The digital financial services developer Enigma prides itself on ultra-secure products . The company's Catalyst platform protects financial info with a cutting-edge combination of blockchain-inspired privacy technology and cryptography. So it comes as no small surprise that on Monday, scammers took over the company's website, mailing lists, and Slack accounts by exploiting some extremely basic security mistakes Enigma had made. The blunders also facilitated a scam that ultimately cost Enigma supporters almost $500,000.

Enigma has planned an Initial Coin Offering for September 11an unregulated cryptocurrency fund-raising campaign that startups use when they want to raise capital for their company without going through the process of working with an established financial institution or venture capital fund. (The SEC has promised to clamp down on these ICOs , but so far is in the exploratory phase.)

Tom Simonite

Regulators Warn Cryptocurrency Startup Fundraisers to Play By the Rules

Gabriel Nicholas

Ethereum Is Coding's New Wild West

Brian Barrett

Security News This Week: Two Huge Cryptocurrency Heists Cost Investors Millions

With the ICO in mind, scammers compromised official Enigma channels to create a sense of legitimacy and urgency. The plot proved easy to pull off. At least one of the passwords protecting the Enigma accounts, which included a Slack account with administrative privileges, had previously leaked, and reports indicate that the accounts weren't protected by two-factor authentication.

The hackers began defacing the company's main site and Slack accounts, and pushed a special "pre-sale" ahead of the ICO, directing money toward their own cryptocurrency wallet. They also went rogue on the company's mailing lists. Many users realized that the push was a scam, but the hustle did tempt some interested backers into sending 1,492 coins in the cryptocurrency Ethereum, which converts to almost $495,000.

Enigma said in a statement on Monday that its community fund-raiser, also called a crowd sale, was always set definitively for September 11, and emphasized that its secure servers had not been hacked. But a spokesperson confirmed that the scammers compromised account passwords using various methods. And in response to the incident, the company says it is adding strong, random passwords and two-factor authentication for each account, plus implementing robust password changing and better system compartmentalization. "Weve moved up a number of critical security steps and taken additional measures to protect the community going forward," says Tor Bair, Enigma's head of marketing and growth. "Were now very well aware of the potential threats and are taking no chances."

Though honest mistakes can happen at any growing organization, the Enigma community grappled with the implications of the incident on Monday, wondering how a specialized cryptography company could only now be realizing the need for stringent account hygiene. "This will go down in crypto history as one of the stupidest moments ever. We need a meme," one Reddit user wrote. Some Redditors even claimed that they used the breached credential repository Have I Been Pwned to determine that the Enigma accounts scammers accessed reused a previously exposed account password from CEO Guy Zyskind. But Zyskind told WIRED that none of the breached Enigma accounts relied on reused passwords.

While the Enigma team worked to restore secure Slack service, the community's discussion moved to secure messaging app Telegram. "No word on honoring those who were scammed b/c of y'all negligence and poor security? Speaks volumes," a user called Jay wrote in the open chatroom. Many users indicated support for Enigma, though, and seemed satisfied with the company's remediation efforts.

"Hacking accounts that do not have dual-factor authentication enabled and other best in class security measures is a trivial hack for most dedicated attackers," says Chris Pierson, the general counsel and chief security officer of the payment platform Viewpost. "To the public it looks as if the company has been hacked, and provides a significant amount of negative press about the companys security and privacy responsibilities."

Enigma said on Monday evening that it is working to mitigate the damage. We're actively investigating the scam attempt and the parties involved with multiple partners, including vigilant members of our community, other companies in our space, and exchanges, Bair says.

Since they are unregulated by the governmentfor now, anywayICOs have perks that make them appealing to cryptocurrency companies, but by their nature they are also less predictable than standard fund-raising avenues. In mid July, scammers stole roughly $7 million from supporters during the ICO of the cryptocurrency management platform CoinDash. A few days later, hackers stole $32 million in Ethereum (though much of it was later recovered) by exploiting a vulnerability in a crypto product called Parity Wallet.

"The news of the attack is certainly not surprising," says Eric Klonowski, a senior advanced threat research analyst at the internet security firm Webroot. "Investors were ready to part with their money at a moments notice, and the attacker was prepared to capitalize.... That said, recent core cryptocurrency heists are all a result of third-party vulnerabilities and their handling of investments, and not in the cryptography or implementation itself."

With the September 11 ICO still rapidly approaching, at least Enigma has some time to get its first-line security right.

See the rest here:

A Very Dumb Mistake Costs Cryptocurrency Investors Big Time - WIRED

Via CoinMarketCap

The combined value of all publicly traded cryptocurrencies has set a new record, surpassing $150 billion for the first time today.

At press time, the value of ether, bitcoin and more than 800 other blockchain-based assets had reached a high of around $154 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.

Overall, the figure indicates that the cryptocurrency market continues to grow at a steady pace. At $154 billion, the market is up 13 percent over the last seven days, 67 percentover the last month and an astounding 1,240 percent year-over-year.

What might be most notable, however, is that the new high came during a trading session in which there were no individual all-time highs for major cryptocurrencies.

At $4,275 and $324, bitcoin and ether were edging up at press time,though still short of their highs above $4,500 and $400, respectively. Further, the new combined recordcame in spite of the fact there were no big gains in litecoin, monero or dash, some of the more popular alternative cryptocurrencies among traders.

The lone breakout, in fact, was Ripple's XRP token a cryptographic asset issued by a San Francisco startup seeking to build enterprise blockchain solutions. On the day's trading, XRP was up more than 50% to $0.28, a movement that built on impressive gains yesterday as well.

Disclosure:CoinDesk is a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which has an ownership stake in Ripple.

Mountain peakimage via Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. Have breaking news or a story tip to send to our journalists? Contact us at [emailprotected].

Originally posted here:

$150 Billion: Total Cryptocurrency Market Cap Hits New All-Time ... - CoinDesk

JOHANNESBURG Our article this week on answering readers burning questions on Bitcoin attracted a lot of interest and more questions which will be posted in a future article. But one readers letter to me particularly caught my attention. While my Dummies guide to Bitcoin article covered a lot of areas, I danced over the mining of crypto. However, this is a world where you can make money if youre willing to invest the capital in powerful cryptocurrency mining hardware. Andrew Crawford, in the below mailbox piece, outlines how he is on course to earn R50,000 this month from mining a cryptocurrency called Dash. Among the over 900 estimated cryptocurrencies in the world today, Dash like Bitcoin also works on a blockchain, but it touts havingadvanced capabilities such as instant and private transactions and decentralised governance. As Andrew outlines below, the price of Dash has shot up from around $94 to $300, dramatically reducing the period on his expected return on investment on a $5,800 Baikal 1.2 Gh Dash mining kit much shorter. So, fast is the pace of development in this space that this particular Baikal kit is now selling for $2,200 amid upgraded models. But this gives one an idea of whats involved. Gareth van Zyl

By Andrew Crawford

Hi Gareth,I enjoyed your article today.

Read more:Dummies guide to Bitcoin: BizNews readers burning questions answered

I first became aware of Bitcoin at a CFA investment conference in 2015. I then learnt its more about decentralised blockchain technology and Bitcoin is just the oldest and most significant currency used in blockchains (open source ledgers).

You glossed over mining as a way to get a toe in the water? Mining is just providing processing capacity to blockchain networks when you strip out the crypto lingo of mining. After researching the topic, I thought it was the least risky approach. What am I missing?

This year I decided to initially buy a Baikal 1.2 Gh Dash mine(price is now $2 200 but it previously cost $5 800). Cryptocurrency Dash was at $94 and the Rand exchange rate $13. Dash hit $300 in the last week so my 6 month projected Return on Investment (RoI) is now considerably shorter. At 300 watts the electricity is less than R300 pm for this Baikal processor. In a world where a share with a PE of 14 and dividend yield of 4% is good this RoI seems too good to be true. However, its working?!? Last week I also took delivery of 5 Antminer L3+ mines. Again the projected payouts are beating projections and these should earn me $3,780 this month (R50,000). My costs are R5,250 pm. Im earning in $ and paying costs in Rands.

Of course the price you pay to import these processors and their efficiency with regard toelectricity is key. I found the guys at Browntoast.co.za to be the most cost effective and efficient suppliers, and they help pick the most efficient processors. Setting up a mine / processor is beyond the average person but I think this was the least risky way for me to get into the unstoppable blockchain technology developments.

Crypto currency prices are highly volatile with all the signs of a bubble. Who knows? Getting into the game by providing processing power to blockchain networks seems to be a more substantial way to earn your crypto currency rather than speculating on the price going up? It also avoids the risk of the various cloud mining pyramid schemes being sold.

Originally posted here:

Mailbox: 'How I earn R50k per month by mining cryptocurrency' - BizNews

By and

August 23, 2017, 10:32 PM EDT August 24, 2017, 12:04 AM EDT

Heres another reason to be leery of the initial coin offerings being done at a staggering pace in the cryptocurrency world: theres a one-in-10 chance youll end up a victim of theft.

Phishing scams have helped push up criminal losses to about $225 million this year, according to Chainalysis, a New York-based firm that analyzes transactions and provides anti-money laundering software. In such scams, investors are tricked into sending money to internet addresses pretending to be funding sites for digital token offerings related to the ethereum blockchain technology.

More than 30,000 people have fallen prey to ethereum-related cyber crime, losing an average of $7,500 each, with ICOs amassing about $1.6 billion in proceeds this year, Chainalysis estimates.

Its a huge amount of money to generate in such a short period of time, said Jonathan Levin, co-founder of Chainalysis, whose software and database are used by some of the largest bitcoin companies and U.S. law enforcement agencies. The cryptocurrency phishers are doing pretty good against all the other types of criminals that are out there.

Indeed, the huge amount of wealth that has fallen prey to cyber criminals is approaching the losses incurred by robberies in the U.S. for the entire year of 2015, which stood at $390 million, according to statistics released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

ICOs are digital token sales typically that raise ether, with users transferring the funds to addresses provided by startups. Investors, sometimes eager to get early access to new token offerings have been tricked into providing their credentials to fake websites through targeted email campaigns, twitter posts and Slack messages, said Levin.

Read more about an Ethereum co-founders views on ICOs

Ether rose 0.1 percent to $324.17 on Thursday, according to data from coindesk, while bitcoin rose 0.2 percent to $4,201.

Most attacks involve creating websites or social media accounts that sound similar to the real ICO project. Levin gave the fictional example of a project named "illuminate," which an imposter might fake by spelling it as "iIIuminate." Using the fake account, they would solicit potential investors to send money to the criminals address.

His firm compiled the data by identifying so-called digital wallets used by scam artists. That information is usually public because criminals widely circulate it, hoping to fool investors into sending them money.

Other common forms of crime involve tapping into project loopholes. The DAO, or decentralized autonomous organization, is a smart contract project built on top of ethereum that was intended to democratize how ethereum projects are funded. A bug in the system was exploited and that led to the theft of $55 million worth of ether at the time.

Read more on how tech startups are ditching venture capital for ICOs

Levin didnt provide data for bitcoin-related cybercrime, and not because it is any safer. He said such data is harder to track as scams are usually specific attacks on individual holders, rather than ICO-related campaigns which try to dupe many people at once.

The overall figures mean there are infrastructure that we need to build to help prevent people from getting abused, said Levin.

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Cryptocurrency Cyber Crime Has Cost Victims Millions This Year ... - Bloomberg

A senior official forSouth Africa's central bank has saidit's "too risky" for the institution to launch its own cryptocurrency.

Speaking during theStrate GIBS FinTech Innovation Conference 2017 on Monday, the deputy governor of the South African Reserve Bank, Francois Groepe, commented on developments in the fintech space, taking a particular focuson blockchain and distributed ledgers.

According to regional news sourceITWeb, Groepe suggested that the central bank has an open mind on the question of issuing its own digital currency. That said, he struck a cautious note about the short-term prospects of doing so.

"Virtual currencies have the potential of becoming widely adopted," he told attendees, going on to say:

"However, for the central bank to issue virtual currencies or cryptocurrencies in an open system will be too risky for us. This is something we really need to think about."

Groepe's comments come almost a year to the day after the South African Reserve Bank indicated that it would adopt an open perspective on the tech even leaving the door open to applications of its own.

"We are willing to consider the merits and risks of blockchain technology and other distributed ledgers," the bank's governor, Lesetja Kganyago, said at the time.

Other major financial players in the country, including its central securities depository, have also moved to investigate possible uses of blockchain.

South African randsimagevia Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. Have breaking news or a story tip to send to our journalists? Contact us at [emailprotected].

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South Africa's Central Bank: It's 'Too Risky' to Launch a Cryptocurrency - CoinDesk

Weve officially hit peak ICO. Estonia, a small country in Northern Europe, just floated the idea of potentially raising money by issuing a token called estcoins.

So why Estonia?

The countryis pretty forward thinking when it comes to technology they are the first nation to offer an e-Residency program. The program is almost like a digital citizenship, and lets participants take advantage of a host of government services, including start a European Union-based company without actually setting foot in the country.

In amedium post today, Kaspar Korjus, the director of Estonias e-Residency program, floated the idea of issuing crypto tokens via an initial coin offering (ICO) to raise money for the nation. Without committing to anything just yet, Korjus outlined what he sees a potential ICO looking like, and said the next step may be a white paper outlining the value of the tokens and what the investment would be used for.

The government already is asking for feedback from the technology world, and Ethereum founderVitalik Buterin is an advisor to the project.

Korjus said that the money raised in the offering could be used for a fund jointly managed by the government and outside private companies. This fund would be used to invest in new technologies for the public sector as well as invest venture capital into Estonian companies founded by both natives and e-Residents. Eventually Korjus sees the tokens holding value and being used as a payment method for public and private services both within the country and globally, which would provide a return on investment to ICO participants.

Sois this a legitimate idea or just the latest example of an entity trying to make a quick buck by slapping together an ICO? To be clear theres no doubt that this idea wouldnt have been proposed if not for the insane money (and corresponding attention) now surrounding ICOs.

That being said its not necessarily a bad thing. Eventually governments will adopt digital cryptocurrencies. Its just a matter of when, and in what form. Will the United States ever replace the dollar with bitcoin? Absolutely not. But will they supplement their gold reserves with bitcoin or another cryptocurrency? Much more likely, especially if Bitcoin becomes a major part of the U.S financial system.

Estonia experimenting with their own cryptocurrency could just make them an early adopter. Sure, doing it via an ICO may not be best image considering all the fraud and get rich quick schemes happening in the space recently. But who can blame them for trying, especially with all the money being thrown around these days?

More:

This European country may hold an ICO and issue its own ... - TechCrunch

Trend Micro says Coinminer's use of fileless WMI scripts and EternalBlue makes its threat to Windows machines "extremely stealthy and persistent".

Criminals are infecting Windows machines with fileless malware that runs in memory, and puts the hijacked PCs to work on mining cryptocurrency.

Two features in particular make this malware, known as Coinminer, "extremely stealthy and persistent", according to malware researchers at Trend Micro.

To infect Windows machine, it's using the so-called EternalBlue vulnerability employed by WannaCry and NotPetya as a spreading mechanism. Microsoft released a patch for the flaw in March but a spate of infections in Asia, mostly in Japan, suggest some systems have not been updated.

On machines vulnerable to this bug, the malware runs a backdoor that installs several Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) scripts that run in memory, which makes them more difficult to detect.

IT admins can use WMI to run scripts that automate administrative tasks on remote computers and acquire management data from these computers and installed Windows applications.

However, in this case the cryptocurrency mining malware uses WMI for more nefarious purposes, including connecting to the attacker's command-and-control domains to download the mining software and malware.

WMI malware isn't new and was used in the infamous Stuxnet malware. FireEye has also found an advanced hacker group APT29 using WMI capabilities to create persistent and stealthy backdoors by automatically triggering a backdoor when a system starts up.

Malwarebytes identified WMI techniques being used to hijack Chrome and Firefox to redirect users to an attack site.

According to Trend Micro, the mining malware operation includes a timer that automatically triggers the malicious WMI script every three hours.

Admins should disable the SMBv1 file-sharing protocol to prevent attacks using Eternal Blue, an exploit for SMBv1 thought to be created by the NSA and leaked in April by the Shadow Brokers.

Even before the leak of EternalBlue and WannaCry's adoption of it, Microsoft was urging customers to stop using the 30-year-old protocol.

Trend Micro also points to a Microsoft tool that can trace WMI activity and recommends restricting WMI on an as-needs basis, as well as disabling WMI on machines that don't need access to it.

Hackers are making their malware more powerful by copying WannaCry and Petya ransomware tricks

The group behind Trickbot is attempting to give its Trojan malware the self-spreading worm-like capabilities that have made recent ransomware attacks go global.

Leaked NSA hacking exploit used in WannaCry ransomware is now powering Trojan malware

EternalBlue Windows security flaw is being leveraged to make Nitol and Gh0st RAT cyberespionage tools more effective, warn researchers.

Originally posted here:

Windows security: Cryptocurrency miner malware is enslaving PCs ... - ZDNet

Computer hardware maker Asus hasrevealed a new motherboard with features geared specifically toward cryptocurrency miners.

Dubbed the B250 Mining Expert, the board was debuted over the weekend by Asus'Republic of Gamers, the Taiwan-based manufacturer's high-end gaming brand.

And while the product'srelease date and price aren't known yet, it nonetheless represents the latest signal that the mainstream hardware industry is expanding its cryptocurrency footprint.Further, theannouncement comes months after Asusbegan rolling outGPUsdesigned specifically with crypto-miners in mind aimed to take full advantage of the digital "gold rush" now taking place.

The B250 Mining Expert motherboard itself boasts a total of 19 PCI-Express expansion slots, compared to the 12, eight or six slots featured oncompetitors' products.

The idea is that cryptocurrency miners who use computing power (and lots of electricity) toadd new transactions to a blockchain, receivingnewly minted coins as a reward want to run as a many graphics cards as possible. The forthcoming board, according to the specs that are circulating, has roughly the capacity of two to three regular-sized motherboards.

The 19 expansion slots are split into threegroups, each containing 24 dedicated pins. This allows the mining rig to be connected to three power supply units at once, stabilizing the rig for multi-GPU usage. The board also boasts a variety of features likely toappeal to miners, such as live visual statistics.

As previously reported by CoinDesk, other major GPU makers like Nvidia and AMD have moved in recent months to capitalize on the spike indemand for products that can be used for mining.

Earlier this month,Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang issued bullish statements on the prospects for his firm's entry into the mining space, suggesting that it could be a long-term revenue driver.

"Cryptocurrency and blockchain are here to stay," he said.

ProductimageviaAsus

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. Have breaking news or a story tip to send to our journalists? Contact us at [emailprotected].

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Asus Debuts Specialized Motherboard for Cryptocurrency Miners - CoinDesk

Onetime bitcoin skeptic Mark Cuban is warming to the digital currency world.

The billionaire is backing a new venture capital fund for cryptocurrency-related investments called 1confirmation. Founded by Nick Tomaino, former business development manager at Coinbase, the fund plans to raise $20 million, according to a Monday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

"It's an interesting space that I [want] to get involved with and learn more" about, Cuban said in an email to CNBC Tuesday. He did not specify the size of his investment.

Cuban's opinion on digital currencies has changed fairly recently. In an Aug. 14 tweet, the Dallas Mavericks owner admitted he "might have to finally buy some" bitcoin, contrasting with a June tweet that said he thought bitcoin was in a "bubble."

"Bias should be up because of finite supply. Until crypto or US politics intrude, and they will," he added in another tweet on Aug. 14.

In late June, Cuban said he planned to participate in an initial coin offering by Unikrn, an online esports betting site in which he holds a stake.

Earlier that month, Cuban tweeted that he didn't know when or by how much the price of bitcoin, which has soared in value this year, would correct. He did acknowledge then that the blockchain technology backing bitcoin had value and that it "will be at the core of most transactions in the future. Healthcare, finance etc all will use it."

IBM announced Tuesday that it will work with major food companies such as Wal-Mart, Unilever, Tyson Foods, Dole and Kroger to "identify new areas where the global supply chain can benefit from blockchain."

However, bitcoin's surge and a rush of funds into initial coin offerings have attracted more investment attention.

Bitcoin has quadrupled in value this year and hit a record last Thursday of $4,522.13 with a market capitalization of about $74 billion, according to CoinDesk. Initial coin offerings, which are fundraising events used by cryptocurrency-related start-ups, have raised $1.37 billion so far this year, CoinDesk data showed.

Source: CoinDesk

The launch of the 1confirmation fund comes amid increased fundraising for cryptocurrency-related businesses.

On Aug. 10, digital currency storage and exchange company Coinbase announced it raised $100 million in private equity funding led by Dropbox investor IVP. That marks the largest single traditional funding round for a public blockchain or cryptocurrency start-up, according to CoinDesk.

Other participants in 1confirmation include Brendan Eich, creator of the JavaScript computer programming language; Balaji Srinivasan, board partner at technology venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, and David Vorick, who is building a blockchain-based cloud storage system called Sia. The fund's founder, Tomaino, is also a principal at venture fund Runa Capital.

Disclosure: CNBC owns the exclusive off-network cable rights to "Shark Tank," which features Mark Cuban as a panelist.

Original post:

Mark Cuban backs new $20 million cryptocurrency venture fund - CNBC

Mark Cuban wants in on the cryptocurrency boom even if it turns out hes right that bitcoin is in a bubble.

Cuban is investing in 1confirmation, a fund that plans to raise $20 million to invest in blockchain-based companies, the tech billionaire said in an interview. Venture capital firm Runa Capital is among other investors, and its technical advisors include Andreessen Horowitz board partner Balaji S. Srinivasan and programming language JavaScript founder Brendan Eich.

I have always looked at blockchain as a foundation platform from which great applications can be built, Cuban said in an Aug. 19 email response to questions. Hopefully we can find a few.

Runa Capital principal Nick Tomaino was an early employee at digital currency exchange Coinbase Inc. and runs the cryptocurrency-focused blog The Control. They plan to differentiate 1confirmation from the slew of digital currency hedge funds that have sprung up recently by taking a page from the venture-capital play book.

Rather than investing in digital tokens through initial coin offerings or in the secondary market,1confirmation plans to invest from $100,000 to $500,000 in early stage companies before their ICO, and help those companies develop their product. Once the startup is ready to issue an ICO, the fund hopes to negotiate a discounted price.

Its a more cautious approach to the frenzy that has consumed the space this year, with startups raising hundreds of millions of dollars in days, or even minutes, with little real business applications besides a white paper and a website. Startups had raised $1.8 billion in ICOs as of last week, according to Coindesk.

The fund will focus investments in projects that help developers build decentralized applications, rather than those aimed at end users, on the belief that the sector isnt mature enough for blockchain applications to be adopted on a mass scale.

A number of funds focused on blockchain companies and their tokens have opened in the past year as bitcoins price more than tripled and cryptocurrencies market capitalization surpassed $100 billion. Polychain Capital, founded by another Coinbase alum, Blockchain Capital and Pantera Capital are some examples.

Cuban, who is a majority owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team and star of startup investing theme show Shark Tank, tweeted in June that bitcoin was in a bubble, causing the cryptocurrency to drop in price. Cuban says thats beside the point given the developing underlying technology.

1Confirmation would be Cubans second foray into cryptocurrencies as he also plans to invest in tokens sold by his portfolio company Unikrn. Cuban says he plans to invest on a third crypto-related project in the future, as well as potentially buying crypto currencies, which he doesnt currently own.

Its hard to establish any intrinsic value for bitcoin or any of the the cryptocurrencies. Ifeveryone continues to tell their grandparents, cousins and co-workers to buy,the price can go a lot higher as there is a definable, finite amount, but if the number of buyers dry up or there are a few massive sellers we could see under $1,000 again, Cuban said. None of this has anything to do with the applications that can be built with blockchain. The question is whether great companies can be financed and built and I think the answer is yes.

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Bitcoin Skeptic Mark Cuban to Invest in Cryptocurrency ...

Estonia is considering taking advantage of the cryptocurrency hype to do an initial coin offering (ICO) for its own country.

Kaspar Korjus, a representative for the Baltic country, wrote that if investors showed enough interest, Estonia would issue its own cryptocurrency to raise funds.

Estoniaalready has an e-residency program where anyone in the world can become a digital resident of the country, allowing them to open a business there. It sees issuing a coin as the next step in advancing its economy and expanding its global presence.

Major investors have taken notice, too. Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz, major Silicon Valley venture capital firms, invested in Filecoins record breaking ICO earlier in the month.

Its unclear how an "estcoin" would differ from other cryptocurrencies that already exist, though.

By using our APIs, companies and even other countries could accept these same tokens as payment, Korjus wrote. It will also be possible to build more functions on top of the estcoins and use them for more purposes, such as smart contracts and notary services.

Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency, is already capable of handling smart contracts and powering notary services. Rootstock allows Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, to do the same things.

A hypothetical estcoins fate being tied to a country, would also undermine its appeal to many in its community who are drawn to cryptocurrencies because there usually is no central authority to trust.

Bitcoin, for example, is decentralized and not reliant on any single hub of activity. Its not based on any single set of servers nor does it require trust in any country or institution, like "estcoin" likely would.

Korjus did not immediately respond to request for comment on this, however, Ethereums developer, Vitalik Buterin, consulted the country on the proposed coin and spoke favorably of it.

An ICO within the e-Residency ecosystem would create a strong incentive alignment between e-residents and this fund, and beyond the economic aspect makes the e-residents feel like more of a community since there are more things they can do together, says Buterin.

More:

Estonia wants to launch its own cryptocurrency - The Hill

The central bank of the Philippines has granted licenses to two local bitcoin exchanges, according to reports.

Daily newspaper The Philippine Starreportedthe developments on Sunday, citing statements from central bank chief Nestor Espenilla Jr.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas firstreleased its rules for domestic exchanges in February, seeking to lay down a foundation for the country's nascent cryptocurrency space. Yet the central bank has seen relatively little interest from prospective applicants, according to one official who commented to local media in late July.

That said, Espenilla, who spoke during a financial technology event over theweekend, indicated that the central bank is being proactive about bringing exchanges under its regulatory auspices.

"We see a rapid increase in the trajectory. It is coming from a small base but increasing that is why we decided to require them to register," he told attendees.

Espenilla also offered some figures on the local bitcoin trade, according to the news source, saying that exchanges are seeing as much as $6 million in volume a month a figure that represents three times the $2 million per month seen last year.

"We are moving to regulate them," Espenilla emphasized.

Financial districtof Manillaimage via Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. Have breaking news or a story tip to send to our journalists? Contact us at [emailprotected].

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Philippines Central Bank Grants First Cryptocurrency Exchange Licenses - CoinDesk

A few days ago, AMD released the Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition Beta for Blockchain Compute driver. According to the release notes on the tech giants website, the software optimizes the performance for Blockchain Compute Workloads, thereby boosting the efficiency of cryptocurrency mining rigs that are using a GPU for mining (eg., Ethereum mining rigs).

Currently, the graphics driver can be downloaded from AMDs official website. The beta software supports desktop GPUs from AMD Radeon HD 7700, and it can be installed on 64-bit Windows 7 (Service Pack 1 or higher required) and 64-bit Windows 10 systems. AMD highlighted in the release notes that the graphics driver is not intended to boost users gaming performance. The company added that since this is a beta software, it will not be supported with further updates, upgrades or bug fixes.

AMDs new beta driver is designed to fix an issue related to the DAG (directed acyclic graph) size. As the number of blocks in the Ethereum blockchain increases (taking roughly 14 seconds to generate a block), so does Ethereums epoch (a 100-hour window). For every epoch, or 30,000 blocks, a DAG is generated. As the DAG size grows, the memory requirements for mining Ethereum increase. Since the memory footprint of the workload is increasing, it will, at a certain time, overflow from the graphics cards memory and will be stored in the main system memory. The main system memory is much slower than accessing the GPUs VRAM. If a mining rig is slower to access the memory, it will result in performance penalties concerning the miners hashrate.

AMDs new beta driver appears to have fixed the DAG issue. According to TechPowerUp, there is only a minimal difference between mining different DAG sizes with the beta software. Compared to the old driver, the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 8GB (1546 MHz/945 MHz) experienced an 81 percent increase in the hashrate mining DAG 199.

The Reddit community has also confirmed that AMDs new update is resulting in greater hashrates for their GPUs.

My RX Vega went from 31 to 37Mh/s mining ETH only. Very nice improvement, wrote a user named Hot-Diggity-Daffodil.

Just got these new drivers installed on one of my 6 gpu rigs. MSI RX 580 8GBs confirmed back up to 29.5 from 27.5. Installing on other rigs now. Using BBT modded ROMs, another user called TheHansGruber wrote in the /r/EtherMining subreddit.

AMDs beta driver will boost the performance of Ethereum mining rigs for a while. However, if Ethereum evolves from proof of work to proof of stake, with a first step toward this model expected on November 1, GPUs will be less needed over time. At the instance of proof of stake, the mining is based on coin ownership rather than hash power.

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AMD Releases Beta Graphics Driver for Better Cryptocurrency Mining - Bitcoin Magazine

Eugne Etsebeth is an ex-central bankerwho was employed as a technologist at the South African Reserve Bank from 2013 to 2017. During his time at the reserve bank, he notablychaired the virtual currency and distributed ledger working group.

In this opinion piece, Etsebeth outlines why he believes central banks won't be able to adapt to innovations in cryptocurrency, arguing they simply aren't set up to compete with sea changes in technology.

It's a familiar trend, one that happened in communications (internet), and that is now playing out in energy (solar), manufacturing (3D printing)and finance (cryptocurrency) power and control are moving into the hands of the individual and away from nation states.

This has huge implications for central banks, which today enable nation states to maintain their monopolies over the issuance of notes, coins and sovereign bonds. While communications and manufacturing are not their focus, cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings (ICOs) fall predominantly in the realm of central banks.

In these systems,central banks don't issue legal tender. Rather, miners and algorithms now control the issuance of tokens effectively, the money supply. Whereas previously banks were licensed to store, send and spend currency, now wallet providers and exchanges allow the same features.

The currency renaissance has arrived and central banks are studying cryptocurrencies, though some central banks are more open to change than others.

Singapore has been investigating the notion of using distributed ledger technologies to settle cross-border transactions in real time, and the Bank of England has experimented with Ripple. Central banks are even looking to build their own versions of central bank-issued digital currency (CBDC).

Even still, central banks are not well equipped to deal with the cryptocurrency renaissance.

In fact, there are10 good reasons why most central banks will find cryptocurrencies insurmountable. Sure, a small number of forward-thinking (and acting) central banks willmaintain monetary competiveness with the burgeoning cryptocurrencies and ICOs that have reared their decentralized heads.

Still, most will succumb to a mix of the following issues:

Central banks will need to attract and retain fresh talent that will enable them to deal with the new openness and transparency demands, as well as digital transformation and the increasingly complex global world.

Decision-making in central banks is like wading through treacle decisions take months because of numerouslayers of hierarchy.

Working groups need to compile voluminous and detailed documents that need to be reviewed and signed by all parties before they can proceed to the heads of departments or the deputy governors.

Academics, economists and big-picture thinkers excel in central banks. The academics ponder on conceptual issues andthe economists make interpretations from data, whereas the policy makers and regulators mull over the cause and effect of promulgating laws.

However,technologists are generally not part of the discussion when it comes to policy and economic decisions for currency.

Although some central banks are engaging in experimentation, there is a fear of going from proof-of-concept to pilot phase.

This is natural, should a central bank make an error, it may turn out to be a reputation buster and reputation is the cornerstone of central banks. There is also some trepidation that the early regulation of cryptocurrencies, and associated new technologies, may legitimize their adoption.

Central banks are similar to conglomerates in that they have a number of different and distinct departments that require diverse skills and outputs.

These differences make it difficult to approach a new technology and economic tour de force like cryptocurrency, because it doesnt fit neatly into any one of the industrial-style conglomerate domains.

To highlight the conglomerate type nature of central banks, the core departments and skill sets are listed below:

Most central banks do not have substantial software development capability. Therefore any new project will have to buy its technology. There is an acute shortage of central bankers who can explain or use Merkle trees.

A large portion of central bankers are career central bankers, so the desire and ability to change arenot incentivised. Change is often considered a threat to staff, and threats are met with jelly-like stickiness to the status quo.

Banks are licensed to operate by central banks, giving them the ability to create money from customer deposits.

The central bank asks the banks to protect depositor's hard-earned money and to serve as many customers as it can: i.e. maximizingfinancial inclusion. The task of banks is therefore to service anation's citizens at the behest of the central bank.

These relationships and licenses are expensive to buy and will not easily be changed to include new members.

Just as the departments within central banks tend to be siloed, so too are the intergovernmental departments that look at currency matters.

They cover treasury, financial intelligence (KYC), financial services conduct authority, central bank, tax revenue and secret service units. Each of these units may have different acts and regulations that overlap cryptocurrencies and ICOs.

Internationally the nation-state must get guidance from a multitude of organisations like the G20 or G7, International Monetary Fund (IMF), Bank of International Settlements (BIS), Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and INTERPOL. International coordination often requires prolonged diplomacy and mismatched agendas.

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10 Reasons Why Central Banks Will Miss the Cryptocurrency Renaissance - CoinDesk

Cryptocurrency facts takes a simplified look at digital currency like bitcoin to help everyone understand what it is, how it works, and its implications. On this site, we cover everything you need to know about:

As of 2017, cryptocurrency has been used as a decentralized alternative to traditional fiat currencies (which are usually backed by somecentral government)such asthe US dollar (USD).

For theaverage person using cryptocurrency is as easy as:

What is a cryptocurrency address?: A public address is a unique string of charactersused to receive cryptocurrency. Each public address has a matching private address that can be used to prove ownership of thepublic address. WithBitcoin the addressis called a Bitcoin address. Think of it like a unique email address that people can send currency to as opposed to emails.

The first decentralized digital cryptocurrency can be traced back to Bit Gold, which was worked on by Nick Szabo between 1998 and 2005. Bit gold is considered the first precursor to bitcoin. In 2008,Satoshi Nakamoto (an anonymousperson and/or group) released a paper detailing what would become Bitcoin.

Bitcoin became the first decentralized digital coin when it was created in 2008. Itthen went public in2009. As of 2015, Bitcoinis the most commonly known cryptocurrency. Given thepopularity of Bitcoin as well asits history, the term altcoin is sometimes used to describe alternative cryptocurrenciesto bitcoin.

As of January 2015, there wereover 500different types of cryptocurrencies or altcoins for trade in online markets. However,only 10 of them had market capitalizations over $10 million.As of 2017 thetotal market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies reached an all-time high passing $60 billion!

In other words, cryptocurrency isnt just a fad, it is likely a growing market that (despite its pros and cons) is likely here for the long haul.

On this site, we explore every aspect of cryptocurrency. Simply choose a page from the menu,visitour what is cryptocurrency page for a more detailed explanation of cryptocurrency, or jump right in to the how cryptocurrency works section to start learning about transactions, mining, and public ledgers.

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New details have emerged about Australia's proposed cryptocurrency exchange law.

As reported yesterday by CoinDesk, Australia is moving ahead with plans to formalize the government's oversight of the domestic exchange space. Specifically, the government wants to update existing anti-money laundering statutes to account for the tech.

A draft text of the bill has since beenposted to the website of the Australian Parliament, offering key details on how the country plans to regulate the industry.

Of particular note are the penalties for operating an unlicensed cryptocurrency exchange offenders could face as many as seven years in prison, depending on the severity of the violation and whether they've received prior warnings from regulators.

First-time offenders could be hit with prison sentences as long as two years and as much as $100,000 in fines. Repeat offenders may also receive fines as high as $400,000.

"A person...must not provide a registrable digital currency exchange service to another person if the first person is not a registered digital currency exchange provider," the bill states.

The measure also outlines the creation of a so-called "Digital Currency Exchange Register", which would be overseen by the Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC), the Australia's foremost financial intelligence agency.

The registration process could take as many as 180 days, according to the bill's text, depending on the outcome of AUSTRAC's approval process and if subsequent filings are required by the applicant.

In statements yesterday, the Australian government positioned the measure as one that would close a "gap" in the regulatory structure for cryptocurrency businesses.

"The bill will ... close a regulatory gap by bringing digital currency exchange providers under the remit of AUSTRAC," officials said.

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Australia Weighs Jail Time for Cryptocurrency Exchange Offenders - CoinDesk

Cryptocurrency exchange service is reviewing its listings in light of recent statements on initial coin offerings (ICOs) from the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

In a new blog post, the exchange said that it was launching the review, which could see it delist some of the trading pairs it offers, in a bid to avoid being "mischaracterized as a securities exchange."

As CoinDesk previously reported, the SEC revealed last month that it had been investigating The DAO, the ethereum-based funding vehicle that raised more than $150 million through a token sale. The agency ultimately ruled that those tokens which were sold and later freely traded on cryptocurrency exchanges qualify as securities, and that other token sales may fall under this definition as well.

It's in light of this statement that ShapeShift has asked its lawyers to examine whether the Howey Test a long-standing test used to determine whether certain assets qualify as securities applies to the tokens it lists. It's a notable development whichsignals that the SEC statement is having at least some impact on the startups that facilitate the exchangeof blockchain-based tokens.

ShapeShift explained in the blog post:

"This means that we may need to delist some types of tokens from the platform, which is unfortunate for our users who have enjoyed the ability to participate in these experimental and innovative technologies. We have thus instructed our counsel to examine the tokens available on ShapeShift, especially through the lens of the Howey Test, which is the test the SEC applies to determine the presence of a security."

As the statement goes on to suggest, US-based customers of ShapeShift may be the ones that feel the biggestimpact as the review moves ahead.

"As that analysis is done, certain tokens may be removed from the service for individuals within the United States, who will then no longer be able to interact with these technologies safely or transparently through the ShapeShift platform," the startup said, going on to add that it may "consider the application of the Howey test to all new tokens we list."

Disclosure: CoinDesk is a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which has an ownership stake in ShapeShift.

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On the heels of its Vega launch last week, AMD has released a new driver for its GPUs that focuses on cryptocurrency mining. The new driver is supposed to make Vega faster when mining, though AMD also notes that the driver is provided as a beta level support driver which should be considered as is and will not be supported with further updates, upgrades or bug fixes.

AMD and Nvidia have taken different approaches to cryptocurrency during this latest cycle. Earlier this year, AMD reported that cryptocurrency might have driven a short-term spike in sales, but that the company did not include it in their future forecasts. AMD has said that it continues to monitor the cryptocurrency business, but that it has no plans for a major pivot. The driver being labeled as a beta as-is product certainly supports this analysis.

Nvidia, on the other hand, has a different take. Jen-Hsun Huang has told investors that Cryptocurrency and blockchain are here to stay. Over time, it will become quite large. It is very clear that new currencies will come to market. Its clear the GPU is fantastic at cryptography. The GPU is really quite well positioned.

This disparate take on mining may reflect certain realities both companies have faced. Back in 2011 2014, when Bitcoin and Litecoin mining were still being done on GPUs, AMD was the only company that really benefitedand at the same time, it didnt benefit much at all. GPU sales to gamers fell like a rock. By the time the cryptocurrency mining craze had pased, Nvidia had the GTX 980 and 970 ready to go. The window of opportunity for Hawaii had passed. Some of you may also recall that AMDs GPU prices simply blew through the roof, with an R9 280X, which should have been a $300 card based on AMDs MSRPs, actually selling for $489.

Nvidia, on the other hand, was locked out of this market altogether. During the same time frame, Kepler and even Maxwell were not a match for AMDs cryptocurrency performance. Now, with Ethereum and Pascal, Nvidias performance is much stronger. Thats likely part of the reason why the two companies see things differently. AMD got burned by this market once already, and Nvidia may feel that its stronger relationships with board partners or greater manufacturing capacity via contracts with TSMC will keep them in a leadership position in graphics.

ExtremeTech recommends that anyone interested in cryptocurrency mining approach the topic the same way you should approach gambling. If you want to take a shot and try to make some profit, feel freebut dont risk any funds you cant afford to lose. Cryptocurrency prices are famously volatile and you may not be able to count on sustained, long-term profits.

Theres a report from Overclock3D that we havent been able to confirm or debunk, claiming that AMDs GPU pricing of 449.99 in the UK ($499 in the US) was only for the launch. Overclockers UKs Gibbo writes:

Now the good and bad news, the good news is AMD are rebating early launch sales to allow us to hit 449.99 on the stand alone black card which has no games. This is a launch only price which AMD at present are saying will be withdrawn in the near future, when if it happens is unknown, but remember do not be shocked if the price jumps nearly 100 in a few days.

We have requested confirmation or explanation of this from AMD, but the company was not able to provide us with a response by the time this story went to press. We will update it when we have more information on the future of Vegas price. It also isnt clear that these price increases, if true, are a global shift or merely reflect UK pricing. And finally, theres the chance the the information given was simply incorrect. A $128.76 price increase on Vega would make it far too expensive to recommend, given its power consumption and performanceunless, of course, the GTX 1080 is kicked up into the stratosphere long-term as well.

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AMD Releases Cryptocurrency Mining Driver, May Raise Vega ... - ExtremeTech

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Unikrn, a U.S. sports betting digital platform backed by some of the biggest names in media, entertainment and sports, will launch the sale of $100 million in cryptocurrency next month, the company's co-founder and chief executive officer, Rahul Sood, told Reuters in an interview earlier this week.

The sale is part of a trend in which creators of digital currencies in the blockchain space sell tokens to the public to fund their projects. Some start-ups call this mode of financing an initial coin offering (ICO); others refer to it as a "token sale."

Cryptocurrency is a digital currency in which encryption techniques help keep transactions secure. Blockchain is a digital ledger of transactions underpinning the original online currency bitcoin.

Sood explained that Unikrn embraced cryptocurrency as a way to bypass banking institutions.

"The problem when you're dealing with banks is that none of these guys are easy to work with," Sood said. "You're dealing with 20 different currencies, you're dealing across borders. There's no other reason to go this route other than to circumvent banking."

The new coin will be called UnikoinGold, which will be a cryptocurrency version of the company's existing coin UniKoin. The current UniKoin, which allows users to bet on e-sports in regulated markets and win prizes in markets where Unikrn is not licensed to operate, will be phased out once UniKoingold is launched.

Unikrn is capping its token sale at $100 million because "if we don't, it's going to go crazy," Sood said.

Sood said there will be a pre-sale of the token in the next few weeks and a crowdsale in September. There will be no discount for early investors or company founders and employees.

Sood founded Voodoo, which manufactures high-end computers for video games, when he was in high school. He eventually sold his company to Hewlett Packard after 16 years and eventually joined Microsoft and ran the company's venture fund for start-ups.

Seattle-based Unikrn, which was launched nearly three years ago, is backed by well-known investors including Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team; U.S. actor Ashton Kutcher's venture firm Sound Ventures; Elisabeth Murdoch's venture fund Freeland Ventures, as well as Shari Redstone's Advancit Capital. TabCorp, the largest betting company in Australia is also an investor.

The company raised $10 million from early investors, Sood said.

Elisabeth Murdoch is the daughter of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, while Shari Redstone is the daughter of Sumner Redstone whose family is a majority owner of several media groups including CBS Corp., Viacom, and MTV Networks.

Reporting by Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss; Editing by Bernadette Baum

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US e-sports platform to launch $100 million cryptocurrency sale in September - Reuters