September 18, 2018 @ 7:28 pm By Cali Haan  |  

All the known assets of Alexandre Cazes, a 34-year-old Quebcois accused of running the AlphaBay Marketplace, were forfeited in a default judgement by the US government in a California courtroom September 6th after no one appeared to contest the forfeiture, court documents indicate. The assets,… Read More

September 18, 2018 @ 5:33 pm By Cali Haan  |  

Major-General Khalil Ibrahim Al Mansouri, the Assistant-Commander of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Dubai Police, told attendees at a relevant forum in Dubai this weekend that a lack of awareness around possible criminal uses of cryptocurrencies in the UAE is putting citizens at risk,… Read More

September 18, 2018 @ 7:34 am By Cali Haan  |  

Security researchers in India have found malware that secretly mines cryptocurrencies on hundreds of local government computers, Economic Times reports. Sites for the Municipal Administration in Andhra Pradesh, Tirupati Municipal Corporation and Macherla municipality are among those affected. “CryptoJacking” attacks inject cryptocurrency mining malware (malevolent… Read More

September 17, 2018 @ 9:01 pm By Cali Haan  |  

Zimbabwe’s new Finance Minister, Mthuli Ncube, has urged central bankers in his inflation-plagued country to reconsider their cautious stance against cryptocurrencies, and says he may push the establishment of a national cryptocurrency for Zimbabwe, ITWebAfrica reports. The country should also should be more forward looking,… Read More

September 17, 2018 @ 1:37 pm By Cali Haan  |  

American crypto exchange Coinbase is hiring massively to staff brand new New York offices built exclusively to accommodate institutional clients, Coindesk reports. The exchange held a party to inaugurate the new office last week. Employees had previously occupied co-working space at WeWork NYC. Coinbase hopes… Read More

September 17, 2018 @ 10:55 am By Cali Haan  |  

The head of email security at Google says research tracing crypto thefts thefts back to comments made on online message boards means you should never talk up your crypto online, CNBC reports. This is because you never know who is watching nor how the info you… Read More

September 17, 2018 @ 9:42 am By Cali Haan  |  

Securities litigations against cryptocurrency projects in the US have tripled in 2018, Law.com reports, and the SEC under new Chairperson Jay Clayton is leading the charge in 30% of cases. In “Securities Litigation Report of 2018,” legal analytics firm Lex Machina found 45 cases filed… Read More

September 17, 2018 @ 7:53 am By Cali Haan  |  

Costs presently outweigh benefits, and so the European Central Bank (ECB), “has no plans to issue a central bank digital currency,” at this time, though it is investigating the matter, says ECB president, Mario Draghi. Draghi made the comments in a September 12th letter responding… Read More

September 16, 2018 @ 9:36 am By Cali Haan  |  

Malware leaked from the NSA’s tool chest over a year ago is now being used to mine cryptocurrencies secretly on infected Windows systems, TechCrunch reports, and worse attacks could follow if enterprises and governments don’t patch the vulnerability. The problem began in April 2017, when… Read More

September 15, 2018 @ 1:34 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Chief Commercial Officer of Bitpay, Sonny Singh, told Bloomberg this week that he and his colleagues at Bitpay have “never been more bullish” about Bitcoin though certain “altcoins” (cryptocurrencies other than Bitcoin) will never recover from current market downturns. Bitpay is a Bitcoin retail… Read More

September 12, 2018 @ 11:14 pm By Cali Haan  |  

Ivan Semagin, Deputy Director of the Financial Market Development at the Bank of Russia, told attendees at a finance and trade conference in Vladivostok this week that the Bank of Russia’s first “sandbox” trial of an ICO (intitial coin offering) blockchain system went well technically, though… Read More

September 12, 2018 @ 10:27 pm By Cali Haan  |  

A small town about 2 hours north of Toronto is being forced to pay bitcoins to have access to its computer systems restored by hackers, the Midland Newsroom reports. “In the early hours of Saturday, September 1, the Town of Midland became the victim of… Read More

September 12, 2018 @ 2:59 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The cryptocurrency market has lost 80% of its value since December 2018, with some altcoins, led by Ethereum, down over 90%. The crash that followed the burst of the dot-com bubble in 2000,  on the other hand, involved a correction of only 78% percent, says… Read More

September 12, 2018 @ 11:36 am By Cali Haan  |  

Authorities in the state of Gujarat, India have been asked by representatives from Illinois and Arizona states to seize the property of Indian citizens accused of promoting Bitconnect, a “wide-ranging Ponzi scheme” that allegedly bilked investors out of an estimated $5.6 billion before it collapsed in… Read More

September 12, 2018 @ 9:29 am By Cali Haan  |  

The founder of controversial crypto exchange OKEx has been questioned by Shanghai police regarding a case of suspected ICO fraud, Sina.com reports. The supervisor of the Shanghai Weifang Xincun Police Station, Lu Jun, issued a statement claiming that Shanghai police questioned OKEx founder Winxing (Star)… Read More

September 11, 2018 @ 10:12 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Government of New South Wales has decided to trial a blockchain-based version of its driver’s license program starting in November, ZDNet reports. During the trial, participants will be able to display a digital version of their drivers’ licenses on their phones at clubs, pubs… Read More

September 11, 2018 @ 9:44 pm By Cali Haan  |  

Seven suspects have been charged with various crimes related to a series of high-profile equipment thefts from Bitcoin mines in Iceland last year, Modern Consensus reports. The thefts came to the attention of industry aficionados in December last year, but became widely reported internationally in… Read More

September 11, 2018 @ 2:25 pm By Cali Haan  |  

FINRA announced today that it has charged the Massachusetts creator of the “HempCoin” ICO (initial coin offering) with securities fraud and, “the unlawful distribution of an unregistered cryptocurrency security…” FINRA, a Washington, DC-based self-regulatory organization of considerable might that presides over American securities brokers, claims that,… Read More

September 11, 2018 @ 12:09 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Marshall Islands could end up putting its one remaining relationship with a US bank at risk if it moves forward with plans to issues a national cryptocurrency, the International Monetary Fund warns. The advice comes after the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)… Read More

September 11, 2018 @ 11:20 am By Cali Haan  |  

A bitcoin mutual fund, “the first investment product of its kind in Canada and the only open-ended Bitcoin fund approved by the Canadian regulators,” is now available to accredited investors in Canada. The First Block Capital Bitcoin Trust (FBCBT) is the product of a partnership between NEO… Read More