Crypto
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AscendEX loses $80M following ERC-20, BSC, Polygon hot wallet compromise
Crypto trading platform AscendEX suffered a loss of $77.7 million in a hot wallet compromise that allowed hackers to access and transfer tokens hosted over the Ethereum (ETH), Binance Smart Chain (BSC) and Polygon (POLY) blockchains. Soon after realization, AscendEX proactively warned its users about the stolen funds, confirming that the hackers were not able to access the company’s cold wallet reserves. 22:00 UTC 12/11, We have detected a number of ERC-20, BSC, and Polygon tokens transferred from our hot wallet. Cold Wallet is NOT affected. Investigation underway. If any user’s funds are affected by the incident, they will be covered completely by AscendEX. — AscendEX (@AscendEX_Global) December 12, 2021 According to PeckShield, a blockchain security and data analytics company, around $60...
Metaverse opens the gateway for luxury NFTs to become a multi-billion market
The nonfungible token (NFT) market is hot right now, and the future forecasts that it will only be getting hotter. The creation of the Metaverse opens the gateway for NFT luxury brands to reach $56 billion by 2030. As the production of NFTs continues to create new forms of fashion consumption, more and more premium brands are jumping on this fast-moving train, investing in their new digital collectibles businesses. As more aspects of people’s lives are moving online, the demand for digital fashion and goods will increase significantly in the coming years. The Metaverse, virtual spaces where people can interact with each other and with digital objects through personalized avatars, is a groundbreaking concept currently being developed and built. Yet, it still has a long way to go. Stil...
Enterprise blockchain to play a pivotal role in creating a sustainable future
Bitcoin (BTC) is often used to criticize all blockchain-based projects. This is understandable since Bitcoin was the first project to use a blockchain, is arguably the most recognizable and is the largest cryptocurrency by market cap. In the first half of this article, I will use Bitcoin as a proxy for all blockchain-based projects because most people associate blockchain with Bitcoin. Anything environmentally positive that can be said about Bitcoin will be doubly true for the vast majority of newer blockchain-based projects since Bitcoin uses the oldest version of blockchain technology. Blockchain energy consumption Bitcoin has been attacked for high energy consumption. Headlines pointing out that Bitcoin’s electricity usage is comparable to a country’s total consumption is a popula...
From NFTs to CBDCs, crypto must tackle compliance before regulators do
Each year that we get a little further away from Satoshi Nakomoto’s whitepaper, crypto becomes more popular than ever, breaking more barriers — not just in sheer enthusiasm, but in mainstream acceptance. From nonfungible tokens (NFTs) to the Metaverse, 2021 was the year of crypto, even following a decade where just about every other year could make the same claim. Despite that peak enthusiasm and excitement though, we shouldn’t be blind to the fact that there are still fundamental issues that must be solved before crypto truly becomes the dominant “coin of the realm” across the globe, along with the backbone of the next industrial revolution. Prime among these issues are Anti-Money Laundering (AML), Know Your Customer (KYC) and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) protections that en...
Vitalik Buterin outlines path to ETH 2.0, Visa launches crypto advisory, Biden’s anti-crypto nominee for Comptroller withdraws: Hodler’s Digest, Dec. 5-11
Coming every Saturday, Hodler’s Digest will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link. Top Stories This Week Vitalik Buterin outlines ‘endgame’ roadmap for ETH 2.0 With the long-awaited transition to Eth2 coming closer to fruition, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin outlined an “Endgame” roadmap on Monday to finally achieve the landmark upgrade. While Buterin did not address the centralization issue with block production as the network works towards scalability, the 27-year-old essentially solved everything else to do with block validation. He suggested the idea of implementing “a second tier of st...
Bitmart pledges to reimburse hack victims as crypto community voices support
As regulatory uncertainty continues to plague the global digital asset ecosystem, there are many anti-crypto proponents who continue to harp on the fact that the industry as a whole has a long way to go when it comes to securing itself in a manner that is anywhere comparable to the traditional finance system. Now, with the recent Bitmart hack coming to light, these individuals have been given even more firepower. To recap, on Dec 5, cryptocurrency exchange Bitmart was on the receiving end of a major hack that saw the platform lose nearly $200 million via a hot wallet compromise hosted over the Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain blockchains. The breach was first exposed by blockchain security firm Peckshield whose cybersecurity team revealed that nefarious third parties were able to initially...
What is an eclipse attack?
When an attacker targets a network’s user, there is usually a deeper motive for doing so. Typically, eclipse attacks can serve as gateways for more complex attacks and disruptions. 0-confirmation double spends A user is at risk of a double-spend if they accept a transaction with no confirmations. By principle, although the transaction has already been broadcast, the sender can still create a new transaction and spend the funds somewhere else. Double spends can occur until a transaction has been included in a block and committed to the blockchain. New transactions that have a higher fee can also be included before original transactions to invalidate earlier transactions. What’s risky about this is that some individuals and businesses are in the practice of acce...
DeFi resolving the five flaws of traditional finance, book review
Writing a book on decentralized finance is a bit like describing a riddle, wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma, to borrow from Winston Churchill. First, one must summarize the origins of modern decentralized finance, then the mechanics of the blockchain technology that provides the sector’s backbone, and only then do you arrive at DeFi’s infrastructure. It all should be done in 191 pages, too, including glossary, notes and index. It is not an undertaking for the faint of heart. Fortunately, the authors of DeFi and the Future of Finance — Duke University finance professor Campbell Harvey, Dragonfly Capital general partner Ashwin Ramachandran, and Fei Labs founder Joey Santoro — were up to the task. After recapitulating the “five flaws of traditional finance” — inefficiency, limited access...
5 times quickfire crypto traders bought the news for double (or triple) digit profits
Why do crypto traders “buy the rumor, sell the news”? Simple. Because whispers of exchange listings or big-name partnerships reach very few people… while an article in Cointelegraph can reach hundreds of thousands of crypto enthusiasts in seconds. While insiders are quietly amassing tokens on rumors, the rest of us are completely ignorant of what may be coming. But with rumors, there are no guarantees. Which can lead to disappointment and serious loss of investment for those traders who gamble that they’re true… and end up wrong. So how can you possibly compete with thousands of other market participants when important news actually breaks? You’d have to be one of the very first to know in order to catch the price before it spikes. Look at the examples below — the time between a closely-gu...
South Africa’s financial regulator plans to introduce framework aimed at protecting vulnerable crypto investors: Report
Unathi Kamlana, the commissioner of South Africa’s Financial Sector Conduct Authority, has reportedly said the government’s rollout of a crypto framework would be aimed at mitigating any potential risks. According to a Friday report from Bloomberg, Kamlana said the financial regulator planned to present a regulatory framework early in 2022 intended to protect investors from “potentially highly risky” crypto assets. The commissioner said any framework on crypto would be created in coordination with the Prudential Authority and Financial Surveillance Board of the South African Reserve Bank. “What we want to be able to do is to intervene when we think that what is provided to potential customers are products that they don’t understand that are potentially highly risky,” said Kamlana. “We must...
Reelected Miami mayor to take 401k retirement savings partly in Bitcoin
The long-standing mayor of Miami Francis Suarez has now announced plans to take a part of his 401(k) payout in Bitcoin (BTC) just a month after he started receiving salary in BTC. Soon after becoming the first United States lawmaker to accept a part of his salary in Bitcoin, Suarez wants to dedicate a part of his retirement savings to Bitcoin based on “a personal choice,” he said in an interview with Real Vision: “I just think it is a good asset to be invested in. I think it’s one that’s obviously going to appreciate over time. It’s one that I believe in.” Suarez highlighted that Bitcoin’s success is tightly tied to the confidence in the system, which is inherently an “open-source, un-manipulatable system”. The mayor revealed that he has started receiving salary payments in Bitcoin t...
Fan token market cap surged over 60% since June: Data
The fan token market has been growing in value this year, surging around $157 million in terms of total market capitalization since June. According to data from major fan token website FanMarketCap, the market cap of all fan tokens is estimated to amount to slightly over $417 million at the time of writing. This is almost 60.4% up from the overall value of $260 million recorded in mid-June 2021, as Cointelegraph previously reported. The fan token market’s daily trading volume amounts to $270.2 million at publishing time. According to FanTokenStats, some of the most-valued fan tokens include Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Manchester City (CITY) issued by major fan token provider Socios and based on the Chiliz blockchain infrastructure. While PSG’s market capitalization is valued at jus...
