Chinese local governments are facing difficulties when implementing blockchain applications due to stakeholders unwillingness to share privately owned data, according to a local report on June 10. Data is king According to the investigation, there are more than 30 related local governments procuring blockchain technology. Their aim is to leverage blockchain to build management platforms that improve local administrative and social governance capabilities. Some of these projects have been forced to shut down in under two years, according to the news due to lack of supporting data. The reason? Many stakeholders refuse to share their personal data. Zhang Desheng, a …

Blockchain-based decentralized data storage solution Filecoin unveiled its testnet recently, complete with a competition. In an act of network experimentation, Filecoin's test network will host a three week mining contest worldwide, with 4 million of the project's FIL tokens up for grabs as prize funding, according to a June 10 statement provided to Cointelegraph. Mainnet — the final frontier A product of tech firm Protocol Labs, Filecoin garnered $257 million during its 2017 Initial Coin Offering, or ICO. Filecoin has completed other trials prior to the testnet unveiling, the statement detailed. The project also transitioned into Proof-of-Replication, or PoRep, consensus, …

Daily Ethereum network fees surpassed those of the Bitcoin (BTC) network for two consecutive days on June 6 and June 7, data obtained by on-chain market analysis firm Glassnode shows. According to Glassnode, on June 6, the total amount in fees spent on the Ethereum network added up to $498,000, compared to Bitcoin’s $308,000. The gap continued to widen the next day, totalling $540,000 and $258,000 represectively. The “feepening” This is the second time Ethereum network fees have topped Bitcoin’s this year. On March 12, there was a sudden spike in Ethereum network fees, which totalled almost $800,000, greatly exceeding …

Waves Enterprise has launched Voting — a blockchain-powered e-voting platform centering corporate clients — for public beta testing. According to the official announcement, published on May 28, the new service aims to “leverage all the advantages of blockchain technology while retaining traditional voting rules and processes”. Artem Kalikhov, chief product officer of Waves Enterprise, told Cointelegraph that only a decentralized solution can guarantee data protection and transparency in online voting: “The blockchain provides a trustless environment for data exchange between independent encryption servers that act as participants of voting protocol. Voting results are protected by cryptographic algorithms. Blockchain technology does …

Top crypto data aggregator CoinMarketCap (CMC) has introduced yet another algorithm update following its acquisition deal with Binance, according to a CMC blog post published yesterday. The data provider, which was purchased for an unspecified sum by Binance in early April, has started adjusting its ranking system soon after the deal took place. As a result, Binance has come on top of its exchange ranking, drawing criticism from the community and other trading platforms. Latest update brings more metrics to exchange rankings In its latest update, CMC implemented a new algorithm “to replace the previous default ranking of exchanges by …

With block #632874, which was mined on June 3, the Bitcoin (BTC) blockchain’s expected cumulative work hit a new milestone. According to Blockstream co-founder Pieter Wuille, it has now surpassed 2^92 double-SHA256 hashes, or 4951760157141521099596496896 hashes. Wuille noted that the previous milestone — 2^91 hashes — was secured in August 2019, also revealing the current rate: “These days we add 2^57 hashes - as much work as was done ever by november 2010 - every 1.3 milliseconds on average…” Crypto pioneer Adam Back — who was cited in the original white paper — retweeted Wuille’s findings, calling blockchain “a new …

Major Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck has suffered a data breach involving unauthorized access to the platform’s domain registration service. Coincheck is one of the world’s oldest crypto exchanges. They suffered a $500 million hack in 2018, which is considered to be the biggest crypto theft in history. The exchange has now encountered another apparent attack that could lead to customers’ personal data and emails being leaked, Cointelegraph Japan reports June 2. Deposits and withdrawals operate while remittances are halted Announcing the incident on Tuesday, Coincheck said that the breach had “no impact on the customer's assets” this time. However, Coincheck …

Zoom, the video conference app whose popularity has rocketed on the back of the global lockdown, won’t be encrypting calls for free users. This way, the company hopes to create space for collaboration with the FBI and other authorities, Zoom CEO Eric Yuan said during a June 2 conference call. According to Yuan, Zoom’s end-to-end encryption service, which is currently under development, will be available exclusively for corporate clients to prevent bad actors from using the app: “Free users for sure we don’t want to give that because we also want to work together with FBI, with local law enforcement …

With the coronavirus pandemic forcing many businesses to adopt work-from-home policies, the demand for video conferencing programs appears to have increased. Indeed, by late April, video conference app Zoom was seeing 300 million daily meeting participants, a 50% rise from the 200 million recorded at the start of the month. Amid its growing popularity, the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation revealed significant privacy flaws with Zoom. SpaceX, owned by Elon Musk, even reportedly banned employees from using the software on account of these vulnerabilities. Blockchain projects are now getting into the video conferencing arena, looking to leverage the novel …

After two years of uncertainty since 2017’s mega bull run, the signs are looking promising for a big crypto rally, says the co-founder of market analytics company Digital Assets Data. “I believe a major crypto bull cycle is inevitable,” CEO Mike Alfred told Cointelegraph. Coronavirus shakes up the global economy Several months of coronavirus prevention measures, including business closures and stay-at-home orders, have wounded the global economy. High unemployment numbers means less spending as people look to meet their budgetary needs. Extended periods of reduced revenue also foreshadow businesses closures. Meanwhile, mainstream financial markets have rallied amid trillion-dollar U.S. government …

The hacker that breached the Ethereum.org forum is allegedly selling the databases for the three most-popular crypto hard wallets — Ledger, Trezor, and KeepKey. The three databases contain the name, address, phone number, and email for more than 80,000 users combined, however, they do not contain passwords for the accounts. The hacker has also recently listed the SQL database for online investment platform, BnkToTheFuture. Ledger and Trezor databases reportedly compromised On May 24, cyber crime monitoring website, Under the Breach, spotted the hacker’s new listings for the databases of the top hardware wallet providers. The hacker claims to be in …

This week’s headlines from Japan included SBI Holdings pairing up with Redstone Digital for a joint venture fund, LayerX teaming up with GMO Aozora for digitalization research, Decurret working to put aspects of the health system on the blockchain with Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance, BitFlyer exchange releasing a commercial, and a data company producing a report on crypto in Japan. Check out some of this week’s crypto and blockchain headlines, originally reported by Cointelegraph Japan. SBI Holdings starts up joint venture fund with Redstone Tokyo-based SBI Holdings has paired up with Redstone Digital, a German venture capital outfit, …