Author: José Oramas

José is a journalist and translator with a keen interest in blockchain and cryptocurrencies.

Categories
Crypto News Cryptocurrencies Regulation Russia

12% of Crypto Market is Owned by Russian Citizens, Says Russian Government

Russian government authorities have revealed that the federation owns more than 16.5 trillion rubles, or US$214 billion worth of cryptocurrencies – controlling roughly 12 percent of the crypto market. 

Russians Own More Crypto Than Expected

According to sources within the Kremlin, the report was an estimate calculated by analysing IP addresses of some of the biggest crypto exchanges in the country. Russian authorities are using this estimate to form a better overview of the industry and implement proper regulations.

It’s unclear if this estimate is lower than the actual number of crypto users in the Russian federation, since a lot of them use anonymous tools to transact cryptocurrencies:

It is, however, a huge leap from December 2021 when it was reported that Russians held only 5 trillion rubles in crypto, or US$67 billion at that time.

Russia Finally Comes Out in Favour of Proper Crypto Regulation

The regulatory weather in Russia has been a quite confusing environment for crypto users. Two weeks ago, the Russian central bank attempted to ban crypto, only to be countered by the finance ministry with a crypto regulatory framework:

But after a bunch of back and forths between authorities, it seems Russia is finally preparing the roadmap for establishing proper crypto regulation, starting first drafts this month. Dmitry Chernyshenko, deputy chairman of the Russian Federation, last week signed a crypto regulation roadmap valid until the end of the year, as per a report from RBC.

Additionally, finance minister Anton Siluanov suggested that banks and other licensed financial entities should be allowed to provide crypto services, reiterating the ministry’s stance on regulating crypto rather than banning it.

Categories
Australia Crypto News NFTs

WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange Set to Release ‘Censored’ NFT Collection

Pak (formerly known as Murat Pak), a digital artist who rose to fame with NFT (non-fungible token) artwork The Merge, is collaborating with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to launch Censored, Assange’s first NFT project.

Another Push to Free Assange

During a Discord discussion, Pak said that Censored is a push to fight for Assange’s freedom: “For me it’s about freedom, and this time my medium is a case.”

Censored drops on February 7, and will include a dynamic limited-edition and a dynamic open edition, in which anyone can participate. While there aren’t many details disclosed as yet, the NFT will incorporate an image that will change over time based on smart contract data.

FreeAssangeDAO Follows in the Wake of FreeRossDAO

FreeAssangeDAO is an decentralised autonomous organisation that was formed to help Assange with his legal fight. The organisation follows the precedent set by FreeRossDAO, which raised money for the release of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht from prison.

While the Censored NFT collection and the FreeAssangeDAO seem to have no connection, the organisation does plan to bid on the NFT.

Assange, an Australian editor and activist, is known as the co-founder of WikiLeaks, a non-profit organisation that publishes news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous users.

Supporters of Julian Assange cheer outside the Old Bailey in London after a judge ruled he could not be extradited to the US.

WikiLeaks has a large database containing classified information about war, espionage and corruption, mostly gleaned from US government sources. Assange has been confined in Belmarsh, a maximum-security prison in London, since 2019. He may yet be extradited to the US to face numerous charges, such as hacking and espionage.

Categories
Australia Crypto News Oxen Privacy

Australian Homegrown Messaging App ‘Session’ Surpasses 1 Million Downloads

Session, an Australian born decentralised messaging platform running on the Oxen privacy network, hit a milestone at the beginning of this year by crossing 1 million downloads on the Google Play Store.

500% Growth Throughout 2021

Session is an end-to-end encrypted messaging application that runs on Oxen, a privacy-focused ecosystem supported by the $OXEN coin. Session runs on Oxen’s 1,700-plus community-driven nodes to store and route messages. Unlike P2P messaging apps, however, Session users can chat with each other when they are offline.

In 2021 Session witnessed 500 percent growth, and this year’s early milestone is a clear signal that users are more drawn than ever to privacy-focused, decentralised applications.

A million downloads is a huge milestone for us, we’ve been working towards this for a couple of years, and we’re expecting even bigger growth this year. Session is proof that people want to use decentralised applications — you just have to build good ones.

Kee Jefferys, Oxen CTO

Data Privacy and Anonymity

Session messages are onion-routed, a technique where messages are wrapped under layers of encryption, preventing traffic analysis eavesdropping (theft of information).

Unlike other messaging platforms, which compile meaningful information about the user, every encrypted message is routed through three nodes in the Oxen Service Node Network, making it virtually impossible for the nodes to compile sensitive data from the user.

Comparison of sensitive data from several messaging applications.

When users sign up to Session, their devices generate a Session ID, which is the sole contact information on the app – you don’t need your phone number or any other type of personal information to generate a Session ID.

Because of the design of the Session protocol, users can have extreme confidence that whenever they send a message that only the person they send it to will be able to know the message contents, who they messaged, and when they sent the message.

Session whitepaper

The Session app also has some really cool features such as the ability to unsend messages which deletes the message completely from both the sender and recipient devices.

Get started with Session:

Categories
Crime Crypto News DeFi Scams Tokens

TIME Token Collapses 60% Amid Revelation that Co-Founder is a Known Convict

DeFi (Decentralised Finance) project Wonderland has seen its native token TIME collapse 60 percent after it was revealed it had been co-founded by Michael Patryn, also one of the co-founders of the now-defunct Canadian crypto exchange QuadrigaCX.

0xSifu Steps Down as CEO of Wonderland

The co-founder and chief financial officer of the Avalanche-based DeFi protocol Wonderland had been known as OxSifu. A user by the name of zachxbt revealed OxSifu was actually Michael Patryn, who continually changed his identity – to the point of undergoing multiple facial surgeries – to avoid detection by police.

Before he was Michael Patryn, OxSifu went by the name of Omar Dahini, then Omar Patryn. He was part of a criminal organisation called Shadowcrew, whose operations consisted of trafficking stolen credit and identity information using E-gold, a privacy-focused digital currency issued in 1996.

Two faces of Michael Patryn. Source: davidgerard.co.uk

QuadrigaCX was a Canadian crypto exchange owned and operated by Gerald Cotten, who died unexpectedly in 2018, his body cremated before anyone could verify his death. The eerie side is that he took with him more than US$160 million of investors’ money, but Omar (Patryn) and his wife ended up with the majority of the assets.

Everyone ‘Deserves a Second Chance’

Daniele Sesta, the other co-founder of Wonderland, said he knew about Patryn’s criminal past and the numerous Ponzi projects he had led. Despite Patryn’s long criminal record, Sesta decided to keep him on as Wonderland’s treasury manager.

I found out about this one month ago. I am of the opinion of giving second chances, as I have mentioned on Twitter. I’ve seen the community very divided about my choice of maintaining [Patryn] as the treasury manager after finding out who he was and his past.

Daniele Sesta, blog post

This sparked outrage in the Wonderland community, many of whom are accusing Sesta of being Patryn’s accomplice, or even being Patryn himself.

The voting process to remove Patryn from his positions ended on January 29. with the vote 87.56 percent in favour of removing OxSifu against 12.44 percent voting to keep him.

Sesta Swimming in Hot Water

Wonderland members on Twitter, Reddit, Discord, and all other social media channels related to the project, are now questioning Sesta’s legitimacy and his overall financial background.

An example of Reddit users being up in arms. Source: Reddit

Did Cotten Really Die?

Gerald Cotten reportedly died from Chrohn’s disease in 2018. The keys to the digital vault containing a massive fortune in Bitcoin were buried with him.

The event was so controversial that it was covered by worldwide media, even inspiring documentaries and movies. As Crypto News Australia reported last year, a documentary titled Dead Man Switch was screened at the Melbourne Film Festival in August, leaving a handful of questions unanswered – including whether he had faked his own death in an elaborate “exit scam”.

Categories
Facebook Institutions Stablecoins

Meta’s Diem Plans Fail, Zuckerberg in Talks to Offload Intellectual Property

Diem (formerly Libra), the stablecoin backed by Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta, hasn’t had the best start to the year. It appears that the Diem Association is selling off its intellectual property to Silvergate Capital for US$200 million, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing an unnamed source familiar with the matter.

Diem Fails to Receive Regulatory Approval

The Diem project was presented by Zuckerberg’s Meta (formerly Facebook) in June 2019, formed under the name of the Diem Association. The Libra stablecoin was meant to be backed by a handful of global currencies such as the US dollar, in similar fashion to the business model of Tether’s USDT or USDC.

The Diem Association secured Silvergate Capital, a bank that serves blockchain companies, as the exclusive issuer of the Diem USD. However, Zuckerberg was soon confronted with obstacles imposed by US regulatory bodies and abroad.

The lack of security and privacy was the main concern for regulators, warning off investors including eBay, Mastercard, Visa and PayPal – all of whom resigned as founding members in a single day. Zuckerberg then rebranded Libra to Diem, but it only made things worse.

Diem Association Trying to Repay Investors

The Diem Association is now selling its intellectual property to Silvergate to repay investors, which include tech and investment concerns such as Coinbase, Spotify, a16z, Ribbit Capital, and more high-profile institutions.

It wasn’t as if the news hurt the crypto community. We need to remember that Zuckerberg and his businesses have attracted controversial accusations ever since news broke in 2018 that Facebook had allowed Cambridge Analytica to harvest sensitive data from 87 million users.

Categories
Blockchain Google Metaverse NFTs

Google Launches its Own Blockchain Division

As reported by Bloomberg, software giant Google has reportedly formed a division focused on blockchain technology, appointing Shivakumar Venkataraman as the new executive to lead the unit.

What Will the Blockchain Division Do?

Venkataraman, an engineering vice-president for Google, says the new division will focus on “blockchain and other next-gen distributed computing and data storage technologies”.

The new division comes under the umbrella of Labs, an incubator created by Google that focuses on long-term projects regarding emerging technologies such as virtual reality. Venkataraman will also become the “founding leader” of Labs.

Not much is known about the group apart from the information obtained by Bloomberg. This is probably a response to other tech giants integrating emerging technologies, such as Meta (formerly Facebook) and Instagram, both exploring NFTs (non-fungible tokens).

Will Google Integrate Crypto into Its Business Model?

While it’s still not known if Google will integrate digital assets like Instagram and Meta plan to do, this could be its jumpstart for exploring crypto assets and their foundational technology.

Google has alleviated the pressure on cryptocurrency promotion by lifting its advertising ban last August, allowing crypto companies to place ads on its search engine and sites that are part of its platform.

Another tech giant focusing on the rise of NFTs and Web3 is Microsoft, which has followed Facebook/Meta into the metaverse by launching 3D avatars and immersive meetings.

Categories
Banking CBDCs Crypto News

South Korea Becomes 14th Nation to Successfully Complete Phase 1 CBDC Trial

The first phase of South Korea’s CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency) trial has been successfully completed, as per an announcement from the Bank of Korea.

Following the issuance and distribution pilot, June 2022 is the potential date to start working with financial institutions to publicly distribute the digital won. One of these financial entities is Ground X – a subsidiary of Korea’s largest social network, Kakao – selected as the bank’s technology partner for the digital won simulations.

A simulation environment [will be] created in the cloud for the basic functions of the implemented CBDC (manufacturing, issuance, distribution, etc). Based on this, we plan to verify the possibility of implementing various additional functions (offline payments, etc) and applying new technologies, such as enhancing personal information protection.

Bank of Korea report

The bank emphasised that the digital won would not replace its fiat currency, rather it will be used as a “backup payment method” in situations where telecommunication companies experience failure.

Travel Rule Puts Pressure on Crypto Exchanges

South Korea has become the 14th nation to officially and successfully complete a CBDC pilot, following China, the Bahamas and Nigeria, to name a few.

The CBDC announcement comes after many South Korean financial entities have placed a lot of pressure on crypto exchanges following the Travel Rule, which requires exchanges, digital wallet providers and other crypto-related companies to share personally identifiable information (PII) for transactions over a certain amount.

On January 25, South Korea’s second-biggest exchange, Bithumb, had to suspend crypto withdrawals following pressure from the Korean Financial Intelligence Unit.

An odd sidelight to all this is that, as Crypto News Australia reported earlier this month, South Korean presidential candidate Lee Jae-Myung is using non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as part of his fundraising campaign.

Categories
Bitcoin Blockchain Crypto News ETFs

World’s Largest Asset Manager ‘BlackRock’ Files for Blockchain Tech ETF

The world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, has filed for a blockchain-focused ETF (exchange-traded fund).

BlackRock is a US-based hedge fund with roughly US$10 trillion in assets under management (AUM). The firm filed for an ETF focused on blockchain technology, called the Ishares Blockchain and Tech ETF.

As per the filing, the ETF will track the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) FactSet Global Blockchain Technologies Index, which is composed of companies working on the development of blockchain technology in the US and overseas.

Ishares Blockchain and Tech ETF seeks to track the investment results of an index composed of US and non-US companies that are involved in the development, innovation and utilisation of blockchain and crypto technologies.

BlackRock filing

The filing doesn’t disclose the ticker nor the components of the index, but it reads that “the underlying index is composed of (i) blockchain technology companies, (ii) cryptocurrency mining, (iii) cryptocurrency trading and exchanges, (iv) crypto-mining systems, and (v) video multimedia semiconductors”.

Will the SEC Approve BlackRock’s ETF?

It will be interesting to see how the process plays out since the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) has been rejecting ETF proposals in the past seven days or so. Last week, for example, the SEC rejected Anthony Scaramucci’s SkyBridge spot ETF.

BlackRock has previously proven its intentions to explore cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. A year ago, the asset manager disclosed its intent to allow its funds to engage in futures contracts based on Bitcoin.

Besides crypto ETFs, the NFT (non-fungible token) movement has seen the first NFT-focused ETF, thanks to fintech firm Defiance.

Categories
Crypto News DeFi Hackers

Hack Persists for Cross-Chain Protocol ‘Multichain’, Losses Reach $3 Million

The Multichain hack drama is far from over as hackers are still draining millions of tokens from the protocol, with the biggest victim reportedly losing roughly US$1 million.

Multichain Announcement Prompts Further Compromises

As per a January 17 blog post, Multichain – a cross-chain router protocol – announced it had been compromised by several hackers who exploited various vulnerabilities in the protocol, stealing over US$1 million from several tokens. But the protocol’s announcement backfired as it only prompted the hackers to steal more funds, raising the total amount to roughly US$3 million:

Security firm Dedaub spotted six cross-chain tokens in the protocol that are still subject to vulnerabilities: Wrapped ETH (wETH), Peri Finance Token (Peri), Official Mars Token (OMT), Wrapped BNB (wBNB), Polygon (MATIC), and Avalanche (AVAX).

Hacker Wants to Return Funds But ‘Keep Tips’

One of the hackers stole US$1.4 million in the first round of attacks, while another offered to return 80 percent of the funds while keeping the rest as “tips for me saving your money”. One user lost almost US$1 million in the hack, and decided to offer US$150,000 in ETH to the white hacker to retrieve his funds.

Multichain Sending Mixed Messages

What has Multichain users confused are the contradictory messages coming from the protocol’s Twitter account. On January 17, Multichain said that the critical vulnerabilities found in the six affected tokens had been “reported and fixed” by the team, but two days later it reminded users to revoke approvals of the tokens.

These mixed messages were spotted by Crypto Twitter figure ChainLinkGod, who said: “I can’t be the only one who’s incredibly confused by @MultichainOrg’s messaging here.”

Multichain has since turned off the comments on its Twitter account. Users in the company’s Telegram group are reporting that no vulnerability has yet been fixed, and that the company is not doing anything to reimburse affected users.

This is one of several DeFi hacks so far this month. Two weeks ago, Tinyman, an Algorand-based decentralised trading platform, was hacked and drained for roughly US$3 million.

Categories
Australia Bitcoin Mining Crypto News

Australian Bitcoin Miner Mawson Infrastructure Hashrate Soaring, Earns 5.8 BTC a Day

Sydney-based crypto mining firm Mawson Infrastructure has reached a new milestone by operating above 1.0 EH/s (exahash per second), and it’s aiming for 1.1 EH/s by the end of January.

1.0 EH per Second, 5.8 BTC a Day

In August 2021, Mawson said it was looking to increase its mining power in Australia and bought more than 17,000 ASIC BTC mining rigs from Chinese manufacturer Canaan Creative. According to a recent statement, the company’s computer power is now up 38 percent since November 2021.

Hash rate growth since January 2021 on a yearly basis. Source: Mawson

To reach its goal of 3.0 EH/s by Q2 2022, Mawson purchased 4,000 ASIC BTC miners on top of the 17,000 rigs purchased in Q3 2021, increasing its fleet to over 40,000 BTC mining rigs globally.

The company’s expansion in Sandersville, Georgia [US] is progressing rapidly, with an additional 60MW of energy now available, taking the facility to 100MW of capacity. The company’s Midland, Pennsylvania facility phase 1 of 50MW is on track to be energised in Q1 2022, with phase 2 on track to be energised in Q2 2022 for a total of 100MW.

Mawson forecast

The continuing success of the company’s operation has elevated its expectations – the corporate goal is to reach 5 EH/s by early 2023, which could turn Mawson into one of the largest NASDAQ-listed Bitcoin miners globally.

With the scale-up of our existing facility in Georgia this year well under way, combined with securing our new facility in Pennsylvania, our team has been able to focus on securing additional Bitcoin mining hardware for deployment. This reflects our ‘infrastructure first’ approach to deployment where the Mawson team has been securing long-duration, sustainable energy facilities.

James Manning, CEO, Mawson Infrastructure

What powers Mawson’s mining operations is 75 percent non-carbon emitting energy such as nuclear, hydro and wind. As it expands its business worldwide, it will continue to seek out the most efficient energy sources for its operations.

Mawson also has a majority stake in Luna Squares, a US-based mining facility, owning a total of 90 percent of shares acquired last year.