Chinese multinational PC company Lenovo also filed a Blockchain-based patent for verifying the integrity of physical documents, but with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), rather than China’s SIPO. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/bank-of-china-files-patent-for-new-blockchain-scaling-solution
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The Public Will Decide Cryptocurrencies’ Future: Malaysia’s Central Bank The head of Malaysia’s central bank has firmly stated that the fate of cryptocurrencies in the country depends on the public adopting them, adding it would neither ban nor recognize cryptocurrency. Speaking at the 40th-anniversary dinner of the Harvard Business School Alumni Club of Malaysia this month, Bank Negara governor Muhammad Ibrahim had some noteworthy things to say about the future of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin in Malaysian society, according to a report by local portal The Nation. The central banker, refreshingly, revealed a decidedly free-market stance on cryptocurrencies wherein a hands-off approach would essentially see the public make their own decisions with investments or participation in cryptocurrency markets. “Basically, we will let the cryptocurrency promoters including bitcoin, Ethereum and ripple to be more transparent, the methods to be more transparent and people behind the scene are to be more transparent too,” the central bank chief stated, hinting at introducing some fundamental guidelines for the cryptocurrency sector to operate in Malaysia. More pointedly, he added: “By doing so, the public can decide on its own if they want to invest in cryptocurrencies.”
The central bank governor was quick to stress that the authority would not recognize cryptocurrency as fiat money while notably adding it wouldn’t ban cryptocurrencies in the country either. The central bank chief also revealed an upcoming concept paper for the public on cryptocurrencies, presumably a detailed report to educate residents of cryptocurrencies. Malaysia’s central bank is already working toward a regulatory framework that will, for instance, deem cryptocurrency exchanges as ‘reporting institutions’ to curb criminal and unlawful activities through cryptocurrencies. The central baker’s remarks follow similar statements from Malaysia’s deputy finance minister who, in January, confirmed the government would not ban trading of cryptocurrencies. “It is not the intention of the authorities to ban or put a stop on any innovation that is perceived to be beneficial to the public,” he stated at the time. Malaysia joins the Philippines, two countries among the world’s fastest-growing economies, to take a refreshingly open and even embracive approach to cryptocurrencies in society. After figuring among the earliest countries in the world to mandate regulations for its domestic cryptocurrency industry, the deputy director of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) spoke of the convenience of using bitcoin in payments. The central bank official was speaking in a televised interview in late 2017 when he stated: “There are risks but essentially, it can be managed. If you want something that is fast, near real-time and convenient then there’s the benefit of using virtual currencies like bitcoin.”
Source: https://www.ccn.com/public-will-decide-cryptocurrencies-future-malaysias-central-bank/
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Will Lightning Help or Hurt Bitcoin Privacy? Faster, cheaper bitcoin transactions? Check. But at what cost?
For bitcoin users, many of whom were drawn to cryptocurrency for its promise of financial sovereignty, bitcoin is still synonymous with privacy. But the gap between the vision and the reality, in which user transactions today must be published to a globally distributed ledger, has long been one of the technology's biggest points of controversy. "Bitcoin is Twitter for your bank account. Everything is public to everyone," Ian Miers, the co-founder of the privacy-centric cryptocurrency zcash, told CoinDesk. Compounding matters, however, is that as bitcoin users get closer to gaining a whole new way to send transactions, powered by an innovation called the Lighting Network, concerns are spreading that privacy could degrade from its already imperfect state. On the surface, the idea might seem promising - because Lightning payments occur "off-chain," the information isn't included in the blockchain that all nodes store. But while there is no Lightning ledger so to speak, payments in the scheme are still broadcast across nodes within the network. Essentially, to ensure routing is always available, those using Lightning channels need to trust other network users to help relay transactions. Conceptually, this means that participants within the system could pry on a transaction, or even potentially sell that information to governments or advertisers. This is a risk that's worsened if the network becomes centralized into a "hub-and-spoke" type structure, where hubs are large, well-known and often-used entities. "Lightning likely won't improve privacy, it may make it much worse from an average consumer's perspective," Miers added. And like many, more speculative concerns surrounding the upcoming tech, the risk to user privacy may not be obvious until the network is deployed - an uncertainty that, combined with a wave of efforts on behalf of Lightning developers to include privacy features, has led to mixed sentiments as to what the future of private bitcoin transactions might be. According to privacy researcher Kristov Atlas, in a worst-case scenario, privacy attackers could "thrive" on hubs "vampirically feeding off" the data as he wrote in a blog post. However, the upcoming Lightning release does have some privacy features embedded, and there's reason to believe that developers are at least making advances on the problem.
Onion-routingTo date, the most advanced privacy feature included within Lightning is called "onion routing," and it's part of the Basics of Lightning Technology (BOLT), a series of protocols that ensure the multiple iterations of Lightning can interoperate. In onion routing, payments are passed through multiple channels, and only the minimum of information about that payment is exposed. For instance, upon receiving an encrypted payment, a node can only know where that payment came from and to what node that payment should be relayed. According to Olaoluwa Osuntokun, a leading figure in Lightning development who first suggested the scheme on the developer mailing list, the importance of this is that nodes can't be selective when it comes to what payments they're willing to take. "Nodes shouldn't be able to arbitrarily censor certain payments, or blacklist certain destinations within the channel graph," Osuntokun explained. Often compared to the Tor network for its use of onion routing, Lightning has occasionally been celebrated as a darknet for bitcoin payments - however, it's comparatively untested, and could face some of the problems native to Tor as well. "Similar to Tor, there exist known possibilities of timing leaks, and also unknown active attacks that may be viable," Osuntokun said. And according to some, there's ways that onion-routing could be manipulated, leading to the loss of privacy, especially in an early Lightning network. For example, the last node within a route, as well as whoever sent that payment, will know the transaction information, and theoretically, nodes could collude to break privacy, piecing together each layer of the payment in order to create a complete picture. On top of this, there's the risk of a "global adversary which is able to instantaneous monitor all channels on the network," something that the current privacy protocol doesn't address, Osuntokun continued.
Fixed identifiers
And there's further defects to privacy on Lightning today as well. For example, Lightning payments are currently given a fixed identifier that is repeated throughout the entire route. "This means that if an adversary has two non-contiguous nodes on the route, then they can trivially link a payment flow," Osuntokun said. That said, Osuntokun assured that there's ways to correct this in future. For example, if Schnorr signatures, a scaling method that works by aggregating public keys, are adopted into bitcoin, it could correct this issue in a "simple and attractive" way, Osuntokun said. Plus, there's other, "more heavy weight solutions" such as using zero-knowledge to encrypt payments. However, because this encryption device is heavy, it will "significantly increase the amount of data one needs to send in order to complete a payment," Osuntokun said. According to Osuntokun, the "lowest hanging fruit" is to obscure this payment identifier with random numbers as the payments pass through the network. Hub and spoke
Even more speculative risks exist as well, but according to Miers, it's all highly contingent on the structure that the Lightning network will take. "Some people think the amount of money you need to lock up in a channel and the costs of running nodes will inevitably lead to centralization," Miers said. "And then there's clearly no privacy." Because onion routing works by passing payments through multiple nodes, in the case of a highly centralized network, active nodes could have perfect visibility of the payments. However, Blocksteam engineer Christian Decker told CoinDesk that the development teams are creating "counter measures" against this risk of centralization. Programming the system to open channels at random, Lightning "tries to avoid having hubs that can observe traffic," Decker explained, which has the added benefit of "strengthen[ing] the network as a whole against single points of failure." Decker said that this randomness could be extended to how routes are formed on the network, making payment paths less predictable but potentiality increasing fees. Other researchers maintain the risk involved in maintaining a node with high throughput will stave off the formation of centralized hubs. Miers concluded: "We will see which one actually ends up happening."
Source: https://www.coindesk.com/will-lightning-help-hurt-bitcoin-privacy/
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Bitcoin Giant Bitmain Rivals GPU-Maker Nvidia in Profits, Analysts Say It’s taken China-based bitcoin miner Bitmain four years to achieve performance that its larger tech peer took more than two decades to accomplish, according to analyst firm Bernstein. Beijing-based Bitmain, which came on the scene in 2013, generated between $3 billion and $4 billion in operating profits last year, according to Bernstein data cited in CNBC. California-based chipmaker Nvidia, meanwhile, which boasts a market cap of $147 billion, delivered an operating profit of $3 billion in 2017. Bitcoin mining operations are comprised of computer networks that perform calculations and are rewarded in bitcoin for the equations they solve, thereby fueling the network. Bitmain generates revenue by a combination of selling mining equipment and running bitcoin mining pools, where multiple miners join forces for greater scale. Considering Nvidia’s role to provide semiconductors to machines used for bitcoin mining, the combined performance is reflective of a bitcoin mining industry that has shown no signs of slowing down despite China’s best efforts. Bernstein’s profit estimates for Bitmain are based on a gross margin and operating margin of 75% and 65%, respectively. While Bitmain certainly benefited from last year’s astronomical rise in the bitcoin price, it also takes a very strategic approach. “Bitmain shrewdly adjusts the prices of miners according to bitcoin prices,” according to the Bernstein report. That’s how they’re able to achieve such as margins, considering that as the bitcoin price soared, so too did Bitmain’s AntMiner S9, while production costs plateaued. According to Bernstein, Bitmain controls as much as 80% of “bitcoin miners and application specific integrated circuits (ASICs.)” The analyst firm forecasts that Bitmain’s dominance will persist in 2018, but it’s challenging to make predictions beyond that given the uncertainty surrounding the cryptocurrency market and the BTC price. Bitmain key revenue generating channels are highlighted in gray in the Bernstein report. 
Diversifying Away From ChinaWhen China began cracking down on cryptocurrencies including bitcoin mining facilities, Bitmain unveiled an astute expansion into a more friendly jurisdiction for the market, Switzerland. In fact, it’s moving its hub right into the heart of Crypto Valley in Zug. They’ve diversified their business operations even further by also setting up shop in Israel, Canada and Singapore over the past year. Meanwhile, Nvidia, the company compared to Bitmain in the analyst report, is also benefiting from the demand for cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin miners use the graphics chips made by Nvidia or AMD, for instance, to fuel their operations. Gaming is still their core market, but cryptocurrencies are increasingly playing a role.  Source: Yahoo FinanceNvidia’s stock price has risen alongside the demand for cryptocurrencies over the past couple of years, though the company has been clandestine about the percentage of its revenues that originate from the cryptocurrency market. In the most recent quarter, Nvidia execs shared that cryptocurrency-driven revenue was higher on a sequential basis. Source: https://www.ccn.com/bitmains-profits-rival-chipmaker-nvidia-analysts-say/
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Scam-Free: Binance CEO Officially Receives Twitter Verification Chengpang Zhao, CEO of crypto exchange Binance is the proud new owner of a Twitter account with a verified blue check mark symbol on it. Despite Zhao being the third richest person in the cryptocurrency industry with a net worth well over $1 billion, his Twitter account was among those of regular folk since he first signed up back in August of 2017.
Good Old Fashioned Third-Party CredibilityIn his tweet confirming verification status, Zhao reminds the crypto faithful not to trust anyone that promises to send you more ETH because you generously give yours to them: “One more time, NO ONE will not sent you more ETH just because sent them some. The world doesn’t work that way. Binance “quietly” launched a charity, it is for people in real need, not just because you sent one transaction.” Zhao is referring to the numerous scams that are currently floating around on various platforms where users send tokens to people they don’t know. An anonymous user on Twitter posing as Tesla founder Elon Musk now owns more ethereum tokens after offering to send out a return on investment to participants only to leave them hanging.
Restoring Reputation
Zhao maintains a great reputation in the crypto community for creating the industry’s most popular exchange platform. Yet Binance has recently come under fire for a few reasons. Most recently, Binance shut down for a full day thanks to what was called a system upgrade. Many suspected it was due to a hack. This all happening just one month after Binance became the largest exchange in the industry. To make up for the error, Zhao and his team are discounting trading fees until February 24th.
Knowing Who To TrustZhao’s Twitter verification may not seem like a big deal. Consider for a moment though what is happening in the industry right now. Firstly, government regulators are now coming down harder on their citizens when it comes to the regulation of exchanges and tax policies. Secondly, hacks are still costing users millions of dollars. And finally, investors are still losing money to pyramid schemes like BitConnect and USI-Tech. Not to mention initial coin offerings that either steal coins or fail to deliver a working product. A little blue check mark next to a Twitter account is nothing to write home about. At least now there is one less unverified crypto influencer out there. Remember to watch out for fake accounts people. Source: https://www.ccn.com/binance-ceo-officially-receives-twitter-verification/
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I've come across a guy called "nullius" with a shit tonne of merits more than anyone excluding theymos. Then I started digging because I'm good at it and I finally got to the level where I found "nullius" is something else, something that we don't see around here so easily because it appears he has a strong cryptographic background... So, who the hell is this guy? Is he the founder or what? LOL  Reference: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=merit;u=976210 |
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South Korean Cryptocurrency Exchanges Evaluate Self-Regulations An association of South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges said that it is planning to check if its members are following a set of self-regulatory cryptocurrency measures adopted last year, local journal Yonhap News reported Feb. 21. The Korean Blockchain Industry Association, which is currently comprised of 33 of South Korea’s cryptocurrency exchanges, stated that it is going to carry out evaluations of 21 participants, including major trading platforms Coinone, Bithumb, and Korbit. In mid-December 2017, the Korean Blockchain Industry Association announced that it plans to “establish a set of specific ethical codes on the virtual currency bourses, including insider trading and market manipulation” after the South Korean financial authorities began considering cryptocurrency regulations. The self-regulatory move among South Korean exchanges was intended to provide more transparency in trading to alleviate worries over the country’s “Bitcoin frenzy” in December 2017, during which a sudden influx of South Korean investors started buying Bitcoin. Last week, in the UK, seven of the world’s largest cryptocurrency companies, including Coinbase, formed the country’s first self-regulating trade body, CryptoUK. On Feb. 16. Cointelegraph reported that another self-regulating cryptocurrency body is being considered in Japan by the country’s two cryptocurrency industry groups, but the decision has yet to be finalized. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/south-korean-cryptocurrency-exchanges-evaluate-self-regulations
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Japan: Only 0.16% Of 2017 Money Laundering Reports Came From Crypto Exchanges The proportion of suspected money laundering cases involving cryptocurrency in Japan is a fraction of the fiat total for 2017, new data reported by Nikkei Asian Review shows. As Nikkei reports, quoting statistics from Japan’s National Police Agency, from April to December 2017, cryptocurrency exchanges reported 669 instances of suspicious activity they suspect could be money laundering. This compares to around 347,000 cases reported by banks in 2017, 15,400 from credit card companies and 13,300 from credit unions, Nikkei reports, citing police records. The total number of money laundering reports for the whole of 2017 stood at just over 400,000. The reporting period for cryptocurrency began in April, 2017 after new legislation obliged exchange operators to increase transparency and adhere to anti-money laundering regulations. The figures are promising against a continued narrative from international governments that money laundering is a key battleground to be targeted by increased regulations. Of the 669 cases, it is likely many involved “questionable transactions repeated frequently in a short span of time,” Nikkei notes, further reducing the number of bad actors involved in the practice. Japan continues to keep a close eye on its fledgling exchange sphere. In the wake of Japanese crypto exchange Coincheck’s $530mln hack in January, 2018, reporting obligations for exchanges have tightened, with finance minister Taro Aso confirming “impartial” inspections by regulators are occurring across exchanges. In Australia meanwhile, Cointelegraph reported earlier this week, cryptocurrency “scams” sparked 1200 complaints to consumer watchdog the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission last year. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/japan-only-016-of-2017-money-laundering-reports-came-from-crypto-exchanges
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Turkey, Iran To Release State-Backed Cryptocurrencies On Heels Of Venezuela’s Petro The governments of Turkey and Iran are both considering developing their own government-backed digital currencies, following on the heels of the Feb. 20 pre-sale of Venezuela’s national oil-backed Petro coin. Feb. 21, a day after the Petro’s launch, Iran’s Ministry of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) tweeted that Iran’s Post Bank is working on releasing a cryptocurrency: "In a meeting with the board of directors of Post Bank on digital currencies based on the blockchain, I [...] prescribed [...] measures to implement the country's first cloud-based digital currency."
Feb. 22, two days after the Petro’s launch, Middle-Eastern news outlet Al-Monitor reported that Turkey’s Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) deputy chair and former Industry Minister Ahmet Kenan Tanrikulu is publically considering launching a “national Bitcoin” called the “Turkcoin”, described in his 22-page report on regulating the crypto market. Tanrikulu’s report comes two weeks after a Feb. 7 CNN Turk interview with Turkey’s Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simse where he mentioned that the government would be preparing to release a national cryptocurrency. Last November, the Iranian cyberspace authority, the High Council of Cyberspace (HCC), “welcome[d] Bitcoin” and announced that they were working with the Central Bank of Iran on a report on cryptocurrencies. On Feb. 21 the Central Bank of Iran said that it was actively working on a way to “control and prevent” cryptocurrencies in Iran. Turkey’s government had previously taken a harsh stance on Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies, when lawmakers from the Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) said in November, 2017 that trading crypto was “not compatible” with Islam due to its speculative nature and lack of government control. However, Tanrikulu told Al-Monitor that since there is no mention of cryptocurrencies in Turkish law, buying and selling crypto is legal in Turkey: “The use of cryptocurrencies can be considered legal since our law contains no prohibition [...] buying and selling with cryptocurrencies and creating money through Bitcoin mining are not within the scope of criminal activity in Turkey today.”
Tanrikulu’s report adds that crypto regulation is definitely needed in Turkey to prevent money laundering and fraud, and that the creation of a government-controlled “bitcoin bourse” is one way to do so. Venezuela’s Petro has been seen by some critics as solely a way for the country to avoid the Western sanctions imposed on the country; Iran is also currently facing international sanctions. The Petro is not the first government-backed cryptocurrency to be launched — the local government in Dubai launched the state-backed emCash in October 2017, and in 2017 Kazakhstan, Japan, and Estonia have all brought up the possibility of releasing their own government-backed cryptocurrencies. Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/turkey-iran-to-release-state-backed-cryptocurrencies-on-heels-of-venezuelas-petro
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Austria Planning New Regulations for Cryptocurrency, ICOs Austria has joined the list of countries planning to regulate cryptocurrencies and will use as a model existing rules for the trading of gold and derivatives. The government's central concern is curbing the use of cryptocurrencies for money laundering, Bloomberg reports. Likewise, it wishes to extend oversight measures for traditional financial products to crypto assets. "Cryptocurrencies are significantly gaining importance in the fight against money laundering and terrorism financing," Finance Minister Hartwig Loeger was quoted as saying. As a result, he went on to say, "We need more trust and security." Loeger outlined several measures the government plans to implement, including requiring cryptocurrency market participants to identify all trading parties and to disclose trades of €10,000 ($12,300) or more to the government's financial intelligence unit. The regulation will also cover initial coin offerings (ICOs), Loeger said. The government will apply existing rules regarding market manipulation, insider trading and front-running, and organizers will be required to submit "digital prospectuses" to the country's Financial Market Authority (FMA). The finance minister's statements come on the heels of a report that the Austrian government is seeking suspects in an alleged bitcoin scam by a company called Optioment, which may have resulted in investor losses of up to $115 million. Loeger also suggested that the European Union should implement cryptocurrency regulation. This may well come to fruition as the European Commission announced Thursday that top central bank and market supervision figures in addition to unidentified "market players" will meet next week to discuss the matter. Source: https://www.coindesk.com/austria-cryptocurrency-regulation-icos-gold-derivatives/
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Bank of America Now Considers Crypto a Business Risk
Bank of America has cited cryptocurrency as a material risk to its business, public records show. The technology could hamper the second-largest U.S. bank's ability to comply with anti-money-laundering regulations, pose a competitive threat and force the company to spend more money to keep up with the times, the bank said in its annual filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. "Cryptocurrency" is mentioned three times in the annual report, all in the section on risk factors. The first reference is in the discussion of AML, know-your-customer, sanctions and foreign corruption laws in the U.S. "Emerging technologies, such as cryptocurrencies, could limit our ability to track the movement of funds," the filing says, explaining further: "Our ability to comply with these laws is dependent on our ability to improve detection and reporting capabilities and reduce variation in control processes and oversight accountability."Competitive threat Yet perhaps more notable is the acknowledgement that cryptocurrency poses competitive risks to the bank. In a passage about new competitors in the financial services industry, Bank of America expressed caution about how client preferences could lead them to use products like cryptocurrencies - for which, as it stands, the bank does not offer any support. Bank of America notes in the filing:
"Clients may choose to conduct business with other market participants who engage in business or offer products in areas we deem speculative or risky, such as cryptocurrencies."Indeed, the mention of cryptocurrency as an outside risk is taken one step further, with Bank of America stating that rising adoption would result in it having to dedicate more resources - that is, spending money - to stay competitive. "[T]he widespread adoption of new technologies, including internet services, cryptocurrencies, and payment systems, could require substantial expenditures to modify or adapt our existing products and services," the bank said. Bank of America is one of several U.S. banks that recently banned credit card purchases of cryptocurrency. The bank did not restrict crypto purchases using debit cards, however. Based in Charlotte, N.C., Bank of America is also a prolific filer of patent applications for blockchain technology concepts. Source: https://www.coindesk.com/bank-of-america-cryptocurrency-risk-factor-annual-report-10-k/
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