Author: Cristian Lipciuc

Cristian Lipciuc is a blockchain journalist working with startup companies across multiple domains such as freelancing, app development & cryptocurrency. Cristian specializes in applied blockchain technologies, cryptocurrency integration, the adoption of new technologies by governments, and cybersecurity.

Categories
Australia Blockchain Industries

Following Australia’s Lead, Europe Will Soon Begin Securing Wheat With Blockchain

Back in 2016, an Australian startup named AgriDigital was used to fulfill the first blockchain-secured Aussie grain transaction.

The transparency and extra level of security afforded by blockchain quickly grew a steadfast user base – and facilitated payments for over 1.6 million metric tonnes within the span of 2 years.

As of today, AgriDigital reports over 6000 active customers and over  AUD 3 million worth of transactions – and it seems grain tycoons around the world have taken notice.

Europe Follows Suit

In 2018, a pilot blockchain transaction involving wheat grown in the Black Sea basin left Novorossiysk. Two years later, the results of more test runs carried out in Brazil, Japan, Algeria, and Ukraine are in – and Swiss firm Cerealia SA has launched its blockchain-based grain trading platform.

Andrei Grigorov – the CEO of Cerealia – stated that although the Russian wheat market pulls in numbers even in its current state, it could be improved. Blockchain was the technology chosen to enable more streamlined transactions involving grain – one of the main crops worldwide.

“Traders can now be 100% certain they really did the trade, versus traditional over-the-phone brokerage. Instantly, they have digitally signed contracts and blockchain-registered records forever.”

Russia is currently the number one producer of wheat worldwide – but Russia also produces large quantities of barley, vegetable oil, corn, and other grains such as buckwheat.

Cerealia SA representatives say that in the first week alone, transactions on the new blockchain-based platform have nearly reached 20 thousand metric tons of grain.

Earlier this year, France, the Netherlands, the USA, and China also put together a blockchain platform for grains grown in Brazil – another one of the world’s breadbaskets.

Grain is only one Australian crop secured by blockchain, however – earlier this year, the Australian Government provided AUD 150,000 in funding for Entrust – an agricultural blockchain platform rapidly gaining traction.

Categories
Australia Cryptocurrency Law Tokens

High-Value Asset Token Platform Eyeballs Australian Launch

TOKO – a new asset token platform targeting high-value markets such as real estate and the art world – is looking for countries that already have a clear regulatory asset tokenization framework in place.

As such, the USA, the UK, Australia, Singapore, Switzerland, and Canada are in TOKO’s sights. TOKO is a collaboration between law firm DLA Piper, Aldersgate DLS, and Hedera Hashgraph.

Renowned Companies, Renowned Partners

DLA Piper is a law firm that specializes in international law and has offices in over 40 countries, while Hedera Hashgraph is a company running a highly scalable distributed ledger technology used by private companies and government sectors worldwide – including the Aussie agricultural sector.

Scott Thiel – a DLA Piper Technology partner – stated that TOKO is the result of years of development and research into the laws of countries around the globe regarding the creation of tokenized assets.

DLA Piper explained that through the use of blockchain technology, auditing can be carried out much easier – a welcome blessing in industries that are at times rife with speculation and fraud allegations.

“Our clients understand the technology and smart contracts, and see the benefits tokenization can provide in terms of the trust and efficiency it can create in fractionalizing assets.”

Aside from the three companies already involved, the BCW Group will be brought on board to aid with marketing strategies and more.

To celebrate its launch, TOKO finished tokenizing artwork commissioned by DLA Piper partners based in Hong Kong.

Although the partners have not set a date in stone for the launch of TOKO in various countries, Australia’s crypto-friendly atmosphere should make the delay minimal.

Categories
Cryptocurrencies DeFi Ethereum

Ethereum 2.0 Will Go Operational Sooner Than Expected

Although the release of the Ethereum 2.0 system was originally slated to go live on the 3rd of January, the work on the big update to the blockchain behind the second biggest cryptocurrency — and the basis for many other blockchain-related projects — has gone smoothly and will be launching a little over a month earlier.

The test launch — named Medalla —  concluded in August with satisfying results. The team at Ethereum believes that the deposit contracts will attract investors once they are convinced that the tools are safe and that Ethereum 2.0 is the way forward.

From Proof-of-Work to Proof-of-Stake

The biggest update to the Ethereum Blockchain will be the switch to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) version — which, unlike Proof-of-Work (PoW), will allow participants to link their cryptocurrency to the Ethereum network. 

Basically, a component of computational power in a PoW system is tied to a unit of mining power.

However, in a PoS system, the unit of mining power will be tied to a component of value  — in this case, a crypto token.

In order to ensure the Ethereum 2.0 launch goes as planned, almost 16,384 validators must stake 32 ETH or more. 

“Pre-genesis, the only active players on the Eth2 side are the beacon nodes; the validators spring into action immediately after the genesis event. The beacon nodes maintain the state of the system and talk to each other in a peer-to-peer network.”

Once this amount has been deposited, the Ethereum 2.0 launch will be complete. 

Vitalik Buterin — the man behind Ethereum — has made 100 transactions of 32 ETH himself to kick things off.


Whether the massive overhaul to Ethereum’s system will eventually cause Bitcoin to be outclassed remains to be seen. However, Ethereum has already served as the basis for countless other projects, and the way their blockchain is built encourages developers to take the project further —  and gives them all the tools necessary to do so.

Categories
Bitcoin Cryptocurrencies Cryptocurrency Law

Police Seize Nearly $1 Billion From Silk Road’s Hoard

This week, somebody transferred 69,369 BTC from a wallet believed to belong to the former owners of the Silk Road black market that was closed in 2013.

Although briefly brought back as Silk Road 2.0, the final nail in the coffin came on the 6th of November 2014 – exactly a year after the second iteration went online.

The wallet on the receiving end of the transaction was unknown until recently  – but the US Department of Justice confirmed in a press release on the 5th of November that they were behind it.

Ever since Paul Leslie Howard – an Australian national who was the first individual to be convicted of Silk Road-related crimes – was arrested and subsequently convicted for drug offences, law enforcement officials worldwide have been scrambling to confiscate assets that resulted from Silk Road’s sale of illicit drugs and other illegal merchandise.

Individual X

Five years after Ross Ulbricht – the creator of Silk Road – was sentenced to life behind bars, the Criminal Investigation division of the IRS managed to track down a stash of 69,369 BTC. Located in the world’s 4th biggest wallet, no transactions had been carried out involving it – until now.

It turns out a hacker – who goes by the online moniker “Individual X” – was the one who managed to take control of the crypto assets.

“According to the investigation, Individual X was able to hack into Silk Road and gain unauthorized and illegal access to Silk Road and thereby steal the illicit cryptocurrency from Silk Road and move it into wallets that Individual X controlled. According to the investigation, Ulbricht became aware of Individual X’s online identity and threatened Individual X for return of the cryptocurrency to Ulbricht.”

Individual X did not return the assets, in spite of the threats. He did, however, agree to transfer the funds to the US government, following an agreement with the San Francisco US Attorney’s Office.

Categories
Cryptocurrencies Digital Asset Mining Mining

Uniswap Trader Accidentally Pays Thousands For A Relatively Small Transaction

 Although not as serious as the time over AUD 6 million in fees were paid out for a little over AUD 100 thousand, a Uniswap user recently made a comparably large blunder.

Human Error

When facilitating a transaction on the Ethereum blockchain, miners are paid a fee for their effort – some to cover the cost of electricity resulting from the use of processing power, and some as profit. The cost of the transaction is referred to as “gas” and is measured in Gwei.

Although miner fees have been rising in recent months, the current average price is 0.0022 ETH – AUD 1.47 at the time this article was written.

In order to have their transaction prioritized, the person requesting the transaction can manually increase the miner fee. However, this leaves the door open for typos and other errors – such as the one made by a trader who goes by the alias “ProudBitcoiner” on Reddit.

While exchanging 0.2955 wrapped Ether (WETH) for 531 chi gas tokens (CHI) – an amount worth about 164 AUD – the trader accidentally paid 23.5172 ETH – worth almost AUD 13.5 thousand.

The trader stated in his Reddit post that the error arose when he mistakenly entered 200,000 in the “Gas Price” field instead of the “Gas Limit” field. The gas limit is the maximum amount of gas that can be used in a transaction on the Ethereum blockchain.

Although in the past miners have agreed to send back some or all of the money – such as when Sparkpool returned half of an accidental USD 300,000 fee to the sender – the decision to return the funds is ultimately up to the miner.

In the Reddit post, the unfortunate crypto trader stated that he had contacted the mining platform and was hoping to hear back from them.

Categories
Australia Blockchain Investing

Andrew Bragg Doubles Down On Blockchain Support

During the online panel of the Future Of Financial Services 2020 conference, Australian New South Wales Senator Andrew Bragg reaffirmed his support for blockchain technology, stating his belief that it may very well be the solution for regulation and fraud – owing to its traceability.

Andrew Bragg reminded the public that time zones had been a problem for regulatory bodies for a long time – and that blockchain technology is capable of reducing costs in this area.

Staying Competitive In The Financial Domain

The NSW-based blockchain advocate highlighted Singapore’s decision to build the world’s first global data exchange – and stated that Australia will have to take steps to ensure its competitiveness on the global financial market.

“Singapore’s ambition is to build the world’s first global data exchange, and we’re going to have to lift our game to compete with that.

Hong Kong will still be an important gateway to China, but because of the recent turmoil there and the foreign influence laws, they won’t have the same regional headquarter attraction. We would be mad to sit idly by and allow such a lucrative share of the market to lead to Singapore or to Tokyo.”

In order to maintain Australia’s position as a financial powerhouse, Andrew Bragg revealed that a group of 15 experts has been formed. They will brainstorm ideas on how to profit from the waning power of Hong Kong in the APAC sector – and how to remove bureaucratic obstacles faced by Australian businesses.

Last but not least, the senator reminded the audience that becoming a financing center has been a target of the Australian government for years.

Hinting that tax deals may be necessary in order to attract major companies, he added that this could only happen if the government was willing to change some policies – and adapt to new technology.

Categories
Australia Cryptocurrencies Cryptocurrency Law

RBA Partners With Perpetual, Consensys, And Others To Study CBDCs

In a press release, the Reserve Bank Of Australia Stated that they would be joining forces with Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, Perpetual, and ConsenSys Software in order to perform further research into the use of a wholesale CBDC.

Research Continues Despite Prior Reservations

This comes in the wake of an announcement in September that RBA will probably not be developing a CBDC – then recanting and continuing to study.

Whether this is due to banks in countries such as China, Germany, and the USA continuing research – the Chinese going so far as to test the digital yuan by handing out free digital currency to some Shenzhen residents – or a simple change of heart, it seems an Australian CBDC is being looked into more seriously than before.

The RBA hopes to develop a POC (proof-of-concept) system to create tokens for their tentative CBDC. This CBDC would be used for funding, settlement, and loan repayment by companies and individuals buying or selling products and services in wholesale qualities.

Like many other new cryptocurrencies, the new Aussie CBDC would be based on the Ethereum blockchain as a Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) system.

Assistant Governor Michele Bullock stated that while the use of a CBDC remains up in the air, the interest by commercial partners in national cryptocurrencies has been noted.

“With this project, we are aiming to explore the implications of a CBDC for efficiency, risk management, and innovation in wholesale financial market transactions. While the case for the use of a CBDC in these markets remains an open question, we are pleased to be collaborating with industry partners to explore if there is a future role for a wholesale CBDC in the Australian payments system.”

The research should be done by the end of 2020, and the study group plans to release its results within the first half of 2021.

Categories
Australia Cryptocurrencies Scams

Sydney-based Businessman Owns Up To Crypto Scam Worth Tens Of Millions

Running a firm specializing in private security, promoting concerts at the Sydney Opera House, and owning a sizable real estate portfolio – all respectable ventures that would lend an aura of trust to anyone. Unfortunately, it would appear the trust of nearly 150 Sydney residents was misplaced.

Ponzi Scheme

Back in 2017 during the cryptocurrency boom – Mr. Harpreet Singh Sahni started hosting seminars on cryptocurrency, claiming that “crypto is the safest investment possible.”, as reported by ABC News.

He also allegedly started advertising a cryptocurrency called Plus Gold Union Coin – and claimed the cryptocurrency was netting him between $5000 and $8000 a day.

Early adopters and investors are rumored to have been rewarded with huge commissions and expensive holidays for attracting even more investors. Coupled with the seemingly trustworthy nature of Mr. Sahni, news of the cryptocurrency spread rapidly.

Within a few months, investors across 22 countries had poured over $50 million into the cryptocurrency scam.

Mr. Sahni claimed that by depositing around $7000, investors could earn over $100,000 in a year.

However, in order to reap the large rewards, investors would have to lock into a contract that would not permit them to withdraw funds for 12 months.

Unfortunately, the PGUC website would go down for several weeks at a time – and when the crypto market crashed suddenly in December of 2017, users were understandably worried.

At the time, Mr. Sahini assured investors that everything was under control and that their assets were safe. Later on, he admitted he had taken advantage of close acquaintances to widen the scope of the project.

According to an investor whose name has been withheld – who had known him for  15 years – the $38,000 she had invested  together with her parents were invested with full confidence.

“We’ve always heard great things about him in terms of his ability to do charity or his ability to do service for God or for people.”

The investor admitted that she should probably have done more research before investing.

 After leaving investors in a sea of worry, August 2019 brought the news that Mr. Sahni had been arrested by New Delhi Police, following a complaint placed by Sydney real estate agent Rajiv Sharma.

Mr. Sahni has since stated in three written confessions that he had been approached by 3 men in early 2017 – who told him it was a scam – but he went with the plan anyway.

On the 25th of November, Mr. Sahni will appear in court – and face a maximum sentence of 25 years, if convicted.

Categories
Blockchain Crypto News Industries Worldwide

Blockchain solution SIMBA May Become A Strategic Solution For The USA And Its Partners

Two weeks ago, Australia’s Flinders University and SIMBA Chain grew closer via an MOU (Memorandum Of Understanding) targeting future research.

At the time of signing, the lead executive at SIMBA stated that, as a platform built by the University of Notre Dame and ITAMCO, SIMBA would like to help not just the USA, but it’s strategic partners in NATO and The Five Eyes as well.

Boeing Beaten By Blockchain

Following their participation in the Advanced Manufacturing Olympics that took place between the 20th and 23rd of October – a competition held by the US Department of Defense as a way to find innovative solutions for military manufacturing and communications – SIMBA won first place in one of the technical challenges.

Taking home USD 100,000 – and beating Boeing and Stratasys – SIMBA focused on blockchain-secured communication networks between fictional factories producing wartime material.

The challenge required competitors to find more efficient ways of getting supplies to soldiers and paramedics fighting on a fictional island under siege.

Joel Neidig – the CEO of SIMBA – explained the approach taken by SIMBA and what differentiated his company from the competition.

“We […] had six days to put together an entire war games solution to deliver critical parts to a battlefront, keep field hospitals operational and infrastructure like runways intact. What was different about our approach was how we met both the physical challenges of war fighters as well as the cyber threats that are playing a growing role in modern warfare.”

Using blockchain as a way to guarantee quality standards in 3D printing and mining – as well as guaranteeing against tampering with the materials in transit, sabotaging the war effort – SIMBA stood out and proved once again the many qualities of blockchain.

Categories
Australia Industries Investing

Australian Venture Capital-Raising Round To Accept USD Tether

West Coast Australia Group – an Aussie company that specializes in aquaculture – has launched an initial public offering  (IPO) that will accept Tether as well as fiat.

WCA is based in Melbourne and sells its fish alive and fresh, both wholesale and directly to retail customers.

Cryptocurrency-Friendly Funding Platform

The round of funding is being operated by Stax – a crypto-friendly capital-raising platform. The WCA Group, a company on the Sydney Stock Exchange’s (SSX) publicly traded list, is selling a minimum of 10,000,000 and up to 14,000,000 shares at $AUD 0.50 a pop.

West Coast Australia Group selected the SSX as its stock trading platform of choice due to the support the SSX offers to smaller companies – support including, but not limited to, listing requirements within the reach of small-scale companies.

The capital raised will be used to invest in a new hatchery and nursery facilities for a fish farm the company runs in Langkawi, Malaysia – among other smaller investments.

Interested parties can buy these stocks in either AUD or Tether (USDT).

Kenny Lee – the CEO of Stax – explained that even though Bitcoin and Ethereum are more well-known than USDT, it was chosen due to its status as a stablecoin.

“The acceptance of USDT in an IPO is a transformative move in Australia and a significant step forward for cryptocurrency adoption in general. It paves the way for the future of capital markets down under.”

Neo Ching Hoe – the CEO and founder of WCA – stated in turn that he and his company are proud to be part of a historic moment in Australian investment history – and that he hopes this move will set a precedent for other global companies to invest in the Australian market.