United States Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Cynthia Lummis believe that most altcoins would likely be considered securities under their proposed new legislation, but they confirmed that Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) will be classified as commodities. Lummis and Gillibrand both agreed with U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler’s assessment that most cryptocurrencies are securities under the Howey Test, with Gillibrand stating: “Most cryptocurrencies go to the SEC [...] Bitcoin and Ether would be certainly commodities, and that's agreed upon. That’s agreed with Chairman Gensler as well as the chairman of the CFTC.” Gillibrand pushed back on reports characterizing …

On Tuesday, Ethereum (ETH) bridging and scaling solution Aurora announced it had paid out a $6 million bounty to ethical security hacker pwning.eth, who discovered a critical vulnerability in the Aurora Engine. The exploit allegedly placed over $200 million worth of capital at risk. The sum was paid in collaboration with Immunefi, a leading platform for Web 3.0 bug bounties, with more than $145 million bounties available and over $45 million bounties paid out. On April 26, Immunefi received a report from pwning.eth about a critical flaw in the Aurora Engine that would have enabled the infinite minting of ETH …

On June 4, the popular nonfungible token, or NFT, project Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) suffered its third security compromise this year. Nearly 142 Ether (ETH) ($250,000) worth of NFTs was stolen after hackers gained access to the Discord account of a BAYC community manager and posted a message with a link to a fake website. The link advertised a limited-time free-NFT giveaway to users who connected their wallets, which were then drained of NFTs. During two prior occasions in April, hackers breached BAYC's Discord and Instagram pages and managed to siphon 91 NFTs, worth over $1.3 million at the …

The Metaverse and Web3 dominated discussions on the fifth day of the ongoing World Economic Forum (WEF). The panel discussion “The Possibilities of the Metaverse” featured Philip Rosedale, co-founder of High Fidelity; Pascal Kaufmann, founder of Mindfire Foundation; Peggy Johnson, CEO of Magic Leap; Hoda AlKhzaimi, assistant research professor at New York University, Abu Dhabi; and Edward Lewin, vice president of Lego Group. The main discussion revolved around the building blocks and prospects of the Metaverse. The panelists discussed the technical aspects, security and role of human sentiments in building a sustainable, augmented reality-based digital world. Responding to a question …

If all goes to plan, Wednesday’s SpaceX rocket launch in Florida will blast a “crypto-satellite” into low Earth orbit, paving the way for secure blockchain-related cryptography in space. Cryptosat, as the name hints, is the company that created Crypto1, a crypto-satellite module hitching a ride aboard a Falcon 9 rocket for SpaceX’s Transporter 5 mission. The blockchain satellite technology has already been trialed on the International Space Station. “We’re basically joining the Uber of spaceflight,” co-founder of Cryptosat Yonatan Winetraub told Cointelegraph, “Everybody goes into the same orbit and we’re one of the passengers.” “SpaceX launch a bunch of satellites, …

There is no shortage of cryptocurrency exchanges on the market today. Although the choice is a good thing, for many investors, the decision can be debilitating. After all, while a good platform can be the key to building your investment portfolio, the adverse may also be true, that a poorly set up exchange may cost a user both in opportunities lost and more directly in scams. For this reason, one of the greatest tells of a good exchange becomes their reputation. Although marketing speak may tell a good story of an exchange’s success in the industry, secure functions and diverse …

Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of cross-border payments company Ripple (XRP), spoke during a panel discussion Monday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Garlinghouse, who also occupies a role as a member of the company’s board of directors, commented on a wide range of topics, most notably the current status of regulation in the United States versus G20 nations. Emphasising the prudent necessity for regulatory frameworks that serve integral principles of “clarity and certainty," Garlinghouse stated his belief that: “The overwhelming majority of people working within the crypto industry are good actors that want to do right by regulators. …

Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis has released a new tool to track transactions across decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols and multiple blockchains. Chainalysis launched a beta version of its Storyline software on Wednesday. Touted as a “Web3-native blockchain analysis tool,” Storyline aims to track and visualize smart contract transactions with a focus on nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and DeFi platforms. This is in line with the growing popularity and prevalence of NFTs and DeFi in the cryptocurrency space over the past year. Chainalysis provides blockchain analysis and annual reports on cryptocurrency crime trends and other analytics. The ever-changing landscape has seen DeFi and …

The decentralized finance (DeFi) industry has lost over a billion dollars to hackers in the past couple of months, and the situation seems to be spiraling out of control. According to the latest statistics, approximately $1.6 billion in cryptocurrencies was stolen from DeFi platforms in the first quarter of 2022. Furthermore, over 90% of all pilfered crypto is from hacked DeFi protocols. These figures highlight a dire situation that is likely to persist over the long term if ignored. Why hackers prefer DeFi platforms In recent years, hackers have ramped up operations targeting DeFi systems. One primary reason as to …

There has been a spate of “crypto muggings” in London recently, with thieves threatening crypto holders with violence unless they transfer over their digital currencies held in mobile phone wallets or on crypto exchanges. As detailed by The Guardian UK, crime reports from the City of London police detail how thousands of dollars worth of crypto has been stolen by thugs in person. One victim said their phone had been pick-pocketed while out drinking and later realized over $12,000 worth of Ether (ETH) had been siphoned from their Crypto.com account. The victims believe the thieves witnessed them type in their …

Chainalysis, a blockchain analytics provider, has announced its $170 million Series F funding round. The fresh funding succeeded its $100 million raise back in June 2021 and more than doubly exceeded its valuation of $4.2 billion at the same time. The raise was led by Singaporean sovereign wealth fund GIC and further participated in by investors Accel — who previously led Chainalysis' $30 million Series B round in 2019, as well as Blackstone, Dragoneer and FundersClub. Bank of New York Mellon and Emergence Capital also participated in the round as first entries. According to the announcement, the funds will be …

Decentralized blockchain technology has been around for a relatively short period of time, in the grand scheme of things, but its decentralized nature has the power to keep data and information out of the hands of censors looking to create a “safe” and “faultless” version of history. Blockchain is permissionless and literally owned by no one. So, while we can’t save the Alexandria libraries of the past, we can make sure the future is well equipped with the tools necessary to preserve historical records. Here we’ll look at some of the ways nonfungible tokens (NFT) and blockchain technology have been …