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Flexcoin and Poloniex; Security Holes Exploited in Another Hack Attack

 Calvin Tran  04/03/2014  

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Flexcoin ‘the Bitcoin Bank’ Exchange shuts down after they lost 896 bitcoins from their hot wallet by hackers on Tuesday. After suffering such a huge loss, Flexcoin announced that they will be shutting their doors. All users who held accounts there are urged to contact them to extract bitcoins from their cold storage free of charge.

Users who put their coins into cold storage will be contacted by Flexcoin and asked to verify their identity. Once identified, cold storage coins will be transferred out free of charge. Cold storage coins were held offline and not within reach of the attacker. All other users will be directed to Flexcoin’s “Terms of service” located at “Flexcoin.com/118.html” a document which was agreed on, upon signing up with Flexcoin.

The coin-thief or thieves were traced to two wallets: 1NDkevapt4SWYFEmquCDBSf7DLMTNVggdu & 1QFcC5JitGwpFKqRDd9QNH3eGN56dCNgy6 and Flexcoin will continue to work with law enforcement to see what can be done. All bitcoins stolen were only off of their hot wallet and not of their cold storage. Unlike Mt. Gox, they hold reserves that can still be claimed by users.

For all Flexcoin customers, keep checking the Flexcoin Twitter for more updates.

Additionally, another exchange was attacked; Poloniex lost 12.3% of their holdings in another hacker was able to exploit a hole in their withdrawal process. Their system was able to recognize the threat and has since frozen all accounts until they can be certain about moving forward. Due to the inability to fulfill all possible withdrawals, they have cut 12.3% of all Bitcoin accounts until the shortcomings of their balances can be met by exchange fees and donations. Furthermore, they will refine their processing daemons to fix the exploited hole in the system.

It is unlikely to have a deep effect on the market as the recent Mt. Gox episode was largely shrugged off by the Bitcoin community and is seen as a sign to push for higher security and sophistication.

After Mt. Gox fell, the price of Bitcoin recovered over $250: from a low of $425 last Tuesday to a high of $700 last night.

Remember to be smart
After all these happenings and fallouts in the Bitcoin industry, CryptoCoinsNews would like to remind all crypto-currency users to be safe and be smart.

We suggest  to any third-party wallet users to contact your exchange and urge for greater transparency. Also, read our article reminding users to consider safer alternatives such as decentralized exchanges and hardware wallets.

For mac users, a new trojan called CoinThief may be disguising as popular apps.

Continue checking CryptoCoinsNews for further developments in security and safety issues.

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The price of Bitcoin is increased by 15% despite the tragedy of Mt. Gox

  George Krasadakis 04/03/2014


Whatever does not kill you makes you stronger

The famous phrase seems to apply in Bitcoin

It is certain that the past weeks have been adventurous for virtual currency . After the big wave of sales followed by the series bad news from the Mt. Gox price starts to get rising. In the last three days the price BTC / EURO had gains +15 % to the current price to be close to 500 €.

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/%CE%9A%CE%B1%CF%84%CE%B1%CE%B3%CF%81%CE%B1%CF%86%CE%AE-300x106.png

The price of Bitcoin is increased by 15% despite the tragedy of Mt. Gox
Price Chart EUR / BTC the last three days and the rise immediately after the application of bankruptcy Mt. Gox.
Pressure by the formula

Significant threat to the reputation of digital currencies were the media . Many were those who after application bankruptcy exchanger Mt. Gox talked about the " end " of Bitcoin. On March 3, 2014 in fact billionaire investor Warren Buffet revealed his negative view on the currency , " and do not qualify to be considered normal currency " he said in a televised interview. " I would not be surprised if in some 10 years no longer existed ," added the 83 -year investor . These statements swelled after the negative comments of Finance Minister of Japan last week . All this negative publicity , however , seems to have had the reverse effect on Bitcoin and popularity.

Mass markets again

The value of the currency came back to the levels it was before the beginning of the tragedy of Mt. Gox and transactions made ​​over a massive pace after the markets had remained relatively stagnant . This unexpected result leaves them speechless " opponents " of Bitcoin. But also highlights how sturdy is the currency in any kind attack. With decentralized basis , the virtual currency is almost impossible to stop working. The recent events are just another proof.

The Bitcoin bulletproof against the crisis ?

The crisis caused by the recent events in reality not only hurt the Bitcoin but as we had a positive twist in value. The attention the media show , even negative attracts more and more attention to Bitcoin bringing one step closer to widespread acceptance.

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AMD + HBM to Turbo Charge Scrypt Mining

 William Blackwell  05/03/2014  


AMD Pirate Islands
AMD will use HBM in their upcoming Pirate Islands GPUs
The gaming industry is doing cryptocoin mining a lot of favours. A joint development project by AMD and SK Hynix promises to boost the capacity of commercially available memory later this year. The chip manufacturer plans to use it’s new generation of memory module called High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) in it’s GPUs and indications are that target delivery may be the highly anticipated ‘Pirate Islands’ series of GPUs.

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Thousand Island Park

The island themed code names are by now familiar to miners, who discovered the unparalleled hashing power of the Southern Island chip series when, before the introduction of ASICs, Bitcoin mining was ramped up in early 2012 by the hashing power of AMD’s popular HD 7000 cards.

October 2013 saw the release of the Volcanic Islands chip series as part of a strategic AMD campaign to dominate the Gaming GPU market. However, AMD underestimated the miner demand for these cards and the Volcanic Island Rx series was effectively sold out before it hit the retail shelves – leaving both gamers and AMD stockholders looking for answers. Nvidia found itself alone in the race for a few lucky months. Usurped from its Gaming destiny, the R9 290 is of course the undisputed GPU heavy weight champion of scrypt mining, but – grab the rails – because that could loop-the-loop later this year when AMD introduces HBM 3D to it’s GPU arsenal. HBM promises to give scrypt mining the heavy artillery that everyone perhaps expected would be delivered via hybrid ASICs.

AMD Treasure and Pirate Islands
“One more step, Mr. Hands” (from Treasure Island)
The target for HBM 3D technology is likely to be either of the Pirate Islands flagship GPUs, code named ‘Treasure Island’ and ‘Bermuda’, with a third chip, ‘Fiji’, positioned as an entry-level model.

Says Bryan Black, Senior Fellow and 3D Program Manager at AMD:

 

 “Getting 3D going will take a BOLD move and AMD is ready to make that move.”

 

High Bandwidth Memory

The quest for faster memory had hit a ceiling with DDR5 RAM where neither design nor material changes can accomplish significant speed enhancement – and, mind you, it’s really fast. However, if we must go faster – and we do – enter 2.5 and 3D “Stacked” memory. As with CPU design and manufacture, this level of component design makes rocket science seem self-evident. We’re talking nanotechnology and electronic switching that occurs at voltages and speeds smaller than most of us can comprehend. The design concept of HBM can be comprehended, because it is a logical progression from the flat memory banks of DDR.

Think of conventional RAM as a flat, single storey warehouse with aisles and shelves. When the CPU requests stored data, the memory module determines the location (memory address) of that data on the warehouse map and retrieves it from the relevant aisle and shelf. To increase the size of memory, the warehouse’s floor space must be extended and, as a result, the process of retrieving data stored near the outer edges of the map takes longer. Until recently manufacturers ignored this ‘slow edges’ caveat, in favor of finding ways to speed-up memory by making the shelves and aisles smaller – thereby effectively decreasing floor space. As mentioned, the current technological limit of miniaturization was achieved in DDR5 RAM.

Hynix HBM comparison
Hynix promises memory module improvements with HBM
Instead of attempting to decrease the nanosize of aisles and shelves, HBM revolutionizes the memory storage model by, instead, extending the warehouse in the vertical plane. Memory storage is stacked in layers and so our warehouse now has more storeys with multiple elevators interconnecting them. This 3 dimensional memory array makes data storage and retrieval more compact and efficient. Although the primary benefit is a boost to memory module speed, a knock-on effect is that the module consumes less energy than a conventional 2D memory map. Smart.

 

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Commercial Availability

The concept of “die stacking” is not new and is currently used in some FPGAs and image sensors. Cost has, so far, prevented manufacturers from including stacked memory in commercial products. However, Samsung released the first generation of 3D solid state storage in 2013 and thereby ushered in a new era. AMD and Hynix aim to extend the concept of memory stacking to an interconnected 3D array. Obvious targets for their HBM offering include GPU, networking devices and high availability computing architectures.

 

65% Speed Improvement

The question remains: “How fast?” Hynix promotional material suggests they can achieve 40% power reduction and an incredible 65% speed improvement. Whilst these figures are “promised” and not confirmed, whatever the exact speed increase, miners can look forward to greater hashing power and, important for bottom line, power savings.

There are also questions regarding AMD’s commitment to the cryptocoin mining market. Are they even interested? Will AMD develop products aimed specifically at mining application, as opposed to gaming? We have already explored how mining derailed AMD marketing strategy surrounding the Pirate Islands series and it is unsure how they will address mining demand in the future.

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Sponsored Story: Build a Scrypt Coin and Receive 10 BTC

 David Parker  05/03/2014 

Bitcoin AltcoinsThis is a sponsored story.
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We have received a request from “Xeladories” that wants a new customized Scrypt coin with all its functions. He is willing to pay 10 bitcoins for:

1. A customized 100% premined Scrypt Coin with transaction fees and a fully working network
2. A blockchain explorer
3. Wallets for Mac, Windows and Linux
4. A paper wallet service
5. Live support

Including this “Xeladories” will pay 2 BTC a month for support and a working network. Other addons might appear.

Send your work and CV  to: xeladories (at) gmail.com. He does not accept anonymous requests.

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Overstock.com Surpasses Expectations With Bitcoin

 Tom Boice  05/03/2014

Based in Salt Lake City, Overstock.com surprised retailers and Bitcoin enthusiasts alike when they began accepting Bitcoin for payment on January 9th, roughly five months ahead of their initially stated schedule. Now it seems that their hard work has paid off, as Overstock has now surpassed $1 million in Bitcoin sales, said CEO Patrick Byrne in an interview.

While the $1 million pales in comparison to the $1.3 billion of revenue the company brings in, Byrne has also said that instead of converting the bitcoins to dollars, the company is now keeping 10% of its Bitcoin in storage. When asked why Overstock stores a fraction of its bitcoin, he said it could possibly be used to pay vendors or employees. This, of course, is praised by many Bitcoiners as proof that the company is willing to put faith in the crypto-currency, and not just its user’s enthusiasm for spending.

Initially, Overstock.com had projected $5 million in Bitcoin sales for this year, but the company has had to revise its prediction to $10 million, doubling the first estimate.

Byrne also shared that Bitcoin customers are typically men, spending $230 on average as opposed to the $150 average by non-Bitcoin customers. So far 4,300 customers have paid using Bitcoin, with an estimated 60% of them being new to Overstock. Apparently the most popular items purchased by Bitcoiners are sheets, cell phone cases, socks, and computer accessories.

The companies stock (OSTK) rose nearly 10% today, outperforming the market.

Byrne’s comments were cheered by Bitcoiners, now moving forward after Mt. Gox filing bankruptcy and admitting the loss of 740,000 BTC, in addition to both Poloniex and Flexcoin being hacked. When asked about the trouble plaguing Bitcoin, Byrne said, “Banks get robbed and no one says that something must be wrong with the dollar.”

A Man On a Mission

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Overstock Patrick Byrne
Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne
Patrick Byrne is known to be an advocate of limited government and has stated that he supports Bitcoin; as it is in his interest “to see a robust parallel monetary institution.” Of course, saving 2% in processing fees on every transaction is a benefit that a shrewd business man like Patrick Byrne can’t ignore.

Byrne started Overstock by buying the inventories of failed dot-com businesses and reselling the items below wholesale prices. In his time as Overstock’s CEO, Byrne has lead a campaign against “naked short-selling,” where traders can essentially bet on a security’s price falling without ever obtaining the security. Byrne feels that the practice encourages corruption in the market, and in 2005, he famously claimed on a conference call that there was a conspiracy headed by a “Sith Lord” to drive Overstock’s share price below $10. Under pressure from Byrne and others, the SEC banned what it called “abusive naked short-selling” in 2008.

Considering Byrne’s opposition to shorting securities without ever having access to those securities, it is easy to see why the commodity aspects of Bitcoin would be attractive to him. Bitcoin has the potential to provide the ease of using credit cards on the internet, without encouraging a credit-based system.

Amazon’s last statement regarding Bitcoin was that it had no interest in accepting cryptocurrency, citing a lack of customer interest.

Source: WSJ

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CoinBase Payment URL Handler Support Now Live

 Scott Fargo  05/03/2014

With so much negative news about exchanges like MTGox, Flexcoin and Poloniex lately it was refreshing to see something positive, on Feb 28th CoinBase went live with their Bitcoin Payment URL Handler.

So far it has support for both Chrome and Firefox.
I have not been able to find out at this time if Internet Explorer is going to be supported and if so how long it will be until it is.

So what does this do and why is it important?

What it does is makes it much more simple to send a payment in Bitcoin for a transaction. There will be no need to copy/paste followed by switching tabs to go to CoinBase to enter the payment address. Instead with the handler enabled all you have to do is click on the payment address, and it will bring you right to your CoinBase box and enter the information for you. The fussing and multiple clicks are streamlined making it much easier to use.
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Why it’s important is because it will make it much easier for the average user to use Bitcoin to shop with and trade. That will help the adoption of Bitcoin as an alternative currency that much easier for more people to use and help retailers as the process is simplified at the user lever without them having to do anything.

To enable the Payment URL handler log into your CoinBase account and go to advanced settings. From the choices, click the Enable Link Handler button, and you are set to go.

Coinbase URL Handler setup and in action.
Coinbase URL Handler setup and in action.
A quick overview of it in action can be found on CoinBase’s blog. In it, they show how to enable the handler and what it looks like when they use the donation payment button for the Bitcoin Foundation. From there clicking on the payment link brings you right to your send payment page with the payment address already there.

I did find that I needed to be logged into my CoinBase account, or it would ask me to log in and then it would fill in the payment form. This does not bypass your security and login settings to function that is very good. As with any transaction it is always good to have two factor authentication enabled in your CoinBase settings.

Their setup and trouble shooting page is excellent if you have problems installing it or getting it to run. It has quick and simple instructions to get everything going for both Chrome and FireFox.

It is good to see a major exchange as CoinBase keeps raising the bar by being a solid exchange and also by bringing out innovations to make using Bitcoin easy and secure.

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Bitcoin and the issue of Trust

 PJ Delaney  05/03/2014

Bitcoin (unlike many other cryptocurrencies) does meet many of the requirements of fiat money but as an institution some of its advocates have been doing it few favours. Many members of the general public see Bitcoin as a scam and in order to sell it to these  people we must deal with the thorny issue of trust. In order to establish trust I would contend that we, as advocates, should consider changing our emphases to improve stability and thereby increase acceptance. We will have an immersed society when a citizen can pull up at a shop and order a pizza using bitcoins to pay, not as a once off or novelty purchase but as a normal and common transaction. The question is: How do we get from here to there?

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 The Gold Problem

In the past gold was chosen as a most suitable metal for coinage and gold coins had the advantage that the value of the coin directly reflected the value of  the gold bullion that the coin held. Currency was backed by precious metals and people had confidence. However, crooks arrived and shaved the edges of the coins thereby debasing them. In order to restore and maintain confidence in the currency, many countries deemed that debasement became a capital offence. People that counterfitted these notes and coins were also subject to the rigors of the law. Banknotes were initially backed with gold and each nation would hold stores of bullion to support their currency. These policies ensured that the general public developed confidence over a period in the country’s coins and notes.

 

Keeping ahead of the crooks

Today, cryptocurrencies are suffering from some problems: Bitcoin has received bad press as a result of people manipulating transactions in order to facilitate double withdrawals. This may have been at least a part of the problem with Mt Gox; if so, it was certainly not the only problem. People cannot be expected to have confidence in crypto when money is being manipulated from within supposedly secure digitally encrypted accounts. People must have confidence that technology will keep their coins secure and not suffer from a gnawing fear that the same technology is being manipulated to undermine the currency and to take their hard earned funds. We must ensure that the people who have committed these criminal acts be pursued for the full money they have stolen; they must be subject to some form of sanction and levels of security on the relevant exchanges, as well as individual wallets, must be improved.

[bitjuicy]

We're a new bitcoin news aggregator, so we search algorithmically for all the news from around the world, sift it by media authority, give a brief synopsis and link to the original article if you want more info. Also list links to all the related articles, like techmeme. Would like feedback on what you like, don't like and suggestions on how to improve. We have some ideas, but want to make sure we provide a real service, so would enjoy feedback. Feel free to message me. Check us out at www.bitjuice.com

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KnCMiner Finalizes Design For World’s First 20nm Bitcoin ASIC Miner

Nermin Hajdarbegovic | Published on March 5, 2014

KnCMiner says it has finalized the design of what should be the world’s first 20nm bitcoin ASIC miner.

The company is still not saying much about the upcoming ASIC or the rollout schedule, it merely states that the ‘tape-out’ was achieved only three months after starting the project. The actual tape-out happened sometime in February.

In electronics, a tape-out is the last stage of the design cycle for a circuit board.


KnCMiner teamed up with Alchip and Advanced Semiconductors Technology (AST) to design and produce the chip. The company points out that its first generation ASICs were delivered in three to five months.

Power friendly

KnC has not revealed any performance estimates yet, but the company is saying that the new ASIC should cut power consumption by 43%.

This sounds like a realistic estimate, as we have been hearing similar claims from chipmakers who are planning to transition from 28nm to 20nm later this year.

In addition to the new node, KnC has also optimised the design of on-die circuitry, which allowed it to stick 1440 cores in a relatively big 55 x 55mm package.

Back in November KnC said the Neptune 20nm chip would deliver at least 3TH of power, operating at 0.7 watts per GH/sec. The company was expecting a 30% reduction in power consumption and now it appears that it might beat its initial estimate.

This would not be the first time. When KnC announced the Jupiter ASIC, it promised 400GH/sec, but the chip actually operated north of 550GH/sec. However, it will be a while before we know whether Neptune can over-deliver like its predecessor.

Tricky transition

Marcus Erlandson, KnC’s CTO said he is proud of the team’s performance.

“The combined efforts of KnC and our partners Alchip means that once again we are bringing to market a world first silicon design and in record time,” he said.

President of Alchip Johnny Shen said KnC and Alchip have been working together on bitcoin ASIC design for less than a year and they have already delivered “two world-first projects”.

It is still unclear when the new ASIC will be ready for production. It usually takes several weeks between tape-out and full-scale production, but only if everything goes according to plan.

[MICRO]

Poloniex Loses 12.3% of its Bitcoins in Latest Bitcoin Exchange Hack
Pete Rizzo (@pete_rizzo_) | Published on March 5, 2014 at 20:11 GMT | Companies, Crime, Exchanges

Digital currency exchange Poloniex, which trades bitcoin and other popular digital currencies such as litecoin, namecoin and dogecoin, has lost 12.3% of its total bitcoin supply in an attack.

The exchange took to Bitcoin Forum on 4th March to report it had been compromised by a previously unknown vulnerability in its coding.

Writing under the username Busoni, Poloniex owner Tristan D’Agosta, moved to calm concerned users by explaining what lead to the hack, as well as what the next steps from the company would be.

D’Agosta explained:

“The hacker discovered that if you place several withdrawals all in practically the same instant, they will get processed at more or less the same time. This will result in a negative balance, but valid insertions into the database, which then get picked up by the withdrawal daemon.”

D’Agosta also detailed the exact process by which transactions on the exchange were confirmed to highlight the error, and further, took full responsibility for the loss, stating that he plans to repay the company’s customers.

According to a Twitter post from the company, the original attack occurred during the early morning hours of 4th March.

Behind the hack

Due to its current bitcoin shortage, Poloniex indicated that all customer balances would temporarily be reduced by 12.3% “out of absolute necessity”. D’Agosta suggested that this was the only way that bitcoins could be distributed fairly among affected users.

“If I did not make this adjustment, people would most likely withdraw all their BTC as soon as possible in order to make sure they weren’t left in that remaining 12.3%.”

Poloniex plans to record the balances and to pay back customers using exchange fees as well as personal contributions. As a result, he indicated that all exchange fees would be temporarily raised to 1.5%, up from 0.2%. Altcoin and bitcoin withdrawals have since been reinstated, going back online on 4th March after less than a day’s delay.

System changes

D’Agosta did also credit his design with preventing a more massive bitcoin loss. For example, he noted that the company’s existing security features noticed the unusual withdrawal activity and froze affected accounts.

In the attack announcement, D’Agosta listed a number of next steps his company would follow, including updating the withdrawal daemon to check for negative balances before processing withdrawals and freezing any account with a negative balance.

According to its Twitter feed, updates have already been made.

Moving forward

D’Agosta expressed his apologies for the attack and appealed to the community for continued feedback on he could improve the service. Said D’Agosta:

“I do not have the money to wave away the debt, so we’ll need to work together.”

Response from the Bitcoin Talk community was largely positive, with many commenters posting messages of support for D’Agosta and his exchange.

Notably, the announcement follows a recent rush of attacks against bitcoin services, including Mt. Gox, Silk Road 2.0 – which has also embarked on a repayment plan, and Alberta-based “bitcoin bank” Flexcoin, which shut down its services on 4th March after losing $600,000 in bitcoins.

Link:http://www.coindesk.com/poloniex-loses-12-3-bitcoins-latest-bitcoin-exchange-hack/

[gpucoolingmethod]

@ponjava I thought MICRO has made new account!

[MICRO]

@ponjava I thought MICRO has made new account!

Nope i will be MICRO forever

[MICRO]

Robocoin to Debut First Traveling Bitcoin ATM at SXSW Interactive Festival
Pete Rizzo (@pete_rizzo_) | Published on March 5, 2014 at 22:46 GMT | Bitcoin ATM, News

Las Vegas-based bitcoin ATM specialist RoboCoin has revealed new plans for this week’s upcoming South By Southwest (SXSW) Interactive festival, set to begin on Friday 7th March and run through 11th March.

SXSW is one of the more notable events on the annual tech calendar, having helped launched major brands such as Twitter and Foursquare.

Robocoin, which debuted the first bitcoin ATM in Vancouver in October to massive fanfare, has a similarly stylish rollout planned for its SXSW debut. Robocoin will launch four ATMs around the city to raise bitcoin awareness at the event.

The result, according to Robocoin growth guru Sam Glaser, is that attendees will have unprecedented access to bitcoin.

Said Glaser:

“There should be no reasonable time of day where you can’t go buy and sell your bitcoins from a Robocoin.”

Founded in late 2013, Robocoin is in the midst of a massive rollout of ATM units as demand for its products is escalating worldwide.

Event locations

Screen Shot 2014-03-05 at 5.48.56 PMGlaser indicated that Robocoin bitcoin ATMs will available at HandleBar, an “old-school,” neighborhood bar in Austin; Domincan Joe, a local coffee shop; and Central Texas Gun Works, a shooting range and firearm education facility.

Perhaps most notable, however, is the Robocoin Rover, its fourth unit.

The Robocoin Rover will be housed in the back of a moving trailer for mobile access around Austin for the four-day event, providing an experience akin to a traveling food truck.

The Robocoin Rover will be operated by Coinvault, a Houston-based firm, but Glass suggested it could become an idea it encourages more operators to consider.

“We’re going to test it at SXSW, and see how positive the response is. So far [Coinvault] is the only [company] we’re talking to about, but I imagine if it’s successful, it will take off.

At least one of the units will be moved during the day to the SXSW Trade show, where Robocoin can gain access to the festival’s substantial audience. Last year, nearly 30,000 people attended the SXSW Interactive portion of the festival, attendance records show.

Stragetic goals

The event also has a strategic relevance for Robocoin, which is eager to showcase its units to the event’s influential audience members.

Explained Glaser:

“I think the biggest goal is to share Robocoin with a huge collection of technology journalists and influencers, and really share the information on Robocoin compliance, because that’s what we’ve built our company around.”

Attendance records also show that SXSW could be the right event for the company to attend for this reason. Approximately 3,000 media personnel were in attendance at the event in 2013.

Link: http://www.coindesk.com/robocoin-debut-first-traveling-atm-sxsw-interactive-festival/

[MICRO]

Serious Linux Flaw Leaves Bitcoiners Vulnerable to Attacks, Eavesdropping
Pete Rizzo (@pete_rizzo_) | Published on March 5, 2014 at 23:37 GMT | Crime, Technology

A security flaw in a key cryptographic program has been revealed in the Linux gnuTLS package, an optional component for third-party bitcoin and altcoin client applications.

The gnuTLS SSL library is included in many open-source packages such as those in Red Hat, Ubuntu and Debian distributions of Linux.

Originally discovered during an audit of gnuTLS for Red Hat, the effects of the flaw are wide-reaching for developers.

Explained Ars Technica in its report:

“[The] attacks circumvent the most widely used technology to prevent eavesdropping on the Internet, thanks to an extremely critical vulnerability in a widely used cryptographic code library.”

The bug, the source explains, is the result of commands in a section of the gnuTLS code that handle certificate verification. Estimates suggest the error could have been introduced as far back as 2005, though it was discovered on 4th March.

Further, more than 200 different operating systems and apps could be affected.


 

The flaw, which involves errors with several “goto cleanup” calls, is potentially dangerous as it effectively allows someone to perform a “man in the middle attack”, by which encrypted communications between a client and the web server can be exploited with specially crafted certificates.

Wrote Red Hat in its assessment:

“An attacker could use this flaw to create a specially crafted certificate that could be accepted by gnuTLS as valid for a site chosen by the attacker.”

Impact on bitcoin users

Despite the alarm the bug has raised in the wider tech community, bitcoin lead developer Jeff Garzik told CoinDesk that the issue is unlikely to have a substantial impact on bitcoin, though some will be affected.

Explained Garzik:

“The gnuTLS bug is pretty bad, but very few use gnuTLS in the bitcoin community. OpenSSL is standard.”

Garzik indicated that the use of OpenSSL mitigates a fork risk that is present when using other competing libraries for key software, such as gnuTLU.

He also stated that projects using OpenSSL, Mozilla NSS, Crypto++ or another crypto library are not impacted by the bug. Anyone who has compiled Bitcoind against this SSL package, however, would have an implementation that was vulnerable, he noted.

Ankur Nandwani, a developer at Bitmonet, suggested hosted wallet users and the users of bitcoin exchanges would be most affected, but stated that there are easy protections to prevent issues.

“In both cases, an attacker can sniff users credentials, when users are trying to log-in to their account. To reduce the probability of online wallets and exchange credentials from being compromised, it is really important that everyone use two-factor authentication.”

Nandwani said that the bug is evidence that bitcoin users should reduce their reliance on online wallets and exchanges.

Implementing a fix

The gnuTLS team has since announced an update to account for the flaw, one bitcoin and altcoin users and developers in need of the fix can now upgrade to. Red Hat indicated that gnuTLS users should upgrade their packages to correct the issue, and indicated that all applications linked to the gnuTLS library must be restarted for the update to take place.

Though mistakes are resolved in version 3.2.12, they still linger among those in the public, which has invoked comparisons to other extreme errors in coding flaw history.

Link: http://www.coindesk.com/serious-linux-flaw-leave-bitcoiners-vulnerable-eavesdropping/

[BitOnyx]

Bitcoin exchange CEO found dead in Singapore


Autumn Radtke, the 28-year-old CEO of an upstart bitcoin exchange, died last week under mysterious circumstances at her home in Singapore.

The U.S.-born head of First Meta was found dead by police on Feb. 28, with the cause of death yet to be determined. In a statement on its website, First Meta said the company "was shocked and saddened by the tragic loss of our friend and CEO Autumn Radtke."

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, the company's director and nonexecutive chairman, Douglas Abrams, said the exact cause of Radtke's death was "still under investigation."

Prior to taking the reins at First Meta in 2012, the 28-year-old Radtke had once closely worked with technology giant Apple to bring cloud-computing software to Johns Hopkins University, Los Alamos Labs and the Aerospace Corp., according to her biography. She then took up business development roles at tech start-ups Xfire and Geodelic Systems, according to information on her LinkedIn profile.

First Meta bills itself as a clearing house for the purchase and exchange of virtual currencies, including bitcoin.

(Read more: Back to work at bitcoin's embattled Mt.Gox)

Her death comes as troubles swirl around the nascent cryptocurrency industry, and amid a rash of suicides in the financial industry as a whole.

Last week, the world's largest bitcoin exchange Mt.Gox imploded; meanwhile, nearly $500 million in client funds vanished overnight. Elsewhere, untimely demises unrelated to bitcoin have claimed the lives of bankers at JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank and Zurich Insurance Group.

Financial-related suicides are common during times of market upheaval, such as the Great Depression or the Crash of 1987. However, the recent deaths have coincided with a surge of major indexes to record highs.

links:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2573863/Bitcoin-exchange-CEO-dead-home-suspected-suicide-age-28.html
http://betabeat.com/2014/03/bitcoin-ceo-found-dead-of-possible-suicide-in-singapore

[MICRO]

Guys i will be afk for 24h . U can get all news here : http://www.coindesk.com/ . We will be back to businesses when i come back.

[ChuckBuck]

You post like crazy for the last couple weeks news sometimes trivial ones, but don't even bother posting the biggest Bitcoin news of the year??? 

Satoshi Nakamoto just got revealed by Newsweek.

[BitOnyx]

You post like crazy for the last couple weeks news sometimes trivial ones, but don't even bother posting the biggest Bitcoin news of the year??? 

Satoshi Nakamoto just got revealed by Newsweek.

http://mag.newsweek.com/2014/03/14/bitcoin-satoshi-nakamoto.html

[ponjava]

crypt Mining Rejoices Nvidia GTX 750 Ti

 William Blackwell  06/03/2014

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/nvidia_mining-300x187.png
The Nvidia GTX 750 Ti has come up trumps in a comparison of mining GPUs.

Just when we all thought that AMD is king of the hill, along comes a Nvidia contender powered by their heavily plugged Maxwell chip – and knocks the R7  for 1st place. A recent comparison test done by Tom’s Hardware reveals the facts:

 

More Speed For Less Power

The GeForce GTX 750 Ti achieves 245 kh/s which is almost 40 kh/s faster than its nearest AMD rival, the R7 260 X which outputs 206 kh/s. The GTX 750 Ti achieves the hash rate by consuming only 60W of power compared to the R7 260 X’s 130W. Although the Nvidia card is $20 more expensive by RRP, the bang-for-buck factor is significant and makes the GTX 750 Ti the surprise winner.

The bigger surprise is that the closest competitor above: the AMD R7 265 also falls short of the GTX 750 Ti in measures of value for money and power efficiency. Although the R7 265 output is 252 kh/s, a 7 kh/s advantage, it does so by burning through 150W of power – more than double the consumption of the GTX 750 Ti! So from a TCO perspective you would be paying $11 more for the R7 265′s extra 7 kh/s only to pay double the cost in electricity throughout its useful life! Hmm. Which one to choose, eh?

 

Overclock Me, Please

A recent article in Forbes featured the GTX 750 Ti in an overclocking experiment (shown in the image below). It achieved 280 kh/s without distress to CUDAminer, and did so without rising above 60 degrees Celsius.

nvidia gtx 750 ti hash rate overclocked for scrypt mining

 http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/750-Ti-hashrates-overclocked.png

So, from the perspective of mining output per Watt, the GTX 750 Ti is best of breed. This calls into question the current preoccupation with AMD Radeon and the favor it enjoys. Is it justified? Apparently not, and Nvidia is nowhere near out of the mining GPU race yet.

As the Mining Performance per Watt chart below illustrates, the AMD flagship R9 290 is fairly power hungry. This is, of course, justified by its incredible output of 500 kh/s. If your rig allows it and your business plan demands it, you may find the unparalleled R9 290 to be the card for you. For the average miner, who is looking for a fast and cost effective card, the Nvidia GTX 750 Ti is a recommended buy.

Nvidia GTX 750 Ti scrypt mining output per watt
Comparison chart courtesy of PCperspectives
 
http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/PCperspectives_GTX750Ti_perfpower.png
HBM Is Coming

With AMD making a big deal of its forthcoming High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) Pirate Islands series, Nvidia is sure to follow. We can expect more miners to pile into the buying side for this new generation of GPUs, which look to challenge the notion that ASICs are the path to mining nirvana.

[ponjava]

BREAKING – Critical Crypto Security Bug: Linux, Bitcoin Client Apps At Risk

 William Blackwell  06/03/2014
http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/gnuTLS_bug_2-300x190.png
A security vulnerability has been discovered in the standard Linux gnuTLS package.Both the Bitcoin daemon and wallet client are unaffected, but some third party client applications are dependent on this package for cryptographic library interaction. As a result all altcoin client applications using gnutls are also affected.

GnuTLS is a package that references the openssl library and is used by most Linux and Open Source applications for socket encryption. Linux distributions ranging from Debian to Ubuntu and Red Hat are at risk of eavesdropping in a similar manner to the recent Mac OSX bug that allowed the keylogging Pony botnet to enact the theft of over 700,000 online credentials, including online wallet passwords – resulting in the theft of $220,000 worth of cryptocurrency.

The description of the security bug is outlined as follows at Ubuntu Security Notices:

 

Nikos Mavrogiannopoulos discovered that GnuTLS incorrectly handled certificate verification functions. If a remote attacker were able to perform a man-in-the-middle attack, this flaw could be exploited with specially crafted certificates to view sensitive information. CVE-2014-0092

 

At this moment we are still gathering information on this severe security vulnerability – no doubt, one of the biggest to ever affect Linux.

Readers are advised to upgrade their Linux distribution packages to the latest versions and where packages are not yet upgraded to refrain from performing online transactions or logins to sensitive sites (banking, online wallet services, etc)

Developers and miners running Linux installations should manually upgrade to gnutls 3.2.12
Specifically, look for packages like libcurl4-gnutls-dev that most certainly need upgrade.

gnuTLS security bug - Linux Bitcoin openssl SA

The discoverer of the vulnerability sent out a Security Advisory two days ago warning of the exploit and his bug fix. Following a security alert it usually takes various package maintainers for different Linux distributions a hours to a few days to incorporate the fixes in their own packages repositories.

gnuTLS files typically installed in Ubuntu 12.04 LTS:

gnuTLS security bug - Linux Bitcoin openssl

 http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Gold_venzen@sofala1_06Mar14_0035.png

Operating Systems not affected

Google Android
Microsoft Windows

The above OSes do not install or utilize gnuTLS by default, however, where individual user installed applications utilize the gnuTLS library – the vulnerability will most definitely present a security risk.

 

Have you been affected by this security vulnerability? Please tell us about it in the comments section below.