Highlights: The U.S. Secret Service takes on crypto, Mt. Gox’s creditors achieve a sizeable victory, and an update on the NANO wallet fixes.
U.S. Secret Service Asks for Congressional Action on Cryptocurrencies
Source: Forbes
The United States Secret Service asked Congress to take action on privacy coins during a hearing on virtual currency, specifically requesting “legislative or regulatory actions.” Citing the potential for illicit usage, one North Carolina representative went so far as to call misuse of cryptocurrency “one of the greatest emerging threats to U.S. national security.” While it was acknowledged that traditional financial methods still outweigh crypto in terms of illegal activity, it’s clear that top US law enforcement officials consider digital currencies a significant security issue. The language implies that government agencies are asking Congress to de-anonymize digital currency accounts (and quickly) to trace the flow of funding.
Mt. Gox to Enter Civil Rehabilitation
Source: CoinDesk
Mt. Gox will pause its ongoing bankruptcy proceedings and enter into civil rehabilitation as a result of an order issued today by the Tokyo District Court. This means that creditors seeking compensation for their losses in Bitcoin may be advantageously positioned, as now Mt. Gox’s BTC holdings will be distributed rather than sold off, and the reimbursement value will be based on BTCs price at the time it was converted to a “monetary claim” at the start of bankruptcy proceedings.
Japan Financial Watchdog Issues Business Improvement Orders to Exchanges
Source: CoinDesk
Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) announced that six licensed cryptocurrency exchanges in the nation have been issued business improvement orders as a result of recent on-site inspections. The announcement has caused at least one platform, bitFlyer, to temporarily suspend new account creations. Exchanges have until July 23rd to submit a report of updates to the FSA.
Microsoft to Track Copyrights on the Blockchain
Source: Fortune
Microsoft will partner with consulting firm EY to begin tracking copyrights and collect royalty payments for content creators. The project will address inefficiencies in the current system, which carry the now often-cited issues of middlemen and lack of transparency. Microsoft will launch the tech first in its gaming networks, with partner Ubisoft tapped to participate in implementation.
Polymath Releases TORO Core v.1.2.0
Source: Polymath
Securities token platform Polymath has released a its TORO core software to testnet. The release includes a manual approval mode for token transfers, token balance “checkpoints,” and upgradable registries. You can get a full list of the features at the source link above.
Swarm Client Software Release
Source: News BTC
Swarm, an Ethereum decentralized storage platform, has released v0.3 of its client software. It represents the third proof-of-concept release to their testnet, which is run by the Ethereum Foundation. The code has been merged into the go-ethereum repository on Github and is available for anyone wishing to run a Swarm node on the Ethereum network.
NEO Launches Open Blockchain Foundation
Source: NEO
NEO has launched its Open Blockchain Foundation, an independent research & development initiative, kicking it off with $1.8 million in unclaimed funds from the NEO Giveback Plan. It plans to donate an additional $10 to $15 million to the foundation over time.
Partnership: IOTA & SinoPac
Source: IOTA
Another day, another IOTA partnership. This time it’s SinoPac, a Taiwanese holding company, who will look to leverage the IOTA Tangle technology to aid development of a proprietary notary solution.
Zcash Developer Threatens Hard Fork Over Non-Payment
Source: CoinDesk
Zcash avoided a major potential setback this week the sole developer responsible for the creation and maintenance of the Zcash wallet for Windows threatened to hard fork the coin if he wasn’t paid for his services. In the end, it wasn’t the Zcash Foundation that paid up, but the Zcash community, who responded with donations for the developer’s work. This story raises a lot of questions. Why is only one person in complete control of such a significant network product? And more importantly... in what world is it okay not to pay your developers?
French Luxury Brand to Test CryptoKitties Tech
Source: CoinDesk
French startup Arianee will look to leverage the technology behind CryptoKitties to create “unique identities” for luxury items like handbags and watches to verify their authenticity. The startup uses a proof-of-authority consensus protocol and will lean on its advisory board, comprised of former employees in the luxury retail industry, to help drive adoption.
China, Tencent Team Up to Fight Crime
Source: CoinDesk
The Chinese government will partner with tech industry leader Tencent to “fight blockchain crime,” a phrase that should come with its own zany sound effect. The China Blockchain Security Alliance will target fraud and other security risks associated with decentralized technology.
U.S. Senate to Investigate Cryptocurrency’s Role In Elections
Source: CoinDesk
The U.S. Senate will hold a hearing on June 26, 2018 to examine whether virtual currencies have been used to improperly impact public elections. While the official title of the hearing cites “foreign interference,” domestic cryptocurrency donations to campaigns could also be investigated. Such donations have been allowed under federal law since 2014, but are strictly capped. Senator Lindsey Graham will lead the hearing.
India’s Fiat Gateway Ban Takes Effect Soon
Source: Zebpay
India’s fiat gateway bans are taking effect soon, and apparently the market has not been paying attention. As evidenced by the FAQ provided by Zebpay above, many users seem to be waiting until the very last minute to take the necessary actions to secure their funding. We’re not sure why this is coming as a surprise to anyone, as the announcement was originally made back in April. However, the case is set to be heard by the Supreme Court in the coming months, with speculation that there is a strong case against the bank.
Binance to Support VeChain Mainnet Swap
Source: Binance
Binance will support the VeChain (VEN) mainnet token swap, announced on their website today. Dates and details have not been released yet. Binance will also offer a VEN/USDT trading pair, available today.
ETC Classic Dex to Launch Saturday
Source: Twitter
The Saturn Network will launch Radex Classic, the “first decentralized exchange to support ETC,” on Saturday… or, erm, as they’ve called it, “SATURNday.” (Editor’s note: That’s a pun so bad I wouldn’t even make it. If you’re going to make a space pun, you have to planet better than that.)
FCoin Trading Four Times as Much as Binance
Source: CoinDesk
FCoin, a new cryptocurrency exchange based in China, has reportedly surpassed Binance’s trading volume by nearly 400%. FCoin has been the target of some controversy since it opened in May, mostly centered around its practice of issuing tokens to customers as a reward for using the exchange (in lieu of an airdrop or ICO). Binance’s CEO in particular has criticized the practice, saying it is in effect an ICO, and implying that such a model would potentially incentivize price manipulation to keep the token valuable.
Bank of America Holds Most Blockchain Patents
Source: Fortune
Bank of America currently holds the highest number of active blockchain patents of any other company, including IBM, Fortune reports. BoA’s CTO Catherine Bessant expressed that while the bank hasn’t leveraged the technology in any way yet, they “want to be ahead of it.” She further drew a hard line between blockchain technology and the use of digital currencies, which she characterized as “highly risky.” So… they’re hoarding the blockchain patents while dismissing the primary financial use case, which just so happens to threaten the foundation of their industry? Probably nothing to read into there.
Nano Wallet Fix
Source: Fix on Github | Our Video | Reddit | Reddit Again
Shortly after the release of the Nano wallets yesterday, Nano tweeted a warning IN ALL CAPS to users telling them not to deposit any funds in the wallets. We took a deep dive into the issue (linked in the video above), which basically boils down to a potential vulnerability in the seed generation. As of this morning, Nano has issued a v1 fix for the Android wallet and provided status updates for v2 on Reddit.
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