Category: Crypto Wallets

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CeFi Crypto News Crypto Wallets DeFi Ledger

Ledger Partners with Alkemi to Enable DeFi Lending to its 1.5 Million Users

Alkemi Network, a crypto lending platform that combines centralised finance (CeFi) with decentralised finance (DeFi), has announced a partnership with hardware wallet maker Ledger.

The integration with Alkemi Earn means that Ledger’s 1.5 million users will be able to earn yields with their ETH, wBTC (wrapped Bitcoin), or USDC directly on their wallets’ interfaces:

Bridging CeFi with DeFi

Since launching in April 2021, Alkemi Network claims it has received over US$50 million in gross deposits, and the integration with Ledger is expected to boost those numbers significantly.

Alkemi Network’s co-founder, Brandon Mahoney, highlighted the importance of allowing users to keep full control of their assets, adding that this integration differed from other products in the market.

‘Not your keys, not your coins’, as the saying goes. With this native integration into Ledger Live, Alkemi Earn unlocks a protocol-powered cash management experience for Ledger’s community. This is what bridging CeFi to DeFi is all about.

Brandon Mahoney, co-founder, Alkemi Network

Ledger Holding Firm Despite Market Downturn

Despite a bleeding crypto market, Ledger continues to work on behalf of the community. Last month, it launched an NFT-focused wallet to allow users to securely store their NFTs and install up to 100 apps.

In December last year, Ledger launched the Crypto Life card, a debit card that allows users to spend crypto on goods and services or use it as collateral for cash purposes.

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Crypto Wallets MetaMask

Security Flaw Dubbed ‘Demonic’ Discovered in MetaMask and Phantom Wallets

In a classic case of “the devil is in the detail”, security researchers from Halborn have discovered a security flaw dubbed ‘Demonic’ in MetaMask and Phantom wallets.

Do Not Import Wallets Using Unencrypted Computers

According to researchers, when users imported a web extension wallet using their seed phrases via an unencrypted computer, their assets could be at risk if a hacker manages to get access to their hard drives:

These attacks are known as ‘key-finding’ or ‘key-search’, and consist of attackers using cryptography to decrypt messages on computer systems and gain access to them, leaving users’ systems exposed to the hands of the attackers:

Vulnerability Patched Up

The Demonic vulnerability only affects users with web extension wallets including MetaMask, Phantom, Brave, and XDefi wallets, while mobile users and anyone with fully-encrypted hard drives remain unaffected.

According to researchers, all wallets have now patched the security flaw. MetaMask updated its wallet with version 10.11.3, while Phantom is rolling out a new update for its wallet next week.

After the security flaw was discovered, MetaMask awarded Halborn US$50,000, while Phantom hired Oussami Amri, the employee who found the vulnerability.

MetaMask Can’t Catch a Break

MetaMask seems to be constantly in the headlines when it comes to security protocols and users’ safety. A month ago, Crypto News Australia reported that the Ethereum-based wallet had issued a phishing attack security alert for iPhone users, warning that their assets could be at risk from an iCloud-related phishing scam.

After all, the number one rule in crypto is to never give your private key or seed phrase to anyone, and never connect it to a website or app you don’t recognise, or you could end up like Dallas2626, a MetaMask user who lost US$10,000 from a scammer in Discord using a fake WalletConnect app.

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Crypto News Crypto Wallets Cryptocurrency Law Hackers NFTs

Anon Hacker Gets Served with Restraining Order Via an NFT, a World First

In a world first for both the crypto space and the legal profession, a defendant in a hacking case has been served with a temporary restraining order by means of a non-fungible token (NFT).

International law firm Holland & Knight served the defendant on-chain using a “service NFT“. The hacker, who cannot be named, stole US$7.94 million in digital assets from a hot wallet belonging to LCX, a Liechtenstein-based fintech company.

Method Approved by NY Supreme Court

The service method was approved by the New York Supreme Court and “is an example of how innovation can provide legitimacy and transparency to a market that some believe is ungovernable”, according to LCX.

The hack, which took place in January this year, saw assets including Ether, USDC, Sandbox and more stolen from LCX, whose blockchain tracing specialists were subsequently able to identify the addresses of the hacker’s wallets.

LCX has been working with law enforcement authorities in Liechtenstein, Ireland, Spain and the US to trace the funds, which were initially appropriated via Tornado Cash, a crypto mixer protocol for concealing the digital trail of blockchain transactions. LCX traced the funds and wallets through what it describes as “algorithmic forensic analysis”.

Could Legal Precedent Save NFTs?

Perhaps this legal first could be the saviour of NFTs. Earlier this month, crypto analytics firm IntoTheBlock reported that Ethereum transaction volume was down 80 percent on the same period last year due in large part to plummeting interest in NFTs. Google search data showed a concurrent 75 percent reduction in searches for the term NFT, contributing significantly to the drop in transaction volume.

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Crypto News Crypto Wallets Payments

PayPal Allows US Users to Withdraw BTC and ETH to External Wallets

PayPal has announced it will begin allowing US crypto holders to transfer their digital assets to external wallets. The rollout of the update has just begun and is likely to be available to all US users within the next fortnight.

PayPal for BTC and ETH

PayPal will offer users the option to transfer bitcoin, ether, litecoin, and bitcoin cash to external wallets in coming weeks. The long sought-after addition will bring PayPal in line with other successful cryptocurrency services in the industry. The feature has been a hot topic since the company’s October 2021 launch of its crypto buy, sell and hold service:

According to Jose Fernandez da Ponte, senior vice president of PayPal’s blockchain, crypto and digital currencies sector, the company believes its “role in the ecosystem is about increasing access”. The move to permit transfers to external wallets has made PayPal the largest blockchain-enabled consumer digital wallet.

Earlier Crypto Business Moves

In March 2021, PayPal upgraded its technology to permit US users to make payments with their cryptocurrency with the same ease as using a debit or credit card. This option became available for millions of global merchants, easily converting ethereum, bitcoin and litecoin to fiat money.

And at the beginning of 2022, a developer found stablecoin development code within the PayPal App. The discovery prompted PayPal to come forward with the admission that it was experimenting with a stablecoin of the same name. A logo image was discovered alongside the code.

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Bitcoin Crypto News Crypto Wallets South Africa

Central African Republic Teases ‘Project Sango’ Creating Crypto Hub

Just a month after making Bitcoin legal tender, the Central African Republic (CAR) is teasing another crypto initiative dubbed ‘Project Sango’. It has gone as far as publishing online plans for a ‘crypto hub’ that will include a ‘crypto island’ and a digital wallet.

A May 23 post on the government’s official Facebook page referred users to a landing page at sango.org. Users were then requested to register for the waitlist and provided with a link to a 24-page online presentation with more detail regarding the planned initiative.

The president of CAR, Faustin-Archange Touadera, did not confirm the plans, but tweeted on the weekend with the hashtag #bitcoin that the next phase would be announced “very soon”:

First Government-Recognised Legal Crypto Hub

The Sango Project, according to the presentation, entails developing “the first legal crypto hub recognised by a country’s parliament”. The country’s ambitions also include establishing a Digital Nation Bank, allowing Bitcoin land sales, and constructing a crypto wallet.

Door Opened to Natural Resources

The presentation adds that the government will facilitate crypto enterprises’ access to natural resources such as gold, diamonds and uranium, as well as implement a “citizenship by investment” program with zero-rate income and company taxes.

This news is significant as the landlocked African nations rank among the least developed economies in the world, with agriculture being the largest contributor to their gross domestic product. According to figures from the World Bank, the CAR’s economic output stood at US$2.38 billion as of 2020 and the country ranks near the bottom of the United Nations’ Human Development Index.

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Crypto Exchange Crypto Wallets Kraken Trading

‘Super Wallet’ is Coming as Crypto Exchanges Will Soon Enable Trading of Stocks

Kraken CEO Jesse Powell featured on Decrypt’s GM podcast last week, in which he stated that the US exchange is currently exploring broadening its offerings to include stocks. Powell also noted that the so-called ‘super wallet’ appears to be a common goal among many exchanges:

One Wallet, Multiple Assets

During the Decrypt podcast, Powell discussed the future of crypto wallets and the exchanges they belong to. He said that ‘super wallets’ – wallets that allow users to buy and trade varying assets, from crypto and NFTs to stocks – were in the sights of many crypto exchanges right now, with Kraken itself exploring the potential of catering to stocks:

I think we’ve said before that [stocks] are something that we’re exploring, and I think [it] makes sense to do [so].

Jesse Powell, Kraken CEO

With crypto already being offered alongside other assets by companies such as Robinhood and eToro, crypto brokerages won’t be far behind. Kraken users are already speculating on how this potential addition could unfold:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/umjq92/bitcoin_exchange_kraken_exploring_stocks_as_part/
Reddit thread on Jesse Powell’s podcast appearance

Kraken Comes to the Aid of Ukraine

Kraken has been making itself visible over the past two years via multiple company moves. The most notable of these has been its dedication to aiding fundraising for Ukraine. In March, the company announced it would be distributing over US$10 million to relief efforts in the wartorn country, along with the waiving of exchange fees for Ukrainian addresses.  

In June 2021, the company decided to re-evaluate its launch plans following the poor performance of Coinbase’s IPO, stating that a direct listing might have a long-run “dampening effect” if Kraken continued with its plans to go public.

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Blockchain Crypto News Crypto Wallets Toncoin

Telegram’s 550 Million Users Can Now Send Crypto Via Chat

Users of the instant messaging app Telegram can now easily buy, send and receive crypto in-chat using the app’s newly released wallet bot:

The wallet bot, which runs on the Telegram-designed TON blockchain, simplifies crypto transfers between Telegram users. Initially, users will be limited to transferring Toncoin (TON) only, although they will be able to purchase both TON and Bitcoin (BTC):

TON’s price gained around 18 percent following the announcement, jumping from US$1.92 to US$2.28. At the time of writing TON was holding on to most of those gains, with the price sitting at US$2.25.

Toncoin to AUD chart. Source: CoinMarketCap.com

How Does the Wallet Bot Work?

The new wallet bot allows Telegram users to buy crypto (TON or BTC) in-app using a bank card and transfer TON to other users. Once users have added the wallet bot to their attachment menu, they can use the wallet button to send TON to any user they’re chatting to. 

While the bot only allows for user-to-user transfers for now, the TON Foundation expects its functionality will expand to include consumer-to-business payments in future.

The addition of crypto transfers to Telegram follows a recent trend by social media and messaging apps towards implementing crypto payments systems. Twitter has added support for Bitcoin and Ethereum tipping in the past few months and the Meta-owned messaging app WhatsApp has been trialling crypto transfers using its new Novi wallet since December.

TON’s History with Telegram

The TON blockchain started life in 2018 as a Telegram project and was initially known as the Telegram Open Network. However, after a legal battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission over the sale of unregistered securities, Telegram gave up control of the project in 2020 to the community driven, open-source TON Foundation. In 2022, TON changed its name to The Open Network to highlight its separation from Telegram and its open-source nature.

According to the TON Foundation, the TON blockchain is designed to be a fully decentralised, ultra-fast, low-fee and environmentally friendly blockchain that can meet the needs of large-scale apps such as Telegram, which currently boasts around 550 million users.

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Crypto Wallets MetaMask Scams

MetaMask Issues Phishing Attack Security Alert for iPhone Users

Software-based crypto wallet MetaMask has warned its users on Apple devices that their assets may be at risk from an iCloud-related phishing scam. 

MetaMask tweeted out the alert on April 18, stating that users of Apple devices should ensure their Apple ID password is “strong enough” and providing instructions for disabling iCloud backups:

The alert comes after a Twitter user known as revive_dom reported losing US$650,000 of digital assets to the scam.

iCloud Stores MetaMask Seed Phrase 

The crucial vulnerability the scammers exploited is that, by default, iCloud backs up the MetaMask seed phrase and stores it digitally online. 

This means that if a MetaMask user on an Apple device hasn’t specifically turned off iCloud backups and a scammer can gain access to the user’s iCloud account, the scammer has full access to the digital assets stored in that user’s MetaMask wallet.

Classic Phishing Scam with a Twist

The details of how the scam was carried out against revive_dom were tweeted by Twitter user Serpent, who is also the founder of the NFT project DAPE: 

Essentially, the scammers raised the user’s suspicions by triggering numerous iCloud password reset attempts, which made it appear as though someone was trying to maliciously access the user’s iCloud account. 

The scammers then called the user from a spoofed number, which made them appear to be from Apple support. After the scammers established trust, the user mistakenly told them the two-factor authentication code to reset their iCloud password. The scammers then had full control of the user’s iCloud account and MetaMask wallet and stole all the user’s assets.

Scam Highlights Hot Wallet Security Risks

Most Twitter users have been supportive of revive_dom and other victims of this scam, but many have also emphasised the inherent risks of storing your assets on a hot wallet such as MetaMask and have suggested victims should have been using cold wallets such as Ledger and Trezor:

MetaMask is a popular software wallet in the Ethereum ecosystem. It has made news recently for adding a feature that allows iOS users to purchase crypto directly through the MetaMask mobile app using a debit or credit card, and for blocking users from some countries, such as Iran and Venezuela, from accessing their wallets.

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Crypto News Crypto Wallets Ethereum Hackers

US Claims North Korean Hackers Behind $625 Million Ronin Breach

North Korean hacking group Lazarus has been blamed for last month’s US$625 million exploit of Ronin Network, an Ethereum sidechain used by play-to-earn crypto game Axie Infinity.

The link was made public on April 15 when US Treasury announced it had added a new Ethereum wallet to its list of sanctions for the Lazarus Group. It’s the same wallet address that Axie Infinity creator Sky Mavis named as the Ronin attacker in late March, as confirmed by Etherscan.

18% of Stolen Funds Already Laundered

Blockchain analytics firms Chainalysis and Elliptic have corroborated that the wallet address is the same used in the Ronin exploit. Elliptic also confirmed that 18 percent of the stolen funds had already been laundered before the Easter weekend. The wallet still holds 147,753 ETH, worth about US$430 million at the time of writing.

“Identification of the wallet will make clear to other VC actors that by transacting with it, they risk exposure to US sanctions,” said a Treasury spokesperson, who added:

There may be mandatory secondary sanctions on persons who knowingly, directly or indirectly, engage in money laundering, the counterfeiting of goods or currency, bulk cash smuggling, or narcotics trafficking that supports the Government of North Korea or any senior official or person acting for or on behalf of that government.

US Treasury spokesperson

‘Critical Chokepoints’ in the War on Hackers

The spokesperson said that anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorists were “critical chokepoints” in the war on hackers, and called on the crypto industry to implement these types of safeguards.

According to a Ronin blog post, “We are still in the process of adding additional security measures before redeploying the Ronin Bridge to mitigate future risk.” Redeployment was expected before the end of this month and a full post-mortem would follow at a later date.

Since the attack, Sky Mavis announced a US$150 million funding round led by Binance to help reimburse affected users. Sky Mavis ultimately hopes to recover the stolen funds over the next two years.

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Bitcoin Crypto Exchange Crypto News Crypto Wallets Ethereum Lightning Network

Robinhood Unveils Plans to Support Lightning Payments for 2 Million Users

At this week’s Bitcoin 2022 conference, Robinhood announced the rollout of wallets to two million eligible users with further plans to integrate the Lightning Network, according to a blog post by the crypto broker.

Robinhood chief product officer Aparna Chennapragada announced that customers who have been waitlisted for the digital wallet can now send and receive cryptocurrencies. The wallet will not, however, support Ethereum-based services such as NFTs and ERC-20 tokens.

Lightning Strikes Again

The platform is also planning to integrate the Bitcoin Lightning Network to reduce the time and cost of transactions, along with their carbon footprint. It’s another win for the Lightning Network, which has grown parabolic with an additional US$70 million raised to bring stablecoins to the network earlier this month.

The wallet will not be available to users in the US states of Hawaii, Nevada and New York “due to local regulations”. Robinhood has been testing its digital wallet feature since September 2021, completing its first alpha transfer in November and launching a beta version for tens of thousands of users in January 2022.

The reaction from the Robinhood community has been mostly positive, though according to the firm’s FAQ, any NFTs or unsupported tokens sent to a Robinhood Ethereum address will be lost.