roadrunner

The stories covered in today’s edition of Bitcoin in Brief hail from all across the globe. In New York a major cold storage company has received a Bitlicense, in China there are new signs of crypto mania, and in Turkey bitcoin has made an appearance at a historic Istanbul market. Also Read: Etoro Is Launching an OTC Crypto Trading Desk for Institutions Xapo Receives Bitlicense The New York Department of Financial Services (DFS) has announced it granted a virtual currency license to Xapo, the company providing wallet, cold storage, and bitcoin-based debit card services estimated to hold around $10 billion worth of BTC. With the Xapo approval, DFS has in total approved eight firms for virtual currency charters or licenses. The regulator says it has conducted a comprehensive review of Xapo’s application, including the company’s anti-money laundering, anti-fraud, capitalization, consumer protection, and cybersecurity policies. According to the license, Xapo will be authorized to offer a digital wallet and a vault service, and be subject to ongoing supervision by DFS. Xapo President Ted Rogers said: “We are very pleased with the approval of Xapo’s BitLicense application. It is the end result of much hard work, not just by Xapo personnel but by the DFS and its staff.” 2000 New Chinese Crypto Foundations? If anyone really expected that the Chinese government could keep its hordes of cryptomaniac citizens out of the market, they’re due for a rude awakening. According to reports from the giant Asian economy, at least 2,000 new crypto foundations have been set up by Chinese people in offshore jurisdictions, most of these to facilitate the trade of new ICO tokens. The main hubs for this activity are said to be in places offering quick and easy registrations such as Singapore, the Cayman Islands, and Malta. The size of each such foundation is estimated to range from tens of millions to tens of billions of Chinese yuan. Would-Be Bitcoin Robbers Indicted According to media reports from the state of Georgia, a group of would-be bitcoin thieves we previously reported on has been indicted by the Superior Court of Forsyth County on charges of conspiracy to commit burglary and robbery. The five young men, Justin Ellison, Trivette Adams, Matthew Schwartz, Jacob South, and Michael McDermont, conspired to break into a local home and steal nearly $1 million in bitcoin. They were formally charged last Monday, June 11, with counts of conspiracy to commit burglary and conspiracy to commit robbery by force. Bitcoin Grand Bazaar An image posted to Reddit a few days ago shows that bitcoin is now available in one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world. A retail currency exchange shop has placed a bitcoin sign to attract the many shoppers and tourists that visit the Grand Bazaar every day. Turkey could be an ideal location for bitcoin adoption as the local fiat, the Turkish lira, has been on a downward spiral for a while now and the country is an international nexus for trade. Bitcoin accepted in 550 year old Istanbul market! from r/Bitcoin What do you think about today’s news? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi’s Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post Bitcoin in Brief Monday: From New York to Historic Istanbul Market appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

This is a paid press release, which contains forward looking statements, and should be treated as advertising or promotional material. Bitcoin.com does not endorse nor support this product/service. Bitcoin.com is not responsible for or liable for any content, accuracy or quality within the press release. The music industry’s business model has always been broken. For over 100 years artists have been paid a fraction of the earnings their music makes. Take Enrico Caruso, an Italian opera singer from the early 1900’s, credited with being one of the very first recorded artists. Over his lifetime he made over 488 recordings, almost exclusively for Victor, a record label now known as RCA and owned by Sony Music. While it is said that this made Caruso extremely rich, netting him nearly $2 million, his label scooped nearly twice that and is still making money from his recordings today. Many think the golden age of vinyl and CD’s was a time when artists were fairly compensated, but even then musicians weren’t exactly raking it in. A report suggests that, when records were still popular, of every $1,000 of albums sold, 18% went to the musicians, 63% to the record label, and 24% to distributors. Meaning each artist got a grand total of $23.40. Then along came the Internet. Times They Are A-Changin’ According to The Economist, back in 1997 Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was looking for online retail opportunities. He considered selling music, but quickly realised there were only a few major music labels, and they would have the power to stifle any online venture that presented serious competition. The first online music sharing service, Napster, bypassed the record labels altogether and facilitated free peer-to-peer sharing of compressed music files. Obviously that didn’t work out for them, and it wasn’t long before Napster found itself facing litigation from all angles. The company was closed by court order in 2001, after less than three years of operation. The Napster brand only survived because the company’s assets were liquidated and purchased by other companies through bankruptcy proceedings. Free Money So what changed to make online streaming services a viable business model for companies like Spotify and Apple Music? The answer is…. nothing. Musicians are not earning more now, despite having a new revenue channel. Spotify admits the average per-stream payout to rights holders lands somewhere between $0.006 and $0.0084. As this model shows, an artist would need to get 200k plays per month on Apple Music and 230K plays to earn the US minimum wage. Investors aren’t getting rich either. Despite a revenue growth rate of 40% a year and having 140 million monthly active users, Spotify reported a quarterly operating loss of €41 million (around $47,814,000) in May 2018. Jimmy Lovine, whose fledgling Beats Music service was acquired by Apple Music, warned last year that music streaming is not a great business and that there is no profit margin. Despite losses, executive teams still brought home the bacon. Last year Spotify’s executives earned, on average, $1.34 million each, with the top five taking home over $26 million between them. But by far the biggest winners are, unsurprisingly, the record labels. Last year the ‘big three’ made a record-breaking $14.2 million a day from streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music. The Universal Music Group alone made $4.5 million every 24 hours. So what can be done to fix this broken business model and ensure that artists receive fair compensation? Austrian producer and composer David Brandstaetter, believes he has the answer. “Streaming services pay artists pennies, partly because so much is swallowed up by the record labels. Spotify isn’t profitable, but the public won’t support a price raise,” says David, “The only way for artists and collaborators to receive fair payment for their efforts is by decentralizing the industry and taking the power out of the hands of the record labels and streaming services. Blockchain technology is the perfect enabler for this.” For the last two years, David and his business partner Dr. Sascha Dennstedt have been developing a platform called Qravity, which allows creatives to connect with each other and collectively develop and monetize original digital content. The platform uses virtual tokens on the Ethereum blockchain to track digital media creation and distribute project stakes among creative team members David continues, “Using Qravity, musicians can collaborate and work in exchange for stakes in the project. The content will go direct to market, so if a songwriter has, for example, a 30% stake in the project, he receives 30% of the revenue every time his songs are streamed or downloaded.” The platform contains a comprehensive suite of project management and communication tools to help creatives collaborate remotely; it also rewards them with a greater stake in projects as they complete each milestone. “We want to completely overhaul the entire industry,” says David, “With Qravity, we’re transferring the power and profits from the executives to the talent, transparently and equitably.” Get QCO during the Qravity token sale. Presale with 30% bonus: July 2-16, 2018. To learn more, visit www.qravity.com, read the Qravity white paper, or join the discussion in the Qravity Telegram group. Contact Email Address marketing@qravity.com Supporting Link http://qravity.com/ This is a paid press release. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the promoted company or any of its affiliates or services. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in the press release. The post ​PR: Musicians Have Always Been Ripped off – Qravity Wants to Fix It appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

In recent regulatory news, the Shapeshift co-founder and chief operating officer, has given a damning appraisal of the current regulatory climate surrounding cryptocurrencies in the United States. The president of Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, Felix Hufeld, has indicated that the principal concern of German regulators regarding cryptocurrency will be seeking to ensure financial stability, rather than concerns pertaining to individual investors. The U.K’s Financial Conduct Authority has published an open letter to the CEO’s of businesses offering “services related to cryptoassets” regarding financial crime risks associated with virtual currencies. Also Read: EOS Has Issues Shapeshift Co-Founder Says U.S. Cryptocurrency Regulations are Worsening Following the passing of Bill 5031 in Washington and New York, which demands that cryptocurrency exchanges provide regulators with customer information and trading data, Shapeshift has emerged as one of the most vocal critics of the new, and the current direction in which U.S. cryptocurrency regulations are heading. In a recent interview, Jon, Shapeshift’s co-founder and COO, stated “I would say in the US it’s actually gotten worse […] especially in the last 6 months. I think the explosion of value in 2017 brought a lot of these regulators into the space and made them more concerned. Most of them don’t understand what the heck it (cryptocurrency) is, but they want to control it.” Jon also accused regulators of failing to “give clarity,” stating “all these companies and lawyers and lobbyists are left to read the regulatory tea-leaves […] Nobody knows what the rules are and everyone’s just left to figure it out, that’s a dangerous place to be.” Jon described decentralized exchanges as comprising a form of resistance to the current regulatory climate on the part of the cryptocurrency community. Of decentralized exchanges, the Shapeshift COO stated, “I think it’s a lesson to the smart regulators in the space that if they don’t work with companies, they’ll push things that way, and it’ll become harder and harder for them to have an impact in the space. The more regulators push hard, the more things become unregulatable.” Jon concluded by advocating a collective approach among companies in the cryptocurrency sector to push for a more amenable regulatory apparatus, stating that he hopes “more and more of the crypto companies do band together to help educate the regulators in the space and try to work together to do something productive.” German Crypto Regulations Will Strive for Financial Stability, Not Protection of Individual Investors Felix Hufeld, the President of Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory (BaFin), recently delivered a speech addressing cryptocurrencies, in which he emphasized the regulator’s primary intention as being preserving financial stability, rather than issues concerning individual investors. According to a rough translation, Mr. Hufield stated “We will not be able to protect every single investor from his fate, and that can not be the task of state supervision. Once again, the maxim is that we must act on a prudent or regulatory basis if financial stability as a whole is threatened.” Overall, Mr. Hufield spoke favorably of cryptocurrency and distributed ledger technology, stating that he “consider the applications that start where there is a lack of effective control mechanisms or trustworthy institutions to be promising. Among other things in foreign trade or development aid, Blockchain’s promise of confidence and efficiency in cryptography and immutability may prove beneficial.” U.K. FCA Publishes Open Letter to CEOs of Businesses Offering “Services Related to Cryptoassets The United Kingdom Financial Conduct Authority has published an open letter to the CEOs of businesses that offer services pertaining to virtual currencies seeking to warn of the financial crime risks associated with cryptocurrencies. The letter asserts that whilst “There are many non-criminal motives for using cryptoassets [..] this class of product can also be abused because it offers potential anonymity and the ability to move money between countries,” advocating that businesses “take reasonable and proportionate measures to lessen the risk of [firms] facilitating financial crimes which are enabled by cryptoassets.” Said measures include “developing staff knowledge and expertise on cryptoassets,” and “ensuring that existing financial crime frameworks adequately reflect the crypto-related activities which the firm is involved in.” Mohammed Adil Siddiqui, compliance professional & founder of The CFD Trading & Compliance Forum, commented on the letter, stating, “The FCA’s recent notice to banks and financial institutions servicing the cryptocurrency sector comes as no surprise, it’s typical of the regulator‘s approach when things are getting from bad-to-worse. Despite the global regulatory framework around virtual currencies gaining prominence, there are fundamental weaknesses that the watchdog finds uneasy, namely ‘source of funds’. With cryptos, the possibilities to circulate funds from lands few and far between is as easy buying milk, and banks, exchanges and the wider market must act swiftly. The CFD Trading & Compliance Forum welcomes the guidance note and expects regulators to take more stringent & drastic actions by way of legislation to ensure that preventative measures are applied pre-the-use of these innovative financial instruments. And banks, that have questionable or suspicious transactions should carry out the appropriate checks as earliest as possible to maintain confidence and reduce the possibility of financial crime and inefficient activities distorting the marketplace.” Do you agree with Shapeshift’s appraisals of the current regulatory climate in United States? Join the discussion in the comments section below! Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Shapeshift Want a comprehensive list of the top 500 cryptocurrencies and see their prices and overall market valuation? Check out Satoshi Pulse for all that hot market action! The post Regulation Round-Up: Shapeshift COO Says U.S. Regulations Worsen, Germany to Protect Financial Stability not Individual Investors appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

As the South Korean government steps up its anti-money laundering (AML) oversight, major crypto exchanges in the country are voluntarily complying while banks are reportedly failing to meet the guidelines for compliance. South Korea has also been discussing ways to boost crypto-related AML measures with the U.S. Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space Government Concerned About Bank’s AML Compliance South Korea’s AML directives currently do not apply to cryptocurrency exchanges directly. The government has made banks responsible for monitoring and reporting any crypto-related money laundering activities. In an effort to comply with the country’s AML directives, most major South Korean banks have been adding compliance officers. NH Nonghyup Bank, for example, “recently created an independent unit exclusively to handle compliance-related issues,” the Korea Times reported on Friday, adding that the bank increased the number of its employees working in that unit from 16 to 23. Nonetheless, the Joongang Daily noted on Saturday: Despite the effort, Korea’s financial watchdog, the Financial Supervisory Service [FSS], warned that the bank has not sufficiently improved its internal control system. Collaborating with the US South Korea has also been collaborating with the U.S. to boost AML measures relating to cryptocurrencies. The Korea Times described: U.S. Treasury Secretary Sigal Mandelker has discussed with FSC Vice Chairman Kim Yong-beom how to boost anti-money-laundering measures especially related to crypto-assets in addition to international cooperation measures. However, the U.S. has found Korean banks’ AML measures to be inadequate. South Korea’s top financial regulator, the Financial Services Agency (FSC), said Friday that the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) “has notified the financial regulator of its plan to investigate Korean banks [with operations in New York] that are suspected of failing to meet compliance guidelines.” The U.S. regulator has already fined Nonghyup Bank $11 million “for inadequate control and a compliance system against money laundering,” the Joongang Daily conveyed, adding that the NYDFS “will start probes into six Korean banks operating in New York either by the end of this month or next month.” They are “Nonghyup Bank, Woori Bank, KB Kookmin Bank, Shinhan Bank and two state-run banks – the Industrial Bank of Korea and the Korea Development Bank,” the publication detailed, elaborating: Since penalties from the New York DFS would damage the reputation of Korea’s financial industry in general, local financial regulators are also working to encourage the banks to strengthen their control and compliance systems. The list includes banks that are providing real-name services to crypto exchanges: Nonghyup Bank, Shinhan Bank, and the Industrial Bank of Korea. They are responsible for ensuring that the crypto accounts they service are AML compliant. Crypto Exchanges Voluntarily Complying In South Korea, the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) is responsible for money laundering prevention and illegal fund flows, including terrorist financing. The FIU collaborates with the FSS to ensure that banks are adhering to AML rules. Both agencies report to the FSC. Crypto exchanges are currently not directly regulated by the FIU or the FSS, but the regulators have proposed bringing them under the two agencies’ jurisdiction. Meanwhile, the largest crypto exchanges in the country are voluntarily upgrading their AML and internal control systems. Bithumb has blocked 11 countries from using its platform and reduced withdrawal limits for accounts that are not using the real-name system. The Kakao-backed Upbit has adopted Thomson Reuters’ system for the same purpose. 23 crypto exchanges have also agreed to comply with the self-regulation standards set by the Korean Blockchain Industry Association. What do you think of how the South Korean government, banks, and crypto exchanges handle AML measures? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock, NYDFS, and the Korea Times. Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section. The post As Korean Crypto Exchanges Step Up AML Compliance, Banks Are Failing appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Just recently news.Bitcoin.com reported on the unique Electron Cash wallet alongside using the Cashshuffle plugin. Two weeks ago we were granted access to the Electron Cash iOS beta testing period, and we wanted to give our readers a sneak peek at what to expect when this bitcoin cash-centric light client launches. Also Read: How to Shuffle Your BCH Coins Like a Boss Electron Cash Is Coming to iOS The Electron Cash wallet is a reputable bitcoin cash (BCH) wallet that’s been around for quite some time. At the moment the client is available for Mac, Linux, Windows, and Android for mobile phones. However, the wallet’s development team and lead developer Jonald Fyookball are in the midst of building the Electron Cash application for iOS users. Fyookball has allowed news.Bitcoin.com access to the beta testing using Apple’s Testflight system so we could experiment with the wallet, and share our experience with our readers. Experimenting With Beta Version 3.2.0 on Testflight When opening the wallet users are greeted by a neon-blue like screen that says Electron Cash, from here the user can choose a few options when they launch the app for the first time. The choices given are the usual create new wallet, import an existing seed, or use existing public or private keys. We created a new wallet and the Electron Cash iOS interface gave us a new twelve-word mnemonic phrase to write down. After finishing writing the seed down, the wallet asks you to re-type all twelve words, but it doesn’t take too long because words are predicted and easily-tappable after a few letters are typed. You also encrypt the wallet with a password, and are given the option to name it as well. Remember your password and mnemonic phrase give you access to your funds, and keeping them a secret is a top priority. The Electron Cash iOS app always asks you for your password whenever you open it or if you want to sign an outgoing transaction. In the wallet interface there are five main settings which include wallets, addresses, coins, contacts, and the settings section. The wallet section is basically the main page you are greeted with after entering your password. It shows the name of the wallet(s) and you can toggle to different wallets in the first field on the top of the page. The page will also show you all the transactions that have occurred for that specific wallet. On the very top, there is a blue banner with a green light indicating the client is synced up and online. If it was red this would indicate the wallet is not online and synced to the BCH network. Moving on to the addresses page it will show a bunch of addresses both used and unused. You can toggle between funded addresses and unfunded addresses, alongside if they are receiving or change addresses as well. The Electron Cash wallet allows users to create contacts by utilizing an individual or organizations’ address so you can easily send funds to any recurring contact. The coins area shows BCH transactions that have been sent or received but are not yet confirmed. The Electron Cash Wallet Has Numerous Adjustable Settings The wallet’s settings section is where you can make a bunch of changes to the wallet, like change your password, and view your mnemonic phrase if you needed to see it again. In the settings, the Electron Cash iOS client has an address converter so a person can change a legacy address into the Cashaddr format. This section also offers a variety of features like the ability to change the fee to max static or the user can choose a custom fee. Below that where it says transactions, you can choose to utilize change addresses, multiple change addresses, and whether or not the wallet will spend only confirmed coins. Following this section, you can change the appearance, choose what block explorer you want to use. From here users can also set the fiat settings so you can view the value of coins in USD, EUR, and many other monetary units. The wallet works very well for being in its beta (3.2.0) testing phase and Electron Cash users will be sure to enjoy this wallet. There were a few occasions where it was difficult to remove the keyboard and view the lower fields on the screen in the earlier versions we tried prior to the 3.2.0 upgrade released just the other day. Since then we’ve found the app works like a charm, and haven’t found any difficulties using it. The Electron Cash developers have also been looking for testers on the subreddit /r/BTC over the past few weeks in order to get feedback. What do you think about the Electron Cash wallet for iOS? Let us know your thoughts on this subject in the comment section below. Images via Shutterstock, Electron Cash, and Jamie Redman. Want a comprehensive list of the top 500 cryptocurrencies and see their prices and overall market valuation? Check out Satoshi Pulse for all that hot market action! The post An Inside Look at the Electron Cash Wallet Coming to iOS appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

While the major banks are taking their time with offering OTC crypto trading, new entrants to the space are stepping up to fill the void. Social investing platform Etoro, which focuses mainly on retail traders, is now expanding into the institutional segment with a new cryptocurrency offering. Also Read: This Week in Bitcoin: An End to 51% Attacks and Who Controls Bitcoin? New Crypto Trading Desk for Hedge Funds Etoro, which recently announced that it is expanding into the US with ten cryptocurrencies, is reportedly setting up an over-the-counter (OTC) trading desk in London for institutions wishing to trade on cryptocurrencies. The platform is connected to fifteen cryptocurrency exchanges from which to pool liquidity and is also said to be planning to launch one by itself. The move is explained as answering demands from hedge fund owners who expressed interest in experimenting with crypto trading. “We are launching an OTC desk for institutions. We’ve seen more and more interest from corporates and institutions,” CEO Yoni Assia told Business Insider. “We’ve actually set up our corporate team here in the UK to start setting up accounts to trade on eToro. We’ve announced that we’re launching the exchange as well so, between the exchange and the OTC desk, we’re also starting to serve more potential institutions and financial institutions.” The Growing Institutional OTC Crypto Market Institutional OTC desks help big players whose massive transactions might move the markets if they were done in the open. And trading outside popular exchanges can also be seen as risk management, for trying to avoid losing funds in the case of another exchange hacking incident. In the US, Circle Financial and Cumberland Mining operate OTC crypto services and Goldman Sachs was reported to be in the process of entering the field, although its CEO has denied the rumors. Additionally, JP Morgan and Fidelity are said to be assessing a move into the space. In the UK, Barclays was reported as supposedly considering launching a crypto trading desk back in April. And financial industry insiders, like David Mercer the CEO of LMAX, which recently launched a physical crypto exchange dedicated to institutional clients, expect UK banks would eventually join the market next year. In the meanwhile, big players have also set up their own private network for OTC trading, buying and selling billions every month among themselves via Skype. “I think there is growing institutional demand and interest of public investors to understand whether they can join the party,” Etoro CEO Assia said. “That is something we definitely see out there. We see more and more public market players and big banks who are interested in this space and feel left out because they’re not allowed to invest in crypto or ICOs.” Are London banks in risk of losing hedge fund to new trading desks if they won’t support cryptocurrency? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post Etoro Is Launching an OTC Crypto Trading Desk for Institutions appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

A village in Japan has announced its decision to launch an initial coin offering in order to secure funds for creating a sustainable region. This will be the first time in Japan for a municipality to use a token sale to raise funds. Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space Local Government Launching ICO A village in Japan has decided to issue an initial coin offering (ICO) which it describes as “Japan’s first decision to issue a regional ICO by a local government.” Nishiawakura Village is in Okayama Prefecture, which is located in the southern part of Japan’s Honshu island. The prefecture is largely known for its rural landscapes, feudal castles and art museums. With 95% of the area covered in forest, the village has a population of approximately 1,500. In the early 2000s, the village refused to merge with Mimasaka City when municipalities nationwide consolidated, wanting to remain economically independent. According to the village’s announcement: In order to promote the creation of a sustainable region in the future, as a means for small local governments to secure new financing resources and to build up regions through upfront investment, tokens issuance, and the creation of virtual currencies, we will introduce fundraising through an ICO for the first time as a municipality in Japan. Village’s Coins The village’s tokens will be called Nishiawakura Coin (NAC) and will be issued by the Nishiawakura Village Token Economy Association. The NAC coins will carry voting rights which allow their holders to participate in decision making relating to local ventures, the village explained. “We plan to advance according to the revised fund settlement law…in line with the self-regulation rules on the management and finance by the Japan Virtual Currency Exchange Industry Association,” according to the announcement. This industry association was established in April and consists of 16 government-approved crypto exchanges. The revised fund settlement law went into effect in Japan last year, legalizing crypto as a means of payment. The village added: The funds procured will carry out business development, etc. in collaboration with Nishiawakura Village, and will develop a sustainable community. Currently, Japan has no specific law for ICOs, but the regulators have recently been discussing a specific regulatory framework for them. In February, the country’s top financial regulator, the Financial Services Agency (FSA), issued a warning to an unregistered ICO for allegedly conducting business without a license. What do you think of this Village in Japan launching an ICO? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Okayama-iju, Turns, and Nishiawakura Village. Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section. The post This Village Decided to Launch Japan’s First Municipal ICO appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The EOS mainnet is less than a week old but already the much-vaunted blockchain has ran into a spate of issues ranging from the minor to the critical. Teething problems with new blockchains are to be expected, but the numeracy of these, coupled with a series of other anomalies, have had EOS critics scratching their heads and developers on the defensive. Also read: Satoshi Nakamoto Known to CIA? FBI? Created by NSA? Search Intensifies There’s Never a Dull Day in EOS Land The EOS soap opera has made for compelling viewing in recent weeks. The level of hype and funds invested in the project meant a soft launch was never going to be possible. Satoshi appears to have launched bitcoin alone, with zero fanfare and the world oblivious. EOS, on the other hand, has launched following a year-long $4 billion raise, having excited half of the crypto community and the alarmed the other half. The most recent issue was a bug which caused block production to stop over the weekend, forcing a conference call between Block.one, EOS’ developers, and the 21 block producers tasked with running the network. The cause of the problem appears to have been an error in the latest build, obliging EOS to resort to an earlier version of the code. This raises the question of how much testing is being performed on new code; it looks like Block.one is issuing updates that have not been thoroughly tested, forcing them to fix problems as they occur on the mainnet. Features, Bugs, and Anomalies While unfortunate, bugs are to be expected when an entirely new blockchain launches, and bitcoin and ethereum weren’t without their issues in the early days either. But there are troublesome aspects of EOS that are there by design, and whose presence is harder to explain. There’s the high amount of tokens that must be staked by developers, for instance, in order to run EOS dapps. The amount payable ranges according to the amount of network resources the dapp requires. Had Crypto Kitties been running on EOS at the height of the dapp’s popularity, it’s been suggested that the amount of tokens required to operate it would have ran into the millions of dollars. And then there’s the complexity of creating an EOS wallet. Creating an account calls for obtaining the assistance of an existing account-holder. Without their input, it’s impossible for any newcomer to join the EOS ecosystem. In time, EOS dapps should make account creation easier, but until then, the public blockchain operates more like a closed system, with participants reliant on the support of other EOS holders to get the ball rolling. Attaining the 15% quorum of votes to launch the network also proved to be a sticking point. Token holders were required to vote via a process that included entering their private keys. Due to the risk of being tricked by fake EOS dapps, most token holders chose not to vote, leaving the voting process stuck for days at below the 15% threshold. EOS Oddities Have Failed to Dampen Market Enthusiasm Despite all the drama, glitches, and oddities of EOS, the market has remained bullish on Dan Larimer’s blockchain. With so many token holders invested in the project, the community is willing EOS to succeed no matter what, and no amount of negativity – or FUD as the acronym goes – will be allowed to prevail. Even when a major bug was discovered in EOS prior to launch, followed by the hasty creation of a bounty program and the discovery of several more bugs, the market shrugged the problems off. The enthusiasm for all things EOS can partially be attributed to the need for a fast and scalable blockchain. Even the network’s most ardent supporters will concede that EOS isn’t perfect, but given the alternatives – a sluggish ethereum and a handful of untested and unused blockchains – there seems little choice but to pray Block.one can prevail. With each passing drama, the pro and anti EOS brigades become more firmly entrenched in their positions. No other blockchain in the history of cryptocurrency has proven to be so polarizing. Whatever the future holds for EOS, it certainly won’t be dull. Do you think EOS can shrug off these early setbacks and overtake ethereum as the number one blockchain for dapps? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock, and Twitter. Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section. The post EOS Has Issues appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

This article is my advice on how reasonable people can have a public discussion that is strong enough to avoid being derailed by trolls, no matter who they are. I believe the key is the conviction that if there were such a thing as a reasonable public discussion, everyone else would depend on the conclusions that it arrived at. Thus, everyone taking part in the discussion will tend to prefer to follow the rules over anything that might serve a conflicting interest. Also read: Markets Update: SEC Adds a Brief Market Spike — But Will It Last? If you are someone who prefers the Reasonable Network, then you are looking for people who also prefer the Reasonable Network. You must look at what they prefer and see that they prefer to be reasonable. You don’t need to bug him or manipulate him. You just have to let him show you that he prefers reason. I am not going to define precisely what I think reasonableness is because I would want people to develop their reasonableness test based on everything they know rather than just what is in this article. However, I will say that I think that a person’s ability to repeat an intellectual position to his discussion partner is a test that is so easy to administer and evaluate, and simultaneously such a good indicator that I recommend it as the first step in any evaluation of another person’s reasonableness. You, of course, don’t want to waste people’s time, especially your own, so I think you should be able to find the best one-sentence version of your position and look for people who appear to be capable of reporting your position back to you. He does not have to get everything right, but you should believe that he is interested in getting it right. I think it is good to let a person talk for a bit after you give them your test and see if they say anything on their own that shows that they have understood basic things about it. If they do not do this, I think that there is nothing wrong with asking them to repeat your position back to you, just to make sure they got it. Someone who is good at discussions may do this without being prompted because he knows he can’t possibly have a reasonable discussion without understanding the basics of the other person’s position. “He does not have to get everything right, but you should believe that he is interested in getting it right.” No matter who you are and what you think, it is relatively easy to see whether someone can correctly repeat back what someone else said, if such an event were recorded publically. Furthermore, I think it is hard to argue that there is anything unfair about my reasonableness test and it is easy for you to argue publicly that someone has passed it. Remember, we are talking about a public discussion, so everything that is said should be something that can potentially have a lot of attention drawn on it. You want to be able to behave according to rules that you can defend later, in case anything that you do attracts attention. I believe that my reasonableness test is something that people with many divergent viewpoints could agree on, if they all wanted to have a reasonable discussion. It is easy to show that someone has passed the test, but there are many reasons that someone might fail it. I would say that it is hard to show that someone has genuinely failed the test, or in other words, shown that they are uninterested in a reasonable discussion or unable to have one. Someone who does not pass the test is not necessarily someone who does not want a reasonable discussion. I think it is important to differentiate between people who cannot pass the test and people who simply have not. People can have many reasons to choose not to pass your reasonableness test. You must pass their reasonableness test at the same time as they are passing yours, so if you won’t say anything that demonstrates a grasp of whatever they have said to you, they might not bother to say anything. I think the reasonableness test should be based on what people have actually said in the current conversation and they should not expect one another to be familiar with who they are or their prior work as part of the reasonableness test. This ensures that both people are engaging with one another regardless of who they are. On the other hand, someone who makes the same mistake several times in a row and who does not correct his version of your position after you have given him feedback about his response is someone who doesn’t want a reasonable discussion. If he failed because he is stupid, then you don’t need to talk to him anymore. If he failed because he is a troll, then you might see some variety and inventiveness in his failures. In that case, he is testing you to see how easily you can tell that he is a troll. I think it is ok, if you feel like it, to engage with trolls who have a sense of humor, but they should be doing at least something that you find entertaining, and if not, you should not let yourself respond to any of their lures. “It may be necessary to prove that you are a troll before you can begin to assess another person’s reasonableness.” A troll who is failing your test in a way that is a very obvious joke is telling you that there is something wrong with your reasonableness test. For example, let’s say that some ideology or religion has taken over your brain to the degree that you have forgotten how to evaluate other people for reasonableness, then a joke may be a way of drawing your attention to some way that you are excluding thinking people from your network. For example, perhaps your reasonableness test is too big. I think that you should not expect people to have to repeat more than a one-sentence version of your position, and if you are in an ideology or religion, it is often impossible to explain your position in one sentence. On the other hand, in the event of an environment in which there is a lot of thought-control, in other words, there is social punishment for expressing certain ideas, then it may be necessary to prove that you are a troll before you can begin to assess another person’s reasonableness. You want to be talking to someone first who is able to play with social conventions and who is creative with the way that he expresses forbidden thoughts as jokes or in terms that are cryptic so that few will notice. Someone who deliberately fails your test in a way that is not an obvious joke is a suspicious person. There is a bootstrapping problem with the reasonableness network because you cannot reliably pick out reasonable people from a crowd. In a good network where people were genuinely reasonable, you would expect the most prominent people to be reasonable. Unfortunately, you cannot depend on this. I believe it is necessary to be able to pick out reasonable people from a crowd, independent of whether they are prominent. In public, anyone can transmit anything and there can be very loud signals that do not contain a high originality. You must have something that filters people based on what you can see about them publicly, even if it is not a direct test of reasonableness. You, conversely, should want to be someone who is easily identified as someone who wants to have a reasonable discussion. So you need to transmit a signal that will attract reasonable people to you. Since reasonable people cannot depend on having any shared ideas that will always stand out in a crowd, I think the best signal of reasonableness is the ability to stand out itself. You should be someone who can stand out in any crowd, not just the one you’re in. In other words, just be some kind of individual. In an environment in which there is a lot of ‘group-think’ and in which individuality is punished, it is easy to design a signal that goes against the crowd. You may have to endure some social punishment to transmit it, but you can try to come up with something that goes over most people’s heads. I think that you just need to believe that having a reasonable discussion is more important than the disapproval of people who don’t want one. I think it is ok if you just want to play some goofy character and you don’t show yourself directly. You just have to be an individual. I would argue that the ability to go against the crowd is the purest signal of intelligence because it involves identifying a class of behaviors and abstracting something about it. If you are looking at a crowd that’s very unfamiliar to you, then someone who is going against the crowd is the signal that an intelligent person could make which would most easily stand out to you. If you are looking at a crowd and it appears that there are many individuals and you can’t tell who the best contrarian is, then that is a sign that you are looking at a crowd of intelligent people who are able to have a reasonable discussion. If a crowd appears to be many people moving together, then a contrarian among them should be easy to identify. “If you are looking at a crowd that’s very unfamiliar to you, then someone who is going against the crowd is the signal that an intelligent person could make which would most easily stand out to you.” A connection in the reasonable network is valuable because once it exists, it is not easy to replace. Thus, you must be someone who can identify signals of reasonableness and maintain good relationships with such signals, no matter where you see them. The only thing that keeps you in the reasonable network is your ability to be reasonable. You have to learn to prefer rational discussions to feeling like you have won the argument or to feeling like you want to be a celebrity, or from whatever other motivation you might have for engaging in the discussion. In the reasonable network, there is nothing wrong with the existence of celebrities or with wanting to be a celebrity or any kind of important person that you want. It is necessary to withhold judgment somewhat about celebrities whom you have not interacted with. If you do talk to any, you need to get your own sense of how reasonable they really are. The best way to become a celebrity in the reasonable network is to show people that you prefer reasonableness over being personally important. I think that someone who were to think about the problem that I have attempted to solve here would come up with a roughly similar solution. Therefore, I think that the reasonable network exists already. In fact, it exists everywhere, throughout all ages in history. You just have to find it. Steps for finding the reasonable network: Express individuality (may require trolling) Prefer other people who are expressing individuality when you open discussions. Prefer what you learn from other people you know who have passed your reasonableness test to what you learn from anyone who transmits information without interacting with you. People you have not met but who appear to be able to pass the reasonableness test publicly should be preferred as sources of information over those who do not. What do you think about having a public conversation strong enough to derail trolls? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comment section below. This is an Op-ed article. The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own. Bitcoin.com does not endorse nor support views, opinions or conclusions drawn in this post. Bitcoin.com is not responsible for or liable for any content, accuracy or quality within the Op-ed article. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the content. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any information in this Op-ed article. Images via Shutterstock, and Pixabay. Why not keep track of the price with one of Bitcoin.com’s widget services. The post The Reasonable Network appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The cybercrime combating unit of the Ukrainian police has uncovered a network of fraudulent crypto trading websites. Four people are suspected of offering the fake online exchange services. They have maintained at least six platforms luring cryptocurrency traders with deceptive messages. Also read: Survey: 13% of Net-Savvy Ukrainians Own Cryptocurrencies Police on the Lookout for More Fake Exchangers Officers from Ukraine’s Cyberpolice have exposed an organized group of scammers who created a network of fake online exchangers offering conversion of cryptocurrencies. According to a press release issued by the National Police, a number of sites have been used to deceive and defraud unsuspecting citizens who wanted to trade their cryptos. “The criminal group consisted of four people […] possessing specialized knowledge and skills in programming,” the NPU’s press service said. They had set up their own CMS-system to manage the websites’ content. The platforms imitated the activities of legitimate online cryptocurrency exchangers, supporting multicurrency conversion, and even displayed fictitious positive ratings and reviews. The victims were invited to transfer their money to digital wallets registered with forged identification documents under false names of foreign citizens. After receiving some funds through a particular platform, the scammers would close it and open a new one, law enforcement officials explained. So far, Ukrainian police have found at least six fake websites: moneycraft.info, swapex.net, myexchanger.lv, iconvex.net, likechange.biz, and wowex.online, Financial Club reports. Most have been taken down already, with one now redirecting to sites with pornographic content. Investigators believe there are more undiscovered websites and have asked the public to report suspicious platforms to rv@cybercrime.gov.ua. Three of the suspects, aged between 20 and 26 years, have been implicated directly in the six established fraud schemes. They are all residents of the city of Dnepropetrovsk. The police have opened criminal proceedings against them under Section 3 of Article 190 (Fraud) of Ukraine’s Criminal Code. Officers have already conducted authorized searches at the addresses of the suspects. They have seized computer equipment, including flash drives, as well as bank cards and mobile phones that were used by the scammers. The Cyberpolice unit is currently studying the identified websites to determine the size of the fraud. Ukraine’s Booming Crypto Trade In the last couple of years, Ukraine has been experiencing a growing interest in cryptocurrencies with a rising trend in crypto trading volume. According to the latest reports, the estimated daily crypto-hryvnia turnover on the three major Ukrainian exchanges, Exmo, Kuna and BTC Trade UA, reaches $1.9 – $2 million USD (~$700 million, yearly). The total is likely to be even higher, as at least eighteen other trading platforms and more than 4,000 individual traders are believed to provide exchange services, both online and offline. A recently conducted survey found that 72 percent of Internet-savvy Ukrainians know what cryptocurrency is and another 23 percent have heard about it. At least 13 percent of those using the world wide web possess digital coins, the poll confirmed. A number of Ukrainian officials have declared owning digital assets on their tax returns. According to a new report titled “Green Book: Cryptocurrency Market Regulation”, Ukraine is among the top 10 countries in the world in terms of number of cryptocurrency users, while local companies have created 25 new digital coins, raising $132 million in less than two years. Cryptocurrencies, however, and the fintech industry as a whole, remain largely unregulated. Three draft laws have been introduced in the Rada since October, with no real progress so far. These are the bill “On the Circulation of Cryptocurrency in Ukraine”, the law “On Stimulating the Market of Cryptocurrencies and Their Derivatives”, and a supplementary draft amending the tax code to cover crypto incomes and profits. Multiple government officials and institutions have insisted on adopting proper crypto regulations, and Ukraine’s Cyberpolice is one of them. In January, the cybercrime combating department shared its concerns about cryptocurrencies and called on the government to either ban them or legalize them “as soon as possible.” Do you think regulations can effectively ban fraudulent platforms and support legitimate exchanges? Share your thoughts on the subject in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Financial Club, National Police of Ukraine. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi’s Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com The post Six Fake Crypto Exchange Sites Busted by Ukraine’s Cyberpolice appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

This week we reported about a suggested solution to 51% attacks, a hacked exchange that was blamed for tanking the market and a cannabis-themed cryptocurrency bringing peace to the world. We also learned, in this week’s most commented-on article, who really controls Bitcoin and why it won’t become a global currency, according to the CEO of Ripple. Also Read: Get Them While You Can Gamers, Graphics Cards Prices Have Crashed Hack Takes a Toll on Crypto Markets The big news on Monday was another hacked South Korean crypto exchange. While the figures stolen were much smaller than past events and the trading venue involved much lesser known, the incident was widely blamed for the drops across the markets due to its timing. The alleged hacker stole $19.5 million in NPXS, $13.8 million of Aston X, $5.8 million in tokens of Dent, over $1.1 million of Tron, and at least five other tokens, all from Coinrail exchange users. Other subjects covered include a hospital where you can pay with tokens and a “blockchain” based cultural center established by a gangster. POT Prevents Nuclear Armageddon The main topic on Tuesday was Potcoin getting global exposure on the back of the nuclear summit in Singapore. The cryptocurrency has been sponsoring the trips of Dennis Rodman to North Korea for a while now and as two of the basketball star’s friends, Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un, met to discuss peace, POT was able to get into the limelight of this histrionic event. Additional stories covered in Tuesday’s edition of Bitcoin in Brief included Coinbase’s plans for adding support for Ethereum Classic (ETC) and the intentions of Binance to enable euro transactions later this year. Explosive Vote in Crypto Valley On Wednesday, we reported that authorities in the Swiss city of Zug will ask local residents to participate in a non-binding “blockchain-based” vote later this month. The experiment will be held between June 25 and July 1, when residents will be able to vote via their smartphones. They will be asked if they are in favor of fireworks during a festival, and whether they think digital IDs should be used to borrow books from the library, pay parking fees, and more. In other serious news from the country, representatives of Switzerland’s financial, technological, academic and legal sectors have formed the Capital Markets and Technology Association (CMTA) to facilitate the use of blockchain in financial markets. Thomson Reuters Expands Crypto Tracking On Thursday, it was reported that Thomson Reuters had expanded the market data for the top 100 cryptocurrencies in its sentiment data offerings. The service is provided in cooperation with Marketpsych Data LLC, a leader in quantitative behavioral science. The new Marketpsych Indices package uses machine learning and natural language processing to measure emotional and topical items across news and social media sites that may drive market participant behavior in cryptocurrency markets. It monitors more than 2,000 global news and 800 social media platforms in real-time. An End to 51% Attacks? An important story, which has implications for all Proof of Work coins, was covered on Friday. In a new whitepaper, the Zencash team proposes changing Satoshi Consensus, also known as the longest chain rule, to a method that makes it “both technically infeasible and economically disastrous to attempt double spending.” ZEN aims to achieve this by introducing a penalty “in the form of a block acceptance delay in the amount of time the block has been hidden from the public network.” The team now hopes that other PoW coins will adopt this proposal with a view to mitigating further 51% attacks. Crypto Behind Bars An interesting story published on Saturday talked about a new cryptocurrency designed to be used by prison inmates. Prisoners will be able to use the crypto through kiosks that will be installed in the prisons as part of the project. This will allow them to spend their coins in the prison commissary, cover court costs and fees, pay other inmates, and receive money from friends and family. Each user will have a digital wallet to store their funds. Transactions will be made in real time and at minimal fees, Cellblocks claimed. Bitcoin Controlled by China? The most commented-on article during the week covered the claims by Ripple CEO, Brad Garlinghouse, that BTC has no hope of being a world currency and is controlled by China. “A number of prominent people,” he said, “even Steve Wozniak, has said that he sees a world where Bitcoin is the primary currency. I think that’s absurd. I don’t think that any major economy will allow that to happen. By the way, it doesn’t make sense.” Garlinghouse added: “I’ll tell you another story that is underreported, but worth paying attention to. Bitcoin is really controlled by China. There are four miners in China that control over 50% of Bitcoin. How do we know that China won’t intervene? How many countries want to use a Chinese-controlled currency? It’s just not going to happen.” Has the Ripple CEO given an impartial analysis? Add your say to the discussion. This Week in Bitcoin Podcast Catch the rest of this week’s news in the This Week in Bitcoin podcast with host Matt Aaron. What other stories in the Bitcoin world caught your attention this week? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post This Week in Bitcoin: An End to 51% Attacks and Who Controls Bitcoin? appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The “request has been rejected,” came response from the CIA, “with the agency stating that it can neither confirm nor deny the existence of the requested documents.” A tech writer petitioned ‘the agency’ to see what it had on the subject of Satoshi Nakamoto, the name credited with founding Bitcoin, the world’s first decentralized cryptocurrency. There have been legendarily famous attempts to unmask the real person, only to find more paradox, more confusion, more wild theories. At least two online journalists believe a definitive answer just might be had through US intelligence agencies. The evidence borders on compelling and infuriating. Also read: Star Trek Icon Joins Bitcoin Mining Revolution Satoshi Nakamoto’s Real Identity is Probably Known by US Intelligence Agencies It’s not often a journalist in the financial technology genre has cause to contact the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), but this week proved reason enough. Keeping normal business hours, the CIA’s Office of Public Affairs, Washington, D.C. 20505 (really Vienna, VA) was evidently swamped. Three calls placed to (703) 482-0623, along with one voicemail message on the final attempt, were not returned as of publication. Inspiration to do so came from Daniel Oberhaus, staff writer at Motherboard. In an effort to follow up on work done by bloggers and investigative journalists on the tantalizing issue of Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity, Mr. Oberhaus explained, “While recently filing some unrelated [Freedom of Information Act] FOIA requests of my own, I figured it couldn’t hurt to ask some other three-letter agencies what they know about Nakamoto.” It’s a delicate game, FOIA requests. Agencies are keen to dismiss a request out of hand, citing vagueness, ill-prepared request documents, standing, and the perennial go to: national security. The fragility is in having spy agencies at all, for citizens’ own good is the claim, and the modern movement to make coercive government doings more transparent. Mr. Oberhaus continued, “I decided to start broad and request all internal emails containing Satoshi Nakamoto’s name from the FBI and CIA. Agencies generally ask for these sorts of requests to be narrowed down with information you’re unlikely to have in advance, but sometimes they’ll just dump a trove of emails on your plate and say good luck.” Instead, the CIA emailed him a response, short and to the point, complete with obnoxious bureaucrat grammar of referring to itself in the third person. The “request has been rejected, with the agency stating that it can neither confirm nor deny the existence of the requested documents,” the CIA stated flatly. Glomar The CIA’s non denial-denial to Mr. Oberhaus is a classic tactic designed to be a true statement without giving away root facts. It’s known as the Glomar Response, ‘Glomar’ being the abbreviation for Global Marine, a company used by the agency to build a ship capable of salvaging downed Soviet-era subs back in the mid 1970s. The now famously canned statement was employed after a journalist filed a FOIA concerning the CIA ship for Soviet subs project. And that paranoia extends to the present day. Blogger Alexander Muse, a contributor to Medium, wrote a series of posts (3) last year related to his attempt at uncovering Satoshi’s true identity. Mr. Muse writes about a whole host of subjects, from gourmet cooking to tech startups. His professional experience does involve tech, and he has what seems to be at least a passing interest in bitcoin. He was sucked down the rabbit hole when he learned a contact he had at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claimed to have inside information. “According to my source,” Mr. Muse explained, “the NSA was able to the use the ‘writer invariant’ method of stylometry to compare Satoshi’s ‘known’ writings with trillions of writing samples from people across the globe. By taking Satoshi’s texts and finding the 50 most common words, the NSA was able to break down his text into 5,000 word chunks and analyse each to find the frequency of those 50 words.This would result in a unique 50-number identifier for each chunk. The NSA then placed each of these numbers into a 50-dimensional space and flatten them into a plane using principal components analysis. The result is a ‘fingerprint’ for anything written by Satoshi that could easily be compared to any other writing.” His true identity is of utmost importance to the US government precisely because, especially as the price began to rise, so many people were relying on it. The problem, before even the tech could be evaluated on its own merit, was the principal DHS worry: a foreign creator. If bitcoin can do all it claims for itself, disrupting financial markets, a country hostile to the US could quickly start that ball rolling and worse. “Why go to so much trouble to identify Satoshi?” he asked rhetorically. “My source tells me that the Obama administration was concerned that Satoshi was an agent of Russia or China — that Bitcoin might be weaponized against us in the future. Knowing the source would help the administration understand their motives. As far as I can tell Satoshi hasn’t violated any laws and I have no idea if the NSA determined he was an agent of Russia or China or just a Japanese crypto hacker.” Mr. Muse was ultimately unable to get just who Satoshi is. Instead he was left with the conclusion DHS does know, and that bitcoin’s first billionaire was probably a collection of folks. For his effort he was personally contacted by DHS and asked to submit to an interview. He did, noting that he was unable to publish just what he discussed with DHS, but he could say their contacting him was due to his Satoshi’s Medium posts. “I’ve had to stop taking phone calls or accepting voicemail messages,” Mr. Muse concludes. “My email is almost unusable with more than 10,000 unread messages at last count. The only way to contact me now is via text — and it is likely I’m going to have to change my number fairly soon. I still don’t know who Satoshi Nakamoto really is — but I believe the NSA does.” Is Satoshi’s identity known by US intelligence agencies? Let us know in the comments. Images via the Pixabay. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post Satoshi Nakamoto Known to CIA? FBI? Created by NSA? Search Intensifies appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

A fifty-nine-year-old Canadian man accused of advising Ross Ulbricht, the creator and operator of the first anonymous free market, Silk Road, has been extradited to the United States from Thailand. Roger Thomas Clark has been charged by federal prosecutors for a number of crimes relating to the operations of Silk Road, including narcotics trafficking, computer hacking conspiracy, and money laundering conspiracy. Also Read: Markets Update: SEC Adds a Brief Market Spike — But Will It Last? Canadian Extradited From Thailand for Assisting Ross Ulbricht in Operation of Silk Road The U.S. Attorney’s Office Southern District of New York has revealed that Roger Thomas Clark has been extradited to the United States and charged with a number of offenses relating to his alleged association with Ross Ulbricht. The United States Department of Justice asserts that “Roger Thomas Clark was a key figure in the development of Silk Road and advised Ross Ulbricht on all aspects of the criminal enterprise.” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman elaborated: “Silk Road was a secret online marketplace for illegal drugs, hacking services, and a whole host of other criminal activity. Roger Thomas Clark allegedly served as a trusted confidante to Silk Road founder and operator Ross Ulbricht, advising him on all aspects of this illegal business, including how to maximize profits and use threats of violence to thwart law enforcement. Thanks to the investigative work of our fellow law enforcement agencies and our international partners, Clark now faces justice in an American court.” Mr. Clark Helped Develop Fundamental Rules Underpinning Silk Road The Department of Justice reports that Ross Ulbricht described Mr. Clark as a “true mentor” who provided advice regarding “security vulnerabilities in the Silk Road site, technical infrastructure, management of the Silk Road users, and operating in a manner to attempt to thwart law enforcement.” Mr. Clark went by a number of pseudonyms on Silk Road – “Variety Jones,” “VJ,” “Cimon,” and “Plural of Mongoose.” Mr. Clark had a hand in developing the rules and processes underpinning the operations of Silk Road, with U.S authorities asserting that “he communicated at length with Ulbricht regarding the rules that governed Silk Road vendors and users, and regarding the promotion of sales on Silk Road, including the sales of narcotics […] and assisted with hiring programmers to help improve the infrastructure of, and maintain, Silk Road.” Mr. Clark was also reportedly “responsible for gathering information on law enforcement’s efforts to investigate Silk Road,” and “provided advice to Ulbricht on developing a “cover story” to make it appear as though Ulbricht had sold Silk Road.” Mr. Clark Could Face Heavy Sentencing If convicted, the fifty-nine-year-old faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life in prison, among other charges. Mr. Clark was reportedly paid “at least hundreds of thousands of dollars for his role in operating Silk Road.” Homeland Security Investigations special agent-in-charge, Angel M. Melendez, stated that “The extradition of this man today should be a reminder to those who think they can hide within the confines of the dark web, that you are never out of reach of the long arm of the law. These investigations are important in combating the illicit drug market and we will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to fight this fight.” Do you think we will continue to see the arrests of high profile figures linked to Silk Road for years to come? Share your thoughts in the comments section below! Images courtesy of Shuttestock, Wikipedia Get our news feed on your site. Check our widget services. The post Canadian Accused of Assisting Ross Ulbricht Extradited to U.S. appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Embellished estimates as to the total electricity consumed through bitcoin mining have again made the rounds in the media recently, with many stories claiming that energy consumed by mining annually is comparable to that which is consumed by the entire nation of Ireland. Said stories appear to have been triggered by research published by Alex de Vries citing Digiconomist’s Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index (BECI) – an index that critics have approximated to overestimate the power consumed through bitcoin mining by more than 115%. Refuting estimates based upon the BECI index, Coinshares has published a report claiming that the mining industry consumes approximately 35 terawatt hour (tw/h) worth of power each year – a 50% reduction from estimates based upon BECI. Also Read: ”Ludicrous” – Analysts Debate How Much Power Is Consumed per Bitcoin Transaction Exaggerated Reports Claim BTC Mining Consumes As Much Electricity as Ireland A report into the energy consumed by the bitcoin mining network by Alex de Vries, the founder of the Digiconomist blog, has inspired a recent barrage of reports claiming that bitcoin mining consumes as much electricity as the entire nation of Ireland. Receiving less attention, however, have been the criticisms of the assumptions underpinning Digiconomist’s BECI. Mr. de Vries himself has acknowledged that “We’ve seen a lot of back-of-the-envelope calculations, but we need more scientific discussion on where this network is headed. Right now, the information available is pretty poor quality overall, so I’m hoping that people will use this paper as a foundation for more research.” Coinshares Study Estimates Mining to be Half as Energy Intensive A report published by Coinshares has found that the total energy consumption of bitcoin mining to be 35 tw/h, or roughly half of that produced by Mr. de Vries’ study based on Digiconomist’s BECI. The head of Coinshares Research and co-author of the report, Christopher Bendiksen, states “The argument has long gone that the carbon footprint of mining is antithetical to the world’s environmental needs. Many miners we’ve spoken to have objected to the data used by Digiconomist; although they don’t make their methodology clear, it appears that they have taken a bottom-up approach by assuming a small pool of miners is representative of the community.” Of BECI, the report states “Our findings strictly contradict both of these figures and we believe that they rest on incorrect assumptions resulting from inadequate research.” BTC Mining “Mainly Powered by Renewable Energy” The report finds that the bitcoin mining industry to be primarily fuelled by renewable energy sources, particularly hydropower. “Overall, we find that contrary to previously reported assumptions, bitcoin mining is largely driven on cheap renewable energy, dominated by hydro, with the limited permanent use of, and some seasonal migrations to, coal-based generation in certain areas of China only representing a small part of the network’s total electricity demand.” “China has huge excess electricity generation capacity locked up in hydropower stations in the south and southwestern provinces,” the report adds. Do you mine for cryptocurrency using renewable energy? Join the discussion in the comments section below! Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Coinshares.co.uk At Bitcoin.com there’s a bunch of free helpful services. For instance, have you seen our Tools page? You can even lookup the exchange rate for a transaction in the past. Or calculate the value of your current holdings. Or create a paper wallet. And much more. The post Mining Consumes Half as Much Power as BECI Estimates – Coinshares appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Cryptocurrency markets are steadily coasting along after suffering from some volatile low swings last week. Over the past 24 hours, most cryptocurrencies are still in the red nurturing losses between 1-3 percent, and a few are in the green by a few percentages. At the time of publication, the price of bitcoin cash (BCH) is hovering around $850 per coin. Meanwhile, bitcoin core values are meandering just above the 6,500 region. Also read: William Shatner Joins Bitcoin Mining Project, Admits He Doesn’t Quite Get It SEC Announcement Adds Second Wind Into the Cryptocurrency Market Sails Since last week’s ‘Bloody Sunday’ cryptocurrency market have seen some slight recovery but not by much. Markets were dropping pretty low up until the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) revealed cryptocurrencies that are decentralized are not securities. After the SEC’s head of the Division of Corporate Finance, William Hinman, made these statements digital asset markets saw a small rally and this push has kept markets from drawing lower at least for a short period of time. The overall market valuation for all 1600+ cryptocurrencies is currently worth around $280Bn USD and 24-hour trade volume for the entire lot of digital currencies is $10.8Bn. BCH Market Action Bitcoin cash markets have steadily held above the $840 – $855 region over the past few hours with around $303Mn in 24-hour trade volume. Just like before last week’s dump, trade volume is pretty flat and action has simmered down over the past day. The top exchanges swapping the most BCH today are Okex, Exx, Hitbtc, and Bitz. Bitcoin core (BTC) currently represents 48.8 percent of the trades swapped with BCH today. This is followed by tether (USDT 28.8%), USD (13%), KRW (4%) and ETH (2%). As of this writing, one BCH is equivalent to 0.1309 BTC, and bitcoin cash is the fifth highest trade volume. BCH/USD Technical Indicators The daily and 4-hour charts on Bitfinex show that BCH bulls have some resistance ahead in order for the markets to progress upwards. The two Simple Moving Averages (SMA) on the 4-hour BCH/USD chart show the short-term 100 SMA is above the long-term 200 trendline. The two SMA recently crossed hairs and this indicates a move to the upside could on the cards. Both the Relative Strength Index (RSI) oscillator (54) and the MACd show deep consolidation and a touch of uncertainty. Looking at order books shows BCH bulls have some solid resistance past the $870 mark and some more between $900 – $950. On the backside, stronger foundations have been built up over the past few days and BCH bears will see some pit stops around $825 and $775. BTC Market Action As mentioned above, bitcoin core markets have been hovering just above the $6,500 territory for most of today’s trading sessions. Trade volume over the past 24 hours for BTC is around $3.1Bn and the overall market capitalization today is $111Bn. The top five exchanges by BTC trade volume on June 16 are Bitfinex, Coinbase, Bitstamp, Kraken, and Neraex. The Japanese yen today is dominating BTC trades today by over 71 percent. This is followed by tether (USDT 14.3%), USD (9.1%), KRW (1.6%), and the EUR (1.3%). Currently, BTC dominance amongst all the other markets is 39.9 percent. BTC/USD Technical Indicators 4-hour and daily charts for GDAX and Bitstamp’s BTC/USD markets show quite a bit of consolidation as well. We can see from this chart that the two SMAs have also crossed paths with the 100 SMA just above the 200 SMA trendline. This indicates the path of least resistance will be towards the upside, but much like the BCH/USD 4-hour chart the gap is small, and the two could easily cross again. RSI levels are the same as well (52) and the MACd looks to be heading southbound soon. The current resistance zone for BTC bulls is between $6650 and $6775 (20 and 50 MA) at press time. On the back side, bears will meet resistance between 6400 and 6200 and significant foundational buy support beyond that. If things were to go into the sub-$6K region, the $5K region will likely hold for a very long time. However, at any time between this vantage point and that theoretical region, we could see a strong impulse leg upward. The Top Cryptocurrency Markets On Saturday, June 16 the second highest valued market held by ethereum (ETH) is up 1.7 percent and one ETH is averaging around $500. Ethereum values over the last seven days are down 14 percent. Ripple XRP markets are down 0.4 percent over the last 24-hours and down 18 percent during the course of the week. One XRP is trading for $0.53 cents per token. The fifth largest market, EOS, is up 0.12 percent and down 23 percent over the last seven days. The EOS token is trading for $10.67 and the currency holds the fourth highest trade volumes today. The Verdict: Skepticism Remains Strong The verdict this weekend still leans towards the bearish side taking into consideration the current charts, but mostly, market volumes have been considerably low. The SEC news helped add some positivity to an otherwise extremely gloomy week as far as markets were concerned. Traders are likely to remain skeptical for the time being until some bullish signals appear. The good news is markets have found support once again but where it will take us from here is hard to say. Where do you see the price of BCH, BTC, and other coins headed from here? Let us know in the comments below. Disclaimer: Price articles and markets updates are intended for informational purposes only and should not to be considered as trading advice. Neither Bitcoin.com nor the author is responsible for any losses or gains, as the ultimate decision to conduct a trade is made by the reader. Always remember that only those in possession of the private keys are in control of the “money.” Images via Shutterstock, Trading View, Crypto Compare, and Satoshi Pulse. Want to create your own secure cold storage paper wallet? Check our tools section. The post Markets Update: SEC Adds a Brief Market Spike — But Will It Last? appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The Dutch financial regulator, The Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM) has published a letter addressed to new and currently existing institutions invested in cryptocurrencies. The letter seeks to inform that certain cryptocurrency investment activities may require licensing from the AFM, however, expresses “serious doubts” as to “whether managers of investment institutions in cryptos can meet the requirements for licensing.” Also Read: Censorship, Bans, and ETH Scams: Twitter Suspends Bitmain’s Official Account Dutch Financial Regulator Issues Letter to Investment Institutions Operating With Cryptocurrencies The letter seeks to address individuals seeking to apply as an administrator of an investment institution in cryptos, in addition to “existing […] administrator of an investment institution active in cryptos, or [individuals] planning an investment institution to manage cryptos.” The AFM states that it is placing the “heavy requirements” on institutions investing in cryptocurrencies due to “strong concern” as to whether managers of investment institutions who invest in cryptos are able to meet the full licensing requirements. The AFM’s concerns principally regard “the sharp increase in interest in new market parties to provide these services in combination with the usually limited knowledge about applicable regulations,” which generally results in “ignorance” as to how to meet “supervisory standards in practice.” The AFM also requests that investment institution inform the agency regarding “any desired expansion of [cryptocurrency] product offering” well in advance of providing such. Licensing Requirements for Dutch Investment Institutions The AFM to clarify what circumstances in which the administrator for an investment institution will be required to seek licensing from the regulator. The letter states that the “threshold value for an administrator of (an) open-end investment institution (s) [is] €100 million [approximately $1,162 million USD].” “An administrator of an investment institution must obtain a number of important licenses to [meet] licens[ing] requirements,” the AFM continues. “These requirements are intended to include to protect the interests of retail investors and to ensure the proper functioning of retail investors market. No distinction is made between different forms of investing.” The AFM has “drawn up a number of questions” that administrators of institutions invested in cryptocurrencies will be required to answer in order to apply for the required licensing. Said requirements pertain to the institution’s liquidity management, valuation protocols, the product development process, and storage considerations. What is your response to the AFM’s new licensing apparatus for institutions invested in cryptocurrencies? Share your thoughts in the comments section below! Images courtesy of Shutterstock, www.afm.nl At Bitcoin.com there’s a bunch of free helpful services. For instance, have you seen our Tools page? You can even lookup the exchange rate for a transaction in the past. Or calculate the value of your current holdings. Or create a paper wallet. And much more. The post Dutch AFM on Licensing Requirements for Institutions Invested in Crypto appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Embattled cryptocurrency exchange, Bitgrail, announced ongoing bankruptcy proceedings in Italy have turned full force, as the court seized the exchange’s bitcoin wallets. The ecosystem seems decidedly torn between addressing the fundamental cause, a hack that drained $170 million, and making victims whole. Also read: William Shatner Joins Bitcoin Mining Project, Admits He Doesn’t Quite Get It Italian Court Seizes Bitgrail’s Bitcoin “On June 5, 2018, pursuant to the Tribunal of Florence orders,” Bitgrail posted Friday, a full eleven days after, “the Bitcoins contained in the company’s wallets were seized and brought under control of the judicial authorities pending further Court decisions in the pre-bankruptcy proceeding.” Reaction was pretty fierce, if Twitter threads can be believed. @LucChase thundered, “Very bad news to see the court seized the remaining assets. Which idiot thought bringing the courts in could ever be a good move? We need Bitgrail to trade it’s way out of this mess. Now it is a guaranteed loss.” @Bitgrailed struck another note, claiming asset seizure was “Better than in your hands Firano.” @asael2 echoed a popular sentiment, asking, “Somebody know where this criminals live? Local authorities should be notified!” @LookItsLewis put a finer point on the affair, “Wow … and so everyone who predicted all of your funds would disappear and you’d shut down were correct. You should have let everyone withdraw their currency while there was still time. This is now (as if it wasn’t already) officially your fault.” Indeed, the Italian court seized assets in what appears to be a foregone conclusion: bankruptcy, determination of findings, and eventual redistribution of what’s left to outstanding creditors and victims. Nano Soldiers On Bitgrail has had a tough go of early 2018, and was more or less shuttered as far back as February. At first it seemed to be the result of a Mt. Gox-like hack, totalling 17 million nano (XRB) worth something on the order of $170 million. Francisco Firano, founder of the exchange, announced its insolvency, attributing losses to the development team and their failure to secure the token. For its part, developers put the blame squarely on Bitgrail, arguing “all reliable evidence we have reviewed continues to point to a bug in Bitgrail’s exchange software as the reason for the loss of funds.” The Nano Foundation, an advocacy group charging to recover funds, made the above statement in April. By May, Mr. Firano seemed to be attempting a relaunch of the platform, and some say it was in an effort to make victims whole by offering a new token scheme to fill in gaps of losses. The same day Bitgrail announced its return, it announced it would be unable to launch due to a court injunction. While the exchange seems to be all but dead, the Nano project soldiers on, releasing three node updates, patches, in as many months. What do you think about going to courts for relief in such cases? Let us know in the comments. Images via the Pixabay. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post Bitgrail Bitcoin Assets Taken by Italian Government, Victims Still Fuming appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The Bank of International Settlements (BIS), a transnational institution owned by and comprised of central banks that seeks to “fosters international monetary and financial cooperation and serves as a bank for central banks,” recently published its quarterly review of “International banking and financial market developments” for June 2018. The report includes an op-ed written by BIS general manager Agustín Carstens that describes many cryptocurrencies as comprising “get-rich-quick schemes” that “should not be conflated with the sovereign currencies and established payment systems that have stood the test of time.” Also Read: Japanese Police Arrest Coinhive Users for Violating Law Banning Computer Viruses BIS General Manager Critical of New Cryptocurrencies Mr. Carstens’ article opens with a recognition that popular confidence in legacy financial institutions has been undermined by contemporary innovations in communications and technology, such as cryptocurrency, stating that “preserv[ing] trust in financial transactions is a tricky business in our digital age.” The BIS general manager asserts that “With new cryptocurrencies proliferating, it’s as important to educate the public about good money as it is to build defences against fake news, online identity theft, and Twitter bots.” “Conjuring up new cryptocurrencies is the latest chapter in a long story of attempts to invent new money, as fortune seekers have tried to make a quick buck,” Mr. Carstens continued. “It has become the alchemy of the age of innovation, with the promise of magically transforming everyday substances (electricity, in this case) into gold (or at least euros).” “Private Cryptocurrencies Struggle to Earn Public Trust” Mr. Carstens argues that “What makes currencies credible is trust in the issuing institution, and successful central banks have a proven record of earning this public trust.” By contrast, the BIS general manager claims that “Many cryptocurrencies are ultimately get-rich schemes” that “should not be conflated with the sovereign currencies and established payment systems that have stood the test of time.” “The short experience of cryptocurrencies shows that technology, however sophisticated, is a poor substitute for hard-earned trust in sound institutions.” Central Banks Explore Blockchain Technology Mr. Carstens states that “Currently, central banks around the world are working on systems for retail payments that will allow instant transfers, anytime and anywhere. They are also actively testing the distributed ledger technology underlying cryptocurrencies – not as a substitute for the current system, but to build on it.” The BIS general manager concludes that “Even in this digital age, trust in the issuing institution matters and will continue to underpin currencies. Central banks, for their part, will have to continue earning that public trust by closely guarding their currency’s value.” Mr. Carstens added that the BIS would be providing further elaboration regarding its opinions pertaining to cryptocurrency in a “special section” of its annual report on June 17th. Do you think that cryptocurrency undermines the financial hegemony of central banks? Share your thoughts in the comments section below! Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Wikipedia At Bitcoin.com there’s a bunch of free helpful services. For instance, have you seen our Tools page? You can even lookup the exchange rate for a transaction in the past. Or calculate the value of your current holdings. Or create a paper wallet. And much more. The post BIS GM Argues New Cryptos Are “the Alchemy of the Age of Innovation” appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Japanese police from 10 prefectures have arrested website operators using Coinhive to tap into the computer power of their site visitors to mine cryptocurrencies without consent. They are accused of violating the law banning the use of computer viruses. Some people have already been fined. The police have been monitoring the Coinhive program since it was released. Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space 16 People Caught The police from 10 prefectures throughout Japan have reportedly caught 16 people using mining programs to mine cryptocurrencies using other people’s personal computers, according to local media. The Japan Times reported the National Police Agency saying: Sixteen people in Japan have been found to have embedded computer programs on their own websites to use personal computers of viewers for cryptocurrency mining without their consent…These people have been accused of violating the law banning the use of computer viruses. The Asahi Shimbun elaborated, “Three men were arrested on suspicion of illegal use of what were defined as computer viruses, while 13 other men had their papers sent to prosecutors for the same suspicion.” Previously, news.Bitcoin.com reported that the police were investigating the three people whom they have now arrested. All of the accused operate their own websites which allegedly had programs installed to use visitors’ computers to mine crypto. The 16 are between the ages of 18 and 48. One is a teenager, seven are in their 20s, four are in their 30s, and the remaining four are in their 40s. Some of them have already been fined ¥100,000 (~US$904), the Japan Times further revealed, noting that “The most money earned among the 16 suspects was the equivalent of about 120,000 yen ($1,100).” Furthermore, the publication emphasized, “It is the first time in Japan that a person has been accused by police of using another person’s personal computer through a cryptocurrency mining program without approval.” Police Keeping an Eye on Coinhive Japanese police have been monitoring the Coinhive program since it was released in September last year to determine where it has been installed, the publication noted. Citing that the programs were embedded in adult, music and game websites to mine four cryptocurrencies, including monero and jsecoin, the news outlet wrote: Of the 16 people, 14 used Coinhive, a program that provides 30 percent of mined cryptocurrencies to the developer and the remaining 70 percent to owners of websites in which the program is embedded. Hisashi Sonoda, a professor at Konan Law School knowledgeable about cybercrimes, believes that “the sudden arrests may have been somewhat excessive because there are no legal precedents on how to handle the use of such programs,” the Asahi Shimbun conveyed. What do you think of the Japanese police’s action? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock and Coinhive. Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section. The post Japanese Police Arrest Coinhive Users for Violating Law Banning Computer Viruses appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

This week the Twitter handle @Bitmaintech was locked down because Twitter administrators claimed the account belongs to a 4-year-old. The Twitter handle’s owner and Bitmain’s head of marketing have complained to the social media company’s support team and Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey. The account lockdown marks the second high profile bitcoin-related account that’s been banned from Twitter in just a few months. Also Read: Study Reveals ASIC Miners Represent 30% of the Equihash Mining Hashrate The Official Bitmain Tech Twitter Account Has Been Suspended On June 14 Bitmain Tech’s head of marketing Nishant Sharma tweeted to his followers that the company’s official Twitter account @Bitmaintech had been banned from Twitter. At the moment the Twitter account is completely inaccessible to the public and the Beijing-based company’s active ad campaigns have been paused. The official @Bitmaintech Twitter account was locked on June 14, 2018. Bitmain’s account accumulated thousands of Twitter followers over the past four years and now the account is unable to post or utilize the social media platform in any manner until the case is resolved. “The @Bitmaintech account is temporarily inaccessible because apparently, Twitter thinks that the people behind the account are as old as Bitmain i.e. 4 years old,” says Sharma. It should be back soon (and long before Bitmain turns 13). @Jack help please. Case# 85911059 The Recent @Bitcoin Account Suspension The account removal comes at an awkward time for the Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey, who has been asked to address multiple issues tied to the social media platform. For instance, just recently the @Bitcoin account was banned and the topic was very controversial. The account with over 750,000 followers was initially suspended and then the account was restored with a much lower follower count than it had prior to the ban. Some people accused Dorsey of being biased and showing a conflict of interest towards supporters of the Lightning Network (LN) by allowing the banning of the @Bitcoin account. The reason for this speculation is due to Dorsey’s recent investment into the LN project. Legitimate Accounts Banned, but ETH Bot Impersonation Thrives Twitter users within the cryptocurrency industry are also dealing with the vast amounts of scamming ETH bots that have cloned nearly every well-known person in the crypto-community. The ETH bots have managed to scam millions worth of ether because Twitter will not remove the fraudulent accounts impersonating digital currency luminaries. So essentially people are pretty frustrated that Twitter has managed to ban and censor legitimate users like @Bitcoin and @Bitmaintech, while allowing fraudulent scammers to run amuck all over the platform. The case of Bitmain losing it’s official account, because Twitter admins believe it belongs to a four-year-old, seems absurd, but Twitter has been a whacky place lately, and the company hasn’t been very responsive. The issues with Twitter also follows the recent accusations and admissions stemming from other social media platform CEOs abusing their powers. Back in 2016, the Reddit CEO Steve Huffman admitted to editing comments on the pro-Donald Trump subreddit, r/the_donald. This year Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has been scrutinized for selling user data to Cambridge Analytica. And now Twitter users are complaining about banned accounts and censorship and many of them are pointing their fingers at Jack. What do you think about Bitmain’s Twitter account getting banned because admins believe the account belongs to a four-year-old child? Do you think Jack Dorsey and Twitter have a lot of explaining to do? Let us know your thoughts on this subject in the comment section below. Images via Pixabay, Bitmaintech, the Twitter logo, @bitcoin, @bitmaintech, @laurashin At Bitcoin.com there’s a bunch of free helpful services. For instance, have you seen our Tools page? You can even lookup the exchange rate for a transaction in the past. Or calculate the value of your current holdings. Or create a paper wallet. And much more. The post Censorship, Bans, and ETH Scams: Twitter Suspends Bitmain’s Official Account appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

The Satoshi Revolution: A Revolution of Rising Expectations Section 3: Decentralization Chapter 8, Part 6 Crypto Can Create a “Perfect” Political System The anarchists…work not for a perfect social state, but for a perfect political system. A perfect social state is…totally free from sin or crime or folly; a perfect political system is merely a system in which justice is observed, in which nothing is punished but crime and nobody coerced but the invader. -Victor Yarros, American anarchist, lawyer, and author The perfect society is embodied by the institutions that individuals create and through which they function. The same is true of a dystopian society. That’s why institutional analysis is essential to understand how freedom and totalitarianism work. One institution is cryptocurrency, which profoundly affects other institutions of society, and reaches far beyond the financial ones. What is an Institution? The Random House dictionary defines an institution as “a well-established and structured pattern of behavior or of relationships that is accepted as a fundamental part of a culture, such as marriage,” voting, or bankruptcy. An institution is any stable and widely-accepted mechanism for achieving goals within society. The term applies to wide-ranging and complex concepts, such as “family,” “the free market,” “common law,” “religion,” and “the state.” Not all institutions are compatible, however, because some pursue antithetical ends; free-market crypto and the central banking system are a stark example. Crypto is a spontaneous and decentralized empowerment of individuals; the banking system is a centrally-planned and unified expression of government control. As a practical matter, a society often contains the two institutions in uneasy parallel, but their antagonistic goals lead to inevitable conflict. Government will attempt to regulate or ban free-market crypto because, otherwise, the free market will do what it does when left unfettered: prevail. Modern society is a political war zone: the culture war, a race war, weaponized media, class warfare against the 1%, the drug war, a war for democracy, militarized police, the new Cold War, a war on terrorism… One battle provides a common theme for them all. It is a warfare over the structure and goals of competing institutions. Every social conflict involves a clash of institutions that express different ideologies, including cryptocurrency. Created by anarchists using break through technology, it is at war with governments’ desire to regulate and to own it. Technology versus government. Freedom versus control. Generally speaking, there are two types of institutions: spontaneous, and designed. An example of a spontaneous institution is the family. In Western culture, at least, no one predetermines who will marry and produce children; those decisions are left to the individuals involved. All spontaneous and non-violent institutions express freedom in how they function. By contrast, an example of a designed institution is the public-school system, which is created by authorities and experts who impose their vision upon children at tax-payer expense. Not all designed systems are equal, however, and some can also be vehicles of freedom. These are voluntarily-designed free-market systems, such as a car factory or a tuna fish cannery. Factories may impose rigid rules, because producing a specific product requires them, but everyone who “obeys” does so willingly and from self-interest, which usually comes in the form of a paycheck. The pivotal question for a designed institution is whether it is coerced or voluntary. All coercive institutions express government or violence in how they function. Everyone who “obeys” does so without the option of saying “no.” Free-market cryptocurrency is highly-designed and entirely voluntary. Central banks may offer a veneer of being voluntary–for example, people are not compelled to become customers—but the entire economy is regulated so as to prohibit alternatives that refuse to act as an arm of government. The same arguments are deployed against them as against crypto. Free-market financial institutions are said to be scams for tax evaders and other so-called criminals, such as drug dealers. They defraud honest people, who foolishly trust them with money. The true motivation of suppression is unspoken: alternative financial institutions threat the government’s monopoly on money and commerce. And, so, Institutionalized violence—that is, law enforcement—is used against the competition; it is justified as protection against occasional crime and against the poor judgment of individuals left to decide for themselves. What is Institutional Analysis? Institutional analysis examines the dynamics by which institutions of society express and define laws, customs, and culture. It asks: What is an institution’s purpose, the rules by which it functions, its impact? Parallel institutions that purport to serve the same purpose are often compared through a process called “comparative institutional analysis.” An example is to compare how the Federal Reserve creates currency with how an alternative system, such as cryptocurrency, does so. A good starting point of analysis is the competing assumptions upon which a centrally-designed institution and a free-market one rest. The first system uses mathematical representations, historical precedent, and market manipulations to produce currency, because it believes an economy can be scientifically engineered by authorities and experts. The second system realizes that human beings are fallible, driven by fluid preferences, by self-interest, and other factors that cannot be predicted, only analyzed in retrospect. Central banking grounds itself in mathematical models, which can be jiggered or false, and in central authority, which can lie or be badly mistaken. Free-market alternatives ground themselves in human behavior that faces the quick feedback of consequences, and which may be unwise, but not false. Comparative analysis looks at the structures and procedures of competing institutions, which will determine what they produce. It does not consider motivations. In other words, as long as specific procedures are followed, the motivations are irrelevant. A worker in a hat factory may intend to produce wedding gowns. As long as he follows the workplace rules, however, the result will be a hat. A police officer may believe in Murray Rothbard’s free-market-anarchist model of justice, but as long as he follows police procedure, he will enforce laws that punish peaceful behavior. Only by breaking the rules can the hat maker and honest officer achieve their personal goals. Comparative analysis also considers the differing impact of parallel institutions. For example, what can appear to be the ‘chaotic’ nature of spontaneous institutions provides a huge benefit to society—innovation, which cannot be centrally designed. Its powerhouse is the ability of creative people to adapt to changing circumstances. The adaptation can be lightning-fast, as with crypto, and successful adapters are richly rewarded by fortune that favors the first to arrive. Late arrivers are also rewarded, however, because an innovation will survive only if it provides value. In 300 BD, the Chinese Taoist philosopher Chuang-tzu wrote, “there has been such a thing as letting mankind alone; there has never been such a thing as governing mankind with success. Good order results spontaneously when things are let alone.” By contrast, centrally-engineered institutions stifle innovation because their structures and procedures resist all feedback, their flaws are embedded and protected. The institutions serve the interests of an elite class, not of individuals or society. The Institutional Ripple-On Effect of Free-Market Crypto The effect of crypto on authorized financial institutions is well-known. But such a massive door to freedom does not merely crack open; it bursts all its hinges, and shakes up other institutions of society. To touch upon several, in passing: Foreign Policy. Food is frequently used as a weapon of foreign policy. A recent article in Free Thought Project describes how blockchain is bypassing the weaponization of food: “Revolutionary Blockchain Tech is Helping Disaster Victims & Feeding the Hungry Without Government.” Crypto allows needy nations and individuals to skirt economic sanctions imposed upon them by the powerful. It makes it more difficult to starve people for political advantage. Domestic Policy. When Venezuela’s government devalued the Bolivar by removing three zeros from the currency, citizens flocked to the free-market alternative of bitcoin, with which they were already familiar. Crypto rescues businesses; it saves lives; it can topple governments. The Social Control of ‘Vice’. “Operation Chokepoint” was an Obama-era banking policy that attacked allegedly undesirable but legal businesses, such as selling medical marijuana. The banking system closed accounts, canceled credit cards, and refused all services to miscreant customers. The practice is being revived. Banks are targeting marijuana outlets, sex workers (legal or not), and gun businesses. Increasingly, these sellers are turning to crypto to sustain their livelihoods. Protection of Free Speech. After circulating documents that embarrassed governments, Wikileaks faced a banking blockade that killed its access to donations, which were its life-blood. Wikileaks opened donations to bitcoin, and wealth poured in. Censorship was sidestepped. The Free Flow of Information. Intellectual property (IP) prosecutions are usually based on following the money and uncovering the individual at the other end. Since crypto can be close to anonymous, that strategy is gutted. For those who reject the validity of IP, as I do, this is an amazing ‘good’ for the global flow of information. Immigration Policy. Immigration and temporary migration are often based on the possibility of sending money back home. But migrants are often “unbanked” or pay huge fees to do so, with their families waiting days for the transfers. Trump has threatened to cut off this incentive for migration by closing down channels of transmission. Fast, cheap transfers of crypto will be incredibly difficult to control. The Strangle-Hold of Lawyers and Courts. Smart contracts are legally binding agreements that use software to execute themselves. Smart contracts are on the path to becoming ubiquitous, from real estate deals to insurance claims, which dramatically reduces the need for lawyers. The Autonomy of the Family. Inheritance taxes are heinous because they are double taxation; family wealth that has already been taxed is relooted by governments. Crypto can invisibly divide assets among loved ones. Conclusion The preceding is a passing taste of how profoundly cryptocurrencies are redefining the institutions of society. To grasp the scope of the institutional revolution, however, it is necessary to focus contrast more intensely on the two fundamental human institutions. In his classic work, the German sociologist Franz Oppenheimer identified one of them in his book The State (1914). The other is Society. [To be continued next week.] Reprints of this article should credit bitcoin.com and include a link back to the original links to all previous chapters Wendy McElroy has agreed to ”live-publish” her new book The Satoshi Revolution exclusively with Bitcoin.com. Every Saturday you’ll find another installment in a series of posts planned to conclude after about 18 months. Altogether they’ll make up her new book ”The Satoshi Revolution”. Read it here first. The post Wendy McElroy: Crypto Can Create a “Perfect” Political System appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Today’s Bitcoin in Brief features several examples of digital coins entering all spheres of life. A leading German auto manufacturer has revealed its cars may soon be fitted with onboard cryptocurrency wallets. A company now offers crypto payments for inmates in prisons across America. And in South Africa, a new token will support rhino conservationists, while fighting poachers. Also read: Bitcoin in Brief: Halting 51% Attacks and Where Now for Ripple? VW Teams with IOTA to Offer Crypto Wallets in Cars It’s a trademark of the Cebit expo in Hanover to entertain visitors with ingenious ideas on how to further digitize our world. The crypto ecosphere has become a new source of inspiration for designers and engineers. One of this year’s surprises: German auto manufacturer Volkswagen has revealed a concept model equipped with a cryptocurrency wallet. The car can pay for its carwash and fill up its tank without the driver moving a finger. The “Cryptocurrency for the Internet of Things,” IOTA will be embedded in new cars developed by VW. The European automotive giant has announced it wants to integrate crypto technology in its upcoming products. Distributed ledger will be used to handle, store and transfer data between the motor vehicles and their producer, and an IOTA wallet may also be incorporated to facilitate contactless payments using the MIOTA tokens. The cooperation between IOTA and Volkswagen is based on the Proof-of-Concept of IOTA’s Tangle system for autonomous cars. Tangle can transfer software updates and will be interconnected with Volkswagen’s own smart system “Connected Cars”. Each automobile will receive its own, unique Car ID that will be checked by IOTA’s Tangle. The integration of the wallet software is an option that can be added as well. Cellblocks Introduces Crypto Transactions in Prisons A new digital payment system aims to address some of the issues with monetary systems currently used in US prisons and correctional facilities, like high fees charged by third-party financial institutions, limited access to funds, and waiting times. Cellblocks, a cryptocurrency designed to be used by inmates, offers a solution that will put money directly into their hands, its creators promise. They say the system provides a fast, efficient, and secure way for families and prisoners to exchange funds. Inmates will be able to use the cryptocurrency through kiosks that will be installed in the prisons as part of the project. This will allow them to spend their coins in the prison commissary, cover court costs and fees, pay other inmates, and receive money from friends and family. Each user will have a digital wallet to store their funds. Transactions will be made in real time and at minimal fees, the company said in a press release. The new crypto payment system offers several other benefits over the traditional systems. For example, outside parties won’t be able to withdraw money without the inmate’s consent. Wages and other funds can be easily deposited in wallets through any digital access point, such as a laptop or a smartphone. Wallet holders will have total control over their funds at all times. Last but not least, the cryptocurrency can be cashed in for fiat money when the inmate is released. ‘Rhino Coin’ to Support Conservation and Fight Poaching in South Africa A “cryptocurrency with a conscience”, as its creators describe it, Rhino Coin aims to generate sustainable income for rhino conservation efforts in South Africa by supporting the legal horn trade and fighting poaching. According to its founders, Alexander Wilcocks and Jacques du Randt, the new crypto, which has been built on ethereum, “attempts to give value to the legal rhino horn by converting it to cryptocurrency in a 1 coin per 1 gram ratio.” Rhino Coin is meant to “unlock the value of ethically obtained, stockpiled rhino horn, creating a new stream of revenue for conservation”, as well as a trading opportunity for coin holders, local media reported. Wilcocks and Du Randt explained that a holder of the digital token can either trade it or redeem it. Earlier this week, Rhino Coin was selling for around R119 (~$8.8 USD), which represents a 25.26% price increase since the day of its launch, June 7, when it was trading at R95 per coin (~7 USD). Most of the Rhino Coins will be distributed to conservationists to sustain their operations. Although there are many fundraising projects, very little of the money actually reaches the private conservationists. Around a third of all rhinos in South Africa are currently in private care. Each conservationist will be able to obtain Rhino Coins in return for their rhino horn, which can then be traded. “By providing communities with a better means to receive a sustained income, we hope to lower the benefit and temptation of participating in illegal poaching in the immediate areas,” Du Randt explained. What are your thoughts on today’s topics in Bitcoin in Brief? Tell us in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock. Bitcoin News is growing fast. To reach our global audience, send us a news tip or submit a press release. Let’s work together to help inform the citizens of Earth (and beyond) about this new, important and amazing information network that is Bitcoin. The post Bitcoin in Brief Saturday: Coins for Drivers, Prisoners, and Conservationists appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

Hacken has launched a new website that provides an all-in-one tool for rating cryptocurrency exchanges. Crypto Exchange Ranks (CER) allows for side by side comparisons of well over a dozen exchanges, including real-time arbitrage data and ratings for liquidity, compliance, reliability, and security. Also read: Hollywood Stars in Movie About Crypto Money Laundering CER Aims to Accurately Rank Cryptocurrency Exchanges Crypto Exchange Ranks by Ukraine’s Hacken officially launches on Monday, June 18. The service allows users to access a wide range of metrics for major exchanges within the cryptocurrency ecosystem. News.Bitcoin.com was granted access to the beta version of the platform, which comprises a scoring dashboard for exchange comparison together with tabs for viewing liquidity and arbitrage. While not every feature has been activated in the beta version, the ones that are in operation appear to work well and provide useful tools for traders seeking arbitrage opportunities, or trying to determine the withdrawal limits of various platforms. Anton Kaminsky, Business Development Director of Crypto Exchange Ranks, told news.Bitcoin.com that the goal was “to create a sophisticated tool for crypto exchange rankings, to save time and effort for all market participants”. CER Is to Exchanges What CMC Is to Cryptocurrencies While platforms such as Coinmarketcap provide certain data on exchanges, such as 24-hour volume and most traded pairs, CER has taken a different approach. The site, which will be free at launch before later introducing a subscription model, scans the order book of each exchange in real time to calculate its size. It also enables users to compare prices for any coin on up to five exchanges, to view aggregated volumes for up to five exchanges, and to check the balances of the platforms’ hot and cold wallets. While most traders are unlikely to be concerned with cybersecurity ratings, the existence of such tools may incentivize exchanges to improve their service, knowing that their every action is being monitored. Dmitriy Budorin, CEO of Hacken who created the platform, said: “Cryptocurrency exchanges are the backbone of the whole emerging crypto economy. CER will contribute to its healthier development. We hope that with CER, the exchanges will start taking their cybersecurity more seriously and refuse any bad practices, while users will receive comprehensive tools for smart decision making”. Version 1.0 of CER launches on Monday, before future updates will add the ability to track aggregated portfolios, and to access TA and FA tools within the platform’s dashboard. Would you use a platform like Crypto Exchange Rankings? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of CER. Disclaimer: Bitcoin.com does not endorse nor support this product/service. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the mentioned company or any of its affiliates or services. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article. The post New Platform Ranks Cryptocurrency Exchanges by Liquidity, Security, and Reliability appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

For more than a decade, Freedom Fest has been a top attraction on the conference circuit for those leaning toward freer markets. Through the years, it has grown to include speakers and topics well beyond economics. In doing so, it has attracted some of the most interesting minds in the world. Also read: William Shatner Joins Bitcoin Mining Project, Admits He Doesn’t Quite Get It Freedom Fest Founder Talks Crypto This year’s gathering in Las Vegas, July 11th through 14th, is continuing to branch out. Cryptocurrency and its underlying technology are taking up more intellectual space this July, with a host of debates, lectures, and presentations sure to interest news.Bitcoin.com readers. We caught up with its founder, legendary economist Mark Skousen, to gain insight into the popular conference. Dr. Skousen News.Bitcoin.com: Freedom Fest is one of the biggest, best attended libertarian/freedom movement soirees. Why do you think it’s so popular while other conferences struggle to sell tickets? Founder Mark Skousen: We do several things unique — first of all, Freedom Fest is a Renaissance gathering, where we talk more than just politics. We also discuss and debate philosophy, history, science & technology, healthy living, music & dance, law & religion, etc. We even have a film festival. There’s something for everyone. We also have lots of breakout sessions, so there’s plenty to choose from, and nobody is bored. We also have a “financial freedom” investment conference, my area of expertise. I think if we were strictly a libertarian conference, we wouldn’t be so successful. I also like to think that because we are a “for profit” business, we focus more on what the attendee wants, rather than what the donors want. Also, we aren’t competing with non profits and engaged in fundraising. I do think we could be a lot bigger and more influential — as “the greatest libertarian show in earth,” as the Washington Post calls us — if everyone in the freedom movement, including think tanks, would join together instead of each one starting their own conference, which is what they are all doing. As Ben Franklin says, “We just all hang together, or we shall surely all hang separately.” (So let’s hang out in Vegas!) We are relatively small in the world, and spreading ourselves too thin these days. So we offer every major freedom organization a chance to create their own mini-conference at Freedom Fest. Every year Freedom Fest seems to incorporate more cryptocurrency themes into the program. I’ve counted at least four events centered around them, including what looks to be a pretty great debate. Is it just my bias showing? Or, have you seen a growth in interest by Freedom Fest participants as well? Yes, I think so. We’ve been covering digital currencies for several years now, which I regard as a legitimate currency, although not especially utilitarian given its volatility. That’s why we invited Patrick Byrne, CEO of Overstock, to address us this year — he thinks bitcoin and blockchain are revolutionary. I agree. This year’s Freedom Fest boasts Naomi Brockwell, Bitcoin Girl, as the gathering’s mistress of ceremonies. We’re, of course, big fans of her, but why did you choose her as MC? Not because she’s the Bitcoin Girl, but because she’s young, attractive, and intelligent — and a great voice. She’s also well known in the freedom community. Just about every year, there’s a surprise guest or someone thought to be controversial. Two years ago, for example, no less than candidate Donald Trump made a pitch to participants. Any hints as to what might happen this year? We have invited a surprise guest, and if he shows up, it will be standing room only. But it’s a long shot. Naomi Brockwell I printed out the agenda, itinerary, for this year’s Freedom Fest. Wow. It’s something like 20 pages. Is having a wide arrange of topics, from religion to education, to anarchy, done on purpose? Or has it just evolved that way? We’ve had wide diversity of topics, debates, panels, etc. from the very beginning. We also work hard to make the topics provocative. It’s essential to get a good turnout, since each session competes with nine others. We also have a different theme every year…In the past, it’s been “Are We Rome?”…”Are We Headed for Another French Revolution?”…”Is the American Dream Lost?”…and this year “Where is the Voice of Reason?” Your seminal textbook, Economic Logic, now in its 5th edition, has a brief mention of bitcoin. Do you think that’s bound to change, say, for the 6th edition? In other words, do you think economists such as yourself will be compelled to grapple with it to a greater degree? I do plan to include a major section of digital currencies in the 6th edition. I wished I had put in more in the 5th edition. At least one of your quotes about bitcoin went viral a while back. You basically contend it won’t ever replace gold due to the fact computers can be effectively shut off, shutting off access to bitcoin. Do you still maintain your contention about it never replacing gold? I’m of the opinion that the upward trend in gold seems to have been affected by the increasing interest in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as a legitimate alternative. But because it’s digital and non-physical, it can never replace the benefits of actual gold ownership. You were one of the few well-known economists to express a bullishness towards cryptocurrency. Do you still think well of crypto? Has the price drop changed your mind? Volatility is still a problem, and that’s keeping back its use by everyman. Most investors hold it as a speculation rather than a medium of exchange. Do you, or have you, actually used cryptocurrency to purchase goods and services? Just curious. Not yet. Like everybody, I wished I had gotten in early and become a millionaire! This year Freedom Fest is throwing a 50th Anniversary celebration for Reason. How important is Reason to the liberty movement in your view? Reason Foundation has grown tremendously in the past 50 years and now competes with the Cato Institute as the most influential libertarian freedom organization. I’m a big supporter, and they are equally supportive of what we are trying to do. We are delighted to have them co-sponsor many of our events this year. For the first time, they are holding their Reason Media Awards at Freedom Fest at the Saturday night banquet on July 14 rather than in New York. We are honored to celebrate special years with all the freedom organizations. Next year we have a theme that will draw a big crowd (I predict): “The Wild West.” July 17-20, 2019, Paris Resort, in Las Vegas. And yes, we are planning a square dance! What do you think about Freedom Fest? Let us know in the comments. Images via the Pixabay. Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com. The post Freedom Fest 2018: Cryptocurrency Speakers, Debates, & Growing Interest Among Attendees appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article

A crime thriller called Crypto is reportedly being filmed, featuring a money laundering agent and a case involving cryptocurrency. Among the cast of the movie are Hollywood actors Kurt Russell, Luke Hemsworth, Alexis Bledel, Beau Knapp, Jeremie Harris, and Vincent Kartheiser. Also read: Yahoo! Japan Confirms Entrance Into the Crypto Space A Crypto Thriller Kurt Russel. An upcoming crime thriller called Crypto is currently filming in New York, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The cast includes a number of Hollywood stars including Kurt Russell, Luke Hemsworth, Alexis Bledel, Beau Knapp, Jeremie Harris, and Vincent Kartheiser, the media outlet detailed on Friday. The movie reportedly takes place in a U.S. government agent’s “remote New York hometown,” the publication continued, noting that it is “where his father (Russell) and brother (Hemsworth) are struggling to maintain their family farm in a changing economic landscape.” The Reporter described the movie’s plot: Crypto centers on a young anti-money laundering agent (Knapp) tasked with investigating a tangled web of corruption and fraud…The agent quickly finds himself enmeshed in a dangerous underworld populated by a mysterious art dealer (Bledel), a cryptocurrency enthusiast turned cyber-sleuth (Harris) and a corrupt accountant doing the bidding of ruthless clients (Kartheiser). The Cast and Production of Crypto Alexis Bledel. Leading actor Beau Knapp was the main character of the sci-fi thriller The Signal. He also starred in Netflix’s recently-canceled series Seven Seconds. Alexis Bledel grew up on the set of the Gilmore Girls and won an Emmy for her role as Ofglen in Handmaid’s Tale last year. Hollywood veteran Kurt Russell has been constantly featured on the silver screen since the 1960s. Among his most famous roles is Snake Plisskin in the 1981 classic Escape from New York. Luke Hemsworth, of Westworld fame, was also in a couple of older brother Chris Hemsworth’s Thor movies. Vincent Kartheiser of Mad Men and Jeremie Harris of Legion are also accomplished TV actors with many credits under their belts. Beau Knapp. According to the news outlet, this indie film is directed by John Stalberg Jr, who directed the 2010 movie High School, starring Adrien Brody and Colin Hanks. Crypto is written by Carlyle Eubank and David Frigerio, who previously co-wrote The Signal. Producer credits include Frigerio, Jordan Yale Levine, and Jordan Beckerman. Stalberg commented, “I am overjoyed to be working with such an incredible cast to bring this timely, thrilling story to life.” Levine elaborated: Cryptocurrency has captured the attention and imagination of consumers and entrepreneurs all over the world but has never been explored in film in such a nuanced and exciting way. Bitcoin at the Movies Crypto will not be the first movie to feature a cryptocurrency. The first to debut in cinemas worldwide was the well-received 2015 Lionsgate feature film Dope. The following year Vietnamese audiences enjoyed Bitcoin Heist, which was similarly focused on crime surrounding bitcoin. Another crypto-themed movie that has been announced is called Bitcoin, which features a suburban father trying to convert bitcoin from an anonymous account into cash to save his family after he lost his job. This movie was announced back in December 2016 and, according to Imdb, is currently in the pre-production stage. What do you think of the movie Crypto? Let us know in the comments section below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock. Need to calculate your bitcoin holdings? Check our tools section. The post Hollywood Stars in Movie About Crypto Money Laundering appeared first on Bitcoin News. View the full article