Polish insurance company Link4 has partnered with a regtech firm Coinfirm to streamline document correspondence and storage with a blockchain-based system. Called Trudatum, the blockchain-enabled tool developed by Coinfirm reportedly allows the firm to transfer and store electronic documents and ensure their immutability. For Link4’s customers specifically, it means that their insurance papers could be accessed and verified online, thereby reducing the overall amount of paperwork for the company. Link4 considers itself the leader of the direct insurance market in Poland. Launched in 2003, the company was allegedly the first on the local market to sell motor insurance exclusively via …

Civic Wallet is a multi-signature non-custodial wallet that now comes with a $1,000,000 guarantee from Coincover. Civic Technologies (CVC) has been known in the crypto space as one of the leading providers of decentralized identity and is now purportedly the first company to offer a non-custodial wallet with $1,000,000 protection. The wallet is currently in private beta. Speaking to Cointelegraph, Civic co-founder and CEO, Vinny Lingham compared its key feature to the protection offered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC): “This is the first time that both technical and non-technical users can feel safe about their holdings. Until now, …

Black hat hacker group, Maze, claims to have used ransomware to compromise the systems of insurance giant, Chubb. They also claim to have stolen the firm’s data. Brett Callow, threat analyst at cybersecurity firm, Emsisoft, told Cointelegraph on March 27 that Maze published the claim on its website. While the website does not provide any direct proof of the hack so far, Callow pointed out facts that give the claim an air of credibility: “Maze’s past victims include governments, law firms, healthcare providers, manufacturers, medical research companies, healthcare providers and more.” Maze’s modus operandi Callow explained that the group usually …

Bitcoin (BTC) derivatives exchange BitMEX continues to field criticism after attempting to explain a mass liquidation event during which BTC/USD crashed 60%. In a blog post on March 23, BitMEX addressed what it says were “a number of questions” from traders since the event occurred eleven days ago. BitMEX: insurance fund functioned as normal At the time, BitMEX appeared to suffer from what various sources have called a cascading margin call, forcing out traders and sustaining the price of Bitcoin plummeting in the process. The exchange then went offline for around half an hour, after which the price recovered. After …

On March 18, Attestiv, a firm combating digital fraud and deep-fakes using blockchain technology, announced that it had secured funds exceeding $2 million in a seed offering. Cointelegraph recently spoke to Attestiv’s CEO, Nico Vekiarides, to analyze his thoughts on blockchain’s role in combating fake news and digital fraud in the insurance industry. Cointelegraph: Can we get an overview of how the Attestiv platform works? Nicos Vekiarides: Attestiv provides authenticity for digital photos, videos, and documents by registering a fingerprint to a blockchain when a digital asset is captured. While it does not contain the asset itself, the digital fingerprint …

Cryptocurrency custodian BitGo now offers insurance for the assets it holds in excess of its $100 million coverage limit. According to an announcement on March 18, BitGo is the first crypto asset custodian to allow its customers to purchase an excess limit above its standard policy. Over $100 million of insurance coverage on crypto BitGo first launched an insurance policy covering up to $100 million for the digital assets it holds in February 2019, through major insurance firm Lloyd’s. The insurance covers losses due to theft and misplaced keys. With the introduction of the additional policy, the assets BitGo clients …

Amid some notable recovery of Bitcoin (BTC) after a number of subsequent market crashes last week, billionaire investor Tim Draper delivered another optimistic forecast about Bitcoin. In a March 16 interview with 415 Stories podcast, Draper outlined decentralization powered by Bitcoin and other new technologies as a major tool that has the “ability to transform the biggest industries in the world.” “It will be Bitcoin, not banks and governments that save the day” According to Draper, Bitcoin will be one of the most crucial tools in the times of the recovery of the ongoing global financial crisis, opposing the major …

The March 13 crypto market meltdown ravaged cryptocurrency companies across the industry, sparking a MakerDAO debt crisis and causing millions to be deployed from the insurance funds of exchanges Binance and Deribit. In spite of the widespread carnage, the insurance fund of leading derivatives exchange, BitMex, only took two days to break back into new all-time highs. BitMex insurance fund posts new all-time high Despite going offline for 45 minutes due to a “hardware issue” late March 13, BitMex appears to have emerged from the recent cryptocurrency market massacre stronger than ever. The crash saw BitMex only deployed 1,627 to …

Amid global market mayhem, several major Bitcoin (BTC) and crypto insurance funds are showing signs of severe strain. As of March 13, Bitcoin derivatives exchange Deribit recorded a shocking slide in the balance of its Bitcoin insurance fund, down from 391 BTC to 183 BTC (-53%) within a span of three days. Deribit Bitcoin insurance fund balance. Source: deribit.com Binance’s insurance fund balance halves overnight Earlier today, the Binance Insurance Fund issued an update on Twitter, revealing it had used over $6,000,000 in the past 24 hours to reduce auto-deleveraging (ADLs) on its platform. “In the event that the insurance …

Insurance underwriters associated with Lloyd’s of London are now backing a new liability policy designed to protect cryptocurrency stored in online wallets. With a modest minimum of 1,000 British pounds ($1,275) in protected assets and rather flexible terms, the product seems to be geared for retail and corporate investors. But who is behind the novel service, and how will the policy work? Forces behind the innovation Despite the enthusiasm expressed in early media accounts for “insurance giant Lloyd’s backing crypto,” Lloyd’s of London is not an entity to which any centralized agency can be ascribed. Unlike most other major players …

Insurance giant Lloyd’s of London now provides a new type of liability insurance policy to protect cryptocurrency in hot wallets that is lost by theft. Lloyd’s new offering was developed by Lloyd’s syndicate Atrium together with crypto will-focused firm Coincover, with limits from as little as £1,000 ($1,275), Lloyd’s announced on March 2. The policy is also backed by an array of other Lloyd’s insurers, including TMK and Markel, all of whom are members of Lloyd’s Product Innovation Facility. “It is a new type of liability insurance policy with a dynamic limit that increases or decreases in line with the …

As the new decade unreels, a new wave of disruption seems to be coming to the shores of the global financial system. That wave is called decentralized finance protocols. Decentralized finance, or DeFi, simply refers to financial software that is built on the blockchain to make it easy for anyone to piece together digital assets and financial smart contracts. Think of DeFi as a Lego system for the finance industry. According to Defi Pulse, an analytics site that tracks the sector’s growth, the entirety of the DeFi ecosystem achieved its highest valuation in 2019 when its value peaked beyond $600 …