Payment titan Visa has announced its support and development of blockchain and digital currencies. The financial services company wrote in ablog post, were reshaping how money moves across the globe, and that means pursuing a broad array of technologies and partnerships.

In that regard, digital currencies offer an exciting avenue for us to continue doing what we do best: expanding our network-of-networks to support new forms of commerce.

The post entitled Advancing our approach to digital currencynarrates the companys efforts and plans to venture further into blockchain and cryptocurrencies, tying in the relevance of its pursuit as the world moves forward with digitalization in the finance industry.

With more consumers and businesses adopting digital currencies and circulation spreading wide, reaching over US$10 billion in May, Visa is aiming to tap into this space and avoid falling behind from competitors.

Prior to Visas announcement, the United States Office of the Comptroller of the Currency released anofficial letterstating national savings banks and federal savings associations are now allowed to provide cryptocurrency custody services for customers.

Acting Comptroller of the Currency, Brian P. Brooks, stated, from safe-deposit boxes to virtual vaults, we must ensure banks can meet the financial services needs of their customers today.

This opinion clarifies that banks can continue satisfying their customers needs for safeguarding their most valuable assets, which today for tens of millions of Americans includes cryptocurrency.

Hence, legacy finance companies like Visa are declaring their support of digital currencies and blockchain.

Visa clarifies that its primarily looking to help connect its network of financial firms, merchants, and consumers to adapt to an emerging payment sphere powered by blockchain and digital currency.

The payment company explained its years of research in blockchain-inspired solutions aim to bring next-gen digital transactions to life.

Our research team has been exploring the science of blockchain technology for several years. Today their research is focused on new mechanisms to improve scalability and enable offline digital currency transactions.

Meanwhile, Visa promises to maintain a rigorous focus on data protection, consumer privacy and fairness, and full compliance with all applicable laws in its endeavor in blockchain and digital currency ecosystem.

To date, central and commercial banks have been keen to tap into new technologies such as blockchain and cryptocurrencies that were once deemed to be a threat. Financial institutions are increasingly acknowledging the potentials of blockchain in turbocharging cross-border payment and saw vigorous measures that need to be taken.

For instance, theEuropean Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of Japan (BOJ) teamed up to study and experiment with the concept of distributed ledger technologies (DLT) in a financial aspect. The project aimed to lay out the foundations for the design and safety features of DLT in finance, driving initiatives of cross-border payment services further.

Tech giantIBMhas illustrated the capability of blockchain to turn cross-border payment into a reality. Last year, the tech firm announced the arrival of a blockchain network for cross-border payments.

Marie Wieck, General Manager, IBM Blockchain, shared the news: Weve created a new type of payment network designed to accelerate remittances and transform cross-border payments to facilitate the movement of money in countries that need it most.

More here:

Visa is getting behind digital currencies and blockchain - TechHQ

30 July 2020

Arendt & Medernach

To print this article, all you need is to be registered or login on Mondaq.com.

On 27 July 2020, the government has introduced a draft billn7637 in Parliament (the "DraftBill"), which - if adopted - will modernise the lawof 6 April 2013 on dematerialised securities, as amended (the"2013 Law"), in order to facilitate theuse of distributed ledger technology when issuing dematerialisedsecurities.

Last year, the Luxembourg legislator had already amended the lawof 1st August 2001 on the circulation of securities and otherfinancial instrument (the "2001 Law") bya law of 1st March 2019 in order to clarify that account keepinginstitutions such as banks could offer securities accounts operatedusing distributed ledger technology and a number of related items,including confirmation that successive registrations of securitiesusing distributed ledger technology have the same effects astransfers between securities accounts (e.g. regarding transfer ofownership).

The purpose of the new draft bill is essentially to introducetwo changes:

When issuing dematerialised securities, it is necessary to keepa record of the number and type of securities issued in a so-calledissuance account in order to enable the central account keeper orliquidation organism to verify that in securities accounts thereare not more securities in circulation than securities issued. Theissuance account is not a securities account, but simply a recordkept for the purposes of making the aforementioned reconciliationverifications. The central account keeper or liquidation organismwhose duty it is to make these verifications will be able to keepthese records using distributed ledger technology. As a result allelements linked to an issuance of dematerialised securities can bekept using distributed ledger technology in the future, i.e. notonly securities accounts (already possible since 2019 by virtue ofthe 2001 Law) but also issuance accounts.

Currently, only certain regulated Luxembourg service providerscan act as central account keepers under the 2013 Law. Moreover,they require a specific additional license in order to be able toperform this function. This situation will remain unchanged inrelation to equity securities. However, for (non-listed) debtsecurities, the scope of regulated service providers able to act ascentral account keepers will be broadened. In the future thisfunction can be performed by any credit institution or investmentfirm authorised in a Member State of the European Economic Area,provided that they have appropriate control mechanisms and ITsecurity arrangements for the purpose of keeping issuance accountsand performing the relevant tasks linked thereto such as theaforementioned reconciliation verifications. As a result issuers ofnon-listed debt securities governed by Luxembourg law will have alarger choice of service providers for this aspect of anissuance.

The content of this article is intended to provide a generalguide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be soughtabout your specific circumstances.

POPULAR ARTICLES ON: Corporate/Commercial Law from Luxembourg

Original post:

Issuance Of Dematerialised Securities Using Blockchain Technology New Draft Legislation Published! - Corporate/Commercial Law - Luxembourg - Mondaq...

Tommy Jamet, manager at Blockchain Reply, discusses how blockchain can help industries put the Covid-19 pandemic behind them

Blockchain can help in many ways with recovery from the pandemic.

Blockchain and Covid-19 the two dont immediately go together. But, the technology could play a role in putting the pandemic behind us.

The early days of blockchain were like the gold rush of the Wild West. We bore witness to a surge of investor money finding its way into the hands of cowboy founders of less-than-scrupulous, blockchain-based business ideas. Indeed, there have been almost 2,000 cryptocurrency projects in total, but only a few dozen are worth mentioning.

What we are left with today is a smaller number of more serious blockchain projects that have real-world use cases that go beyond cryptocurrency. Blockchain is, and always has been, much more than just a get-rich-quick scheme.

With blockchain technology now being implemented within various industries, we look at the use cases it has within transport and logistics. Read here

Blockchain is the underlying technology upon which cryptocurrencies are built. But to limit a definition of its capabilities to such a function is to overlook its extraordinary potential and wide-reaching application.

For obvious reasons, a recent area of interest in the power of blockchain, and other innovative technology, lies in our health systems. When Innovate UK (the government innovation agency) announced a series of grants to fund potential projects to address the Covid-19 crisis, they received over 8,000 applications in a matter of days, of which less than 10% were awarded. And this is just the tip of the iceberg, as various government bodies receive thousands of innovative pitches on a weekly basis, all claiming to improve efficiencies and reduce costs.

Many of the solutions likely pertained to blockchain elements, and some may even have been good, but the Covid-19 outbreak made it extremely difficult for authorities to filter through the noise and effectively gauge the potential of such an array of different projects.

Kevin Curran, IEEE senior member, security professor at Ulster University and editor of the Journal of British Blockchain Association (JBBA), explains how blockchain has transformed industry and society. Read here

Lets forget for a minute about the exceptional aspects of Covid-19 and try to approach it the same way we would any other challenge. We can clearly see that the reason why blockchain applications might fail to solve certain Covid challenges is for the same reason that has happened in the past whenever weve had a desperate search for a problem to solve. Many are waiving a blockchain-shaped magic wand in the air and hoping it will fix the issue somehow.

Instead, lets take a step back and look at two challenges created by Covid, and where those match the unique use cases created by blockchains unique value proposition.

Covid-19 has revealed the weaknesses of global supply chains with countless reports of PPE issues, a lack of food in impoverished areas, and a breakdown of business-as-normal, even in places where demand has remained constant.

Trust has always been the keystone of trade. But how can you trust supply chain partners to deliver in times of widespread failure? Owing to its decentralised nature, blockchain-based applications create a transparent ecosystem when you trust and see that the mechanisms in place are fair to all. It can provide instant overviews of entire supply chains to highlight issues as soon as they arrive. Whats more, it is possible to implement live failsafes with smart contracts that can ensure the smooth continuation of the supply chain and remove the very need for trust in the first place.

To this end, the World Economic Forum developed the Blockchain Deployment Toolkit, a set of high-level guidelines to help companies implement best practices across blockchain projects especially those helping solve supply chain issues. They worked with more than 100 organisations for more than a year, delving into 40 different blockchain use cases, including traceability and automation, to help guide organisations in their efforts to solve real-world problems with blockchain.

Mike Bhaskaran, chief operations officer at DP World, discusses the need for offline as well as online integration in digital transformation of supply chains. Read here

There is an economic and social need to re-open society in a way thats safe for everyone. But how can organisers re-open high-density venues while reducing the risk of creating new Covid clusters?

Most proposed solutions focus on gathering the personal data of attendees, which has the fatal flaw of deep GDPR-related challenges, as well as many other security issues. A popular proposal that gained a lot of traction in the media was to use health status certificates.

A health status certificate is a way to prove to others, at work and in public, that you are not a danger to public health, and that is where it should stop. The underlying reason should not matter; not whether youve already had the contagion and recovered, whether youve been vaccinated once it becomes available, or whether youre showing no symptoms on the day. The blockchain application of an old cryptographic concept called Zero-Knowledge Proof happens to be extremely relevant for the use case of proving health status while maintaining data privacy and security.

Whats more, the World Health Organisation has warned against the creation of health status certificate initiatives that could potentially create a series of new issues that the right technology could address, such as discrimination, for example, if immunity were to become provable. While the technology exists to help, questions remain over the ethics of its implementation in this context.

The task at hand is definitely greater than any weve seen so far. But if history has proven anything, it is that a major crisis is always fertile ground for innovation. Maybe blockchain wont be able to do anything immediately to tackle the Covid crisis itself, but there is no doubt that it will play an innovative role in solving a number of the wider challenges it has raised.

Originally posted here:

How blockchain could play a relevant role in putting Covid-19 behind us - Information Age

New York-based blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis is extending access to its certification program in crypto fundamentals to the wider professional community.

Announced on July 23, the company said that its Chainalysis Cryptocurrency Fundamentals Certification (CCFC) would from now on be open to professionals in the financial services sector, government employees and the wider enterprise community.

Previously, the course had been limited to clients using Chainalysis investigations and compliance products.

As one of the higher-profile analytics firms in the blockchain intelligence industry, Chainalysis develops investigative tools that enable firms, governments and law enforcement agencies to monitor blockchain transactions and track suspected illicit activities.

The CCFC program has been designed to provide participants with an industry credential and give them a foundational knowledge of cryptocurrency technology, an understanding of key stakeholders in the field, use cases and the functions of cryptocurrency in relation to the traditional financial system.

The CCFC course offers two days of training web-based for now due to the coronavirus that are centered on group discussions, practical exercises and case studies. Anyone is eligible to apply, and those who complete the course receive a two-year CCFC credential, provided both as a digital certificate and LinkedIn badge.

Tim Simpson, a compliance analyst at Bittrex crypto exchange, said:

The majority of individuals do not have the time or technical expertise to filter through the endless amount of information about cryptocurrency to focus on what matters. For individuals with a non-technical background or those needing to become quickly up-to-date on how cryptocurrency really works, the CCFC course provides a focused, well-organized and active learning experience.

Jason Bonds, chief revenue officer at Chainalysis said that as crypto and blockchain enter the mainstream, the course is intended to spread a thorough understanding of the technology that will be crucial for its safe and successful adoption.

As previously reported, many higher education institutions globally have launched their own internal blockchain laboratories, research centers and degree programs and certificates including MIT in the U.S. and the IT University of Copenhagen.

Last year, the French Ministry of National Education announced plans to integrate an educational module into its high school curriculum covering Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies.

Ripple has also continued to add partners in its global University Blockchain Research Initiative, including universities from the United States, China, Singapore and Brazil.

Within the venture capital sector, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has offered a free, seven-week crypto startup school to provide guidance in areas such as product and technology design and legal/regulatory best practices.

This year, the Africa Blockchain Institute planned to open Rwandas first blockchain school, offering five new courses for local developers, professionals and policymakers.

Read this article:

Chainalysis Widens Access to Its Blockchain and Crypto Certification Program - Cointelegraph

An apartment in the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, made history in 2017 when it became the first real estate asset to trade via blockchain, changing hands for US$60,000.

The buyer, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, paid for the property with a combination of two digital currencies and the transfer took place entirely online using smart contracts.

The deal was struck at the height of the hype around blockchains potential to make real estate more tradable and transparent.

But beyond a subsequent flurry of small-scale residential transactions and a number of government-backed pilot programs to bring land registries online, blockchain has failed so far to live up to the commercial property sectors expectations.

Its been very slow going with blockchain in real estate, despite it being touted as a game changer for a number of years now, says Matthew McAuley, director, global research at JLL.

As groups started to pursue blockchain-lead solutions, hurdles that emerged from the technological and regulatory, to the systems sheer permanence have yet to be overcome, despite concerted efforts.

The route to more transparent transactions

In its simplest form, a blockchain is a database of recorded transactions. Each step in a transaction is a block. Each new block is added to the previous one to form a chain. With no single party in control, the system was designed to be completely secure, with even administrators unable to change the information recorded in each chain.

The benefits could be wide ranging for real estate, not least the systems ability to authenticate and track transactions in real time without the use of a third party, such as a bank. For example, every part of a lease or sale agreement could be automated, with payments received instantly even outside of business hours.

As well as making real estate deals more efficient, this would remove some significant barriers for investors by making commercial assets more liquid and transparent.

Governments around the world are trialling the use of blockchain within land registries in the hope that recording this information digitally could reduce costs, save time and increase security across the transaction.

These trials are at a fairly preliminary stage in most cases, says McAuley.

Dubai and Sweden are home to some of the worlds most advanced applications of blockchain in real estate.

The Dubai Blockchain Strategy is actively working on a process to record all real estate transactions on blockchain and is part of a wider blockchain ecosystem that spans utilities and telecommunications. In Sweden, the government is testing transfer of property ownership via blockchain.

Elsewhere, JLLs 2020 Global Real Estate Transparency Index has identified 31 territories where there is some government engagement with the technology. Among these, the UKs Digital Street program is testing a blockchain prototype that supports the digital transfer of a property in a system that automatically updates the land register.

Putting the pilot schemes into practice, however, poses significant challenges.

Its just very difficult to implement as all of the technological, logistical and regulatory building blocks need to be in place, McAuley says.

The onset of blockchain fatigue

A Google Trends analysis shows worldwide interest for blockchain emerged in 2013, and began to grow in earnest in early 2016. It peaked at the end of 2017. Interest has since fallen back to early-2017 levels.

Outside of real estate, mass implementation of blockchain across supply chains has struggled to live up to the initial enthusiasm. A Gartner survey labelled this blockchain fatigue, citing immature technology, lack of standards and overly ambitious scope as contributing factors.

Even moving land registries online and setting up contracting systems is a major logistical challenge that relies on multiple markets having robust regulatory frameworks in place.

For blockchain to be adopted more widely, you need three things: the computing power to run it, legislative frameworks to police it, and a practical workaround for immutability, McAuley says.

One of blockchains major drawbacks is its permanence actions cannot be undone and remain forever etched into the system.

Anything involving humans will never be error free, McAuley says. But with blockchain it becomes more difficult to enforce regulatory oversight or legal judgements.

Keeping the systems that rely on blockchain free of fraud and error human or otherwise has deterred the industry.

I find it difficult to believe blockchain will be as used, or as useful, in real estate as was thought initially, McAuley says.

That said, efforts continue undeterred. COVID-19 could go some way to accelerating blockchain initiatives as the imperative for faster, remote transactions increases.

But the industry will continue to approach the technology with caution as it develops over the years ahead.

The potential is still there, McAuley says. But so are the challenges.

Click to read about what the world will look like in 2030.

Originally posted here:

The Investor | Blockchain was set to transform real estate. What happened? - The Investor JLL

Australian blockchain startups are taking tech giants to court for banning crypto advertisements during the ICO boom, Coinsquare executives have settled over accusations of wash trading and South Korea is mulling increased taxes on crypto profits.

Youre readingBlockchain Bites, the daily roundup of the most pivotal stories in blockchain and crypto news, and why theyre significant. You can subscribe to this and all of CoinDesksnewsletters here.

Top shelf

Be Thankful I DontTake It AllThe South Korean government has proposed a 22% tax including the 2% local income tax on crypto trading profits.The Ministry of Economy and Finance tabled a proposal Wednesday to introduce the measure for gains above 2.5 million KRW (~$2,000). If approved by Koreas National Assembly, the tax rule will come into force in October 2021, and will also apply to non-residents and foreign companies who trade on Korean exchanges. Separately, Russian officials have updated a draft bill that wouldredefine crypto as a taxable property,though not as a means of payment. Previously, the countrys lawmakers introduced a version of the law that would make any business issuing or trading crypto using Russia-based infrastructure illegal.

Crypto Class ActionAustralian crypto startups havebanded together in a class action against Google, Twitter and Facebookrelated to the banning of crypto advertising in 2018. The business owners claim they were harmed by the bans meant to minimize harm to potential investors in initial coin offering (ICO) scams, but which may have overreached into legitimate businesses and seek damages amounting to A$872 million (US$600 million). That amount could rise to A$300 billion in total as more litigants join the class action, according to the Daily Mail Australia.

StrengtheningRightsThe Supreme Peoples Court of China has said the countrys legal system shouldstrengthen protections around digital currency ownership rights.Published Wednesday, a new guideline from the court, under the section Strengthening judicial protection for property and equity rights, specifies that the legal system should enhance protections over new types of ownership rights such as digital currencies, online virtual assets and data. Previously there have been legal decisions made by provincial and municipal courts in China in which digital currencies like bitcoin were treated as virtual properties.

Wash Trade SettlementCoinsquare will settle with the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC)over allegations executives had employees fake tradesto inflate the platforms volumes. As part of the settlement agreement reached Tuesday, Coinsquare admitted that around 840,000 illicit wash trades were conducted on the platform, amounting to a total value of around 590,000 bitcoin (BTC) (worth almost $5.5 billion at press time). Senior executives have also agreed to resign, with CEO Cole Diamond to pay a $1 million penalty and founder Virgile Rostand $900,000.

Watching the WatchdogSEC Commissioner Hester Peirce on Tuesday criticized thewatchdogs decision to penalize Telegrams $1.2 billion ICO.Speaking to the Blockchain Association Singapore, Crypto Mom Pierce said the SEC fundamentally erred in prosecuting and punishing Telegrams Gram token sale, saying the decision to sell Grams under a Simple Agreement for Future Tokens offering structure should have protected the project from securities violations. Peirce again called for a safe harbor that would give certain token projects three years to experiment while regulators retooled their frameworks for what is and is not an investment contract.

Quick bites

The big idea

CoinDesk spoke withGwern, the pseudonymous tech researcher, about his ongoing experiments with the most powerful AI language model to date.

OpenAIsGPT-3has read nearly every word published online, and now has the ability to complete human prompts. The tool can write media articles, business prospectuses and asGwern has discovered poetry.

Human: Please write me a sonnet on the subject of the Forth Bridge.

AI: Countless their wheat-stacks tall and trains which roar across it by night, All these must fall like Gabriels hair, Which was all gold before it withered.

As othershave noted,the model cant think on its own and has clear limitations in always writing what its users want it to. To this end, Gwern found that the biggest hurdle is in coming up with the right prompt.

I think it is partially a matter of intelligence and the technology, yes. I should be able to write out clear descriptions and provide a few examples, which would be enough for a human to infer my intent, but right now its still quite chancy for GPT-3 to pick good completions, he said over a direct message.

Considering this, CoinDesk asked whether the final result of running a situation feels like his own work of art.

[W]hen I nail a prompt, what I tend to feel is more that Ive created a new genre, he said. [I]n the way that JRR Tolkien might feel that he was the author of fantasy even if he didnt feel otherwise like the author of any specific fantasy book, if you follow me. [O]ther people take the idea and run with it. [Y]ou feel proud of how your idea goes on without you.

Still, after a month of experimentation, Gwern has found the novelty has worn off. [I]f Im going to spend half an hour on something, itd better be testing something interesting on GPT-3.

Thats a fine position to take while the program is still in a private beta. It might be a different story when itsreleased to the world.

Market intel

Users Up, Transactions Down?Despite recent price doldrums,the Bitcoin network has as many users since the cryptocurrency topped $20,000in 2017, according to an on-chain metric. The seven-day moving average of Bitcoins active entities rose to 305,355 on Tuesday to hit the highest level since Dec. 23, 2017, according to Glassnode, which defines active entities as a cluster of addresses controlled by the same network entity. This would include both businesses like exchanges and custodians and individuals. However, the seven-day moving average of bitcoins transaction count has increased 23% over the past four months, but is still well below the 2020 high registered on March 5.

Open InterestOpen interest for bitcoin futures on BitMEX the largest derivatives exchange by open interest passed $1 billion Tuesday morningfor the first time since the cryptocurrency market crash in March, a sign of life in a very quiet market. Before the March crash, open interest for bitcoin futures on BitMEX was about $1.2 billion. Further, open interest for bitcoin futures across all cryptocurrency exchanges broke above $4 billion for the first time since March, according to data from Skew.

Broken RecordDecentralized exchange volumes have already topped $1.6 billion, as of Tuesday,breaking the previous all-time high set in June,according to Dune Analytics data. Four platforms Uniswap, Curve, Balancer and Bancor Network have already surpassed their June volumes. For investors racing to get exposure to the newest decentralized finance (DeFi) projects, decentralized exchanges are the earliest and often only place to make those initial investments, said Joseph Todaro, managing partner at Blocktown Capital.

Tech pod

Hype & High FeesEthereumfees are at a two-year highas the hype around DeFi yield farming leads to a surge in network activity, according to research firm Coin Metrics. Coin Metrics data shows median transaction fees, which increase in step with network activity, were around $0.50 yesterday the highest since August 2018. The total value locked (TVL) in DeFi projects recently passed the $3 billion mark, according to DeFi Pulse, having only crossed the billion-dollar milestone in February. Digital Assets Data analyst Connor Abendschein attributes massive increase in ERC-20-standard stablecoins as a contributing factor.

Ethereum at Five

The World Computer at a CrossroadsFive years ago, an unlikely project went live. It called itself the world computer and it promised to transform not just cryptocurrencies as we knew it, but the very idea of what could be done with cryptography and consensus. Ethereum had arrived.

From its technical aspirations to unicorns and memes, Ethereum is a culture on its own. It has spawned blockchain uses from digital cats to yield farming previously unimagined.

Ethereum is at a crossroads. But it must complete an ambitious and fraught retooling of its foundations the long awaited move to Ethereum 2.0 to keep up with the markets demands.

CoinDesk is marking the milestone withEthereum at Five:a cross-platform series comprising a series of special coverage, a pop-up newsletter and live-streamed discussions. New issues and sessions launch daily from July 27-31.Register for CoinDesk Live and our pop-up newsletter.

Opinion

Scaling Blockchain BusinessesLex Sokolin, a CoinDesk columnist and Global Fintech co-head at ConsenSys, is joined by Figure CEO Mike Cagney and Rebanks Will Beeson to discusshow to successfully run a business in blockchain,why working from home is better and lessons learned from scaling multi-billion dollar corporations.

Who won #CryptoTwitter?

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

See the article here:

Blockchain Bites: Coinsquare Conclusion, Ethereum Fees and a GPT-3 Poet - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

A global research firm has listed HashCash Consultants as the top blockchain development company in UAE through an industry survey acknowledging the companys extensive range of innovative services

HashCash Consultants continues garnering accolades, solidifying its position globally as one of the leading software enterprises with specialization in new-age technologies. Known for its cutting-edge solutions, HashCash has been listed as the topblockchain and crypto development company in UAE, by a research firm.

The afore-mentioned research firm, with its global outreach, had conducted an industry-specific survey to review both local blockchain service providers and global firms active in the region of UAE. Several factors like the exclusivity of the services and products offered, scale of innovative solutions, standards maintained in delivering the same along with feedback from clients, partners, and industry insiders were considered and analyzed. HashCash Consultants displayed high standards from every aspect and has been recognized as the top blockchain development company in the UAE.

Recommended AI News: FlexiWAN Surpasses 1,000 Accounts On Its SD-WAN SaaS Platform

HashCash conducts an in-depth analysis of the market requirements and implements the same in developing scalable and advanced services that can be easily integrated with the client or partners existing system. It is a sustainable and cost-effective approach towards mass adoption of blockchain and crypto. Our team strives to maintain the highest standards in the solutions and services that are offered, upholding client/partner interest above all. We want to accelerate blockchain revolution across sectors, and we are doing so with a united effort, mentioned Raj Chowdhury, the CEO of HashCash Consultants.

Headquartered in California, USA, HashCash has physical offices in several locations, which includes the UAE, Singapore, India, and Australia. It maintains a partner network of global banks, corporations, and enterprises across industries. Owing to such a robust network, HashCash is operational globally, with subsequent activities in Africa and the UK, among multiple other locations.

HashCash Consultantsoffers software development services and IT solutions driven by advanced automation and digital integration. They specialize in Blockchain and cryptocurrency development and related solutions through a suite of highly scalable products and services to cater to all major sectors. They have a pool of global clients hailing from banking and financial services, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, real estate, manufacturing and supply chain, gaming, mining, insurance, food, and retail along with other industries.

Recommended AI News: Sharecare Acquires WhiteHatAI To Provide Health Plan And Provider Clients With Additional Capabilities

HashCash helps enterprises to integrate their existing infrastructure with its blockchain solutions, to improve their operational architecture by unifying all functions on a single platform. It has its very own blockchain network, the HC Net, which is leveraged by the partner and client companies to facilitate their blockchain operations like smart contract execution, DApps deployment, peer-to-peer payment processing, etc.

Some of the notable blockchain products offered by HashCash are HC Remit (process remittances), HC Corporate Payment, and blockchain digital identity verification platform. It has aided numerous businesses with its all-inclusive ICO services and is one of the leading providers of white label crypto exchange software and white label payment processor software.

Continue reading here:

HashCash Listed as the Top Blockchain Development Company in UAE - AiThority

For the last month Bitcoin (BTC) price has traded in a tight range and trading volume has been relatively flat. Meanwhile, several tokens on the Ethereum network have been topping the price charts, especially the Decentralized Finance (DeFi) tokens.

New data from Messari shows that Ethereum has just surpassed Bitcoin as the network that settles the most value per day. This means that the dollar value on the transactions of both Ether (ETH) and its tokens is now higher than that of Bitcoin.

Ethereum vs Bitcoin daily settlement value. Source: Messari

While the DeFi sector has been gaining popularity, stablecoin transactions have been responsible for most of this volume, having settled over $508 billion in transactions over the course of 2020. This figure is nearly double the $253 billion settled in 2019.

Tether (USDT) is the main stablecoin responsible for the volume and according to Messari, it could possibly surpass Bitcoin as the most transacted cryptocurrency in the market.

USDT vs Bitcoin daily transaction value. Source: Messari

Bitcoin offers colored coins through protocols like Counterparty and Omni, but these assets pale in comparison to the smart contract capabilities of the Ethereum network, which continue to be showcased through the novel possibilities of DeFi. Coupled with lower fees and faster transaction times, Ethereum has become the chain of choice for centralized and decentralized stablecoins alike.

While USDT was first issued on the Bitcoin blockchain, only 13.2% of its supply currently resides on BTC, while the Ethereum chain holds 59.8% of the USDT supply. As most of the USDT balance is held on Ethereum, USDT is also the biggest spender of gas in the network, according to data from ETH Gas Station.

Led by USDT, the collective stablecoin market capitalization grew from $2.4 billion to around $8 billion in Q1 alone. Another $3.8 billion was added in the Q2, making the current figure over $12 billion, and approximately $9.18 billion belongs to Tether. Tether has also surpassed Ripple (XRP) as the third largest cryptocurrency.

Stablecoin collective market capitalization. Source: Messari

While inter-exchange settlement is the most popular use for stablecoins, DeFi has also been a considerable force in the growing activity seen on the Ethereum network. Because of their peg to fiat currencies, stablecoins are quite popular among DeFi lending protocols which have been gaining traction throughout 2020.

The platforms have seen noticeable surges in the amount of funds locked and in Q2 the figure surged above $2 billion. Compound alone achieved a major milestone with over $1 billion assets borrowed in total.

Stablecoins and growth within the DeFi sector are likely to continue driving transaction volume and settlement value on the Ethereum network but will the network be able to support this growth?

Stablecoins already account for more than 70% of the total daily value settled and if the Ethereum network continues to have unresolved congestion and scalability problems there could be real problems within the DeFi platforms.

For the time being, its unclear whether or not the Ethereum Network will be able to deal with the rapidly increasing stablecoin and DeFi activity, especially as corporations set their sights on the sector.

See the original post here:

Ethereum Flippens Bitcoin to Become the Most Used Blockchain - Cointelegraph

With blockchain technology now being implemented within various industries, we look at the use cases it has within transport and logistics

Blockchain can provided added visibility, among other benefits.

The transport and logistics sector is becoming increasingly digitised as supply chain management and visibility remain as important as ever, and both are key areas that can be improved by blockchain.

This feature will explore in detail the various use cases that blockchain brings to transport and logistics.

One general benefit that blockchain provides is transparency across supply chains, from production to distribution.

Aparna Jue, product director at IOHK, explains how food distributors in particular can benefit from the technology in this way.

For consumers, the provenance of goods is becoming increasingly important, said Jue. They want to know where the products they choose have come from, and whether they have been produced and transported in ethical and/or environmentally sustainable ways.

This is where blockchain comes in. Producers can use this affordable technology to address consumers requests for transparency, providing comprehensive information on the origin, production methods, supply chain journey and environmental footprint of their products.

For example, IOHK is currently working with Wyoming-based Beefchain, whose blockchain-based software for supply chain traceability of beef products from ranch to plate is the only US Department of Agriculture approved software of its type. Beefchain has worked with IOHK to harness our proprietary blockchain, Cardano, to trace the origin and movement of beef from farm to table.

Through blockchain, consumers can access significantly more detail than ever before, from where and how a calf was raised even down to who fed a cow on what day, though to how both the cattle and the beef was transported.

Mike Bhaskaran, chief operations officer at DP World, discusses the need for offline as well as online integration in digital transformation of supply chains. Read here

Jitendra Thethi, blockchain lead at Altran, expanded further on the added transparency that blockchain can provide to customers.

Provenance uses a blockchain to register every step of the production process, he said. This ensures that the transfers of ownership are explicitly authorised by their relevant controllers without having to trust the behaviour or competence of an incumbent processor.

For the different participants in the supply chain, different software solutions exist to access the blockchain, to extract the relevant information for this participant and to confirm the step in the production process. Afterwards, the buyer can scan the product, whether this be via a QR-Code or NFC, and access the information from the blockchain to check every step of the production process.

In addition, Jue went on to explain how blockchain can level the playing field across sections of food and beverage logistics.

She said: If we think about the coffee industry, for instance, smaller coffee farmers in countries like Ethiopia may lack the capital to invest in the traceability solutions needed to complete traceability from source to supply. This is not the case for larger coffee producers, who not only have access to more resources, but also to the latest technologies.

While larger farmers are able to use their access to secure certificates concerning the sustainability, traceability and provenience of their coffee beans, smaller farmers lack access to the technology needed to store these records, but without them multinational companies are unlikely to select them as suppliers. As a result, the space is dominated by a few large suppliers.

By using blockchain in sectors like coffee and agriculture, all farmers need to access traceability solutions is a basic GPRS-enabled mobile phone, of the type that have been available for 20 years. With one of these, farmers can become part of a global network.

Blockchain, by enabling them to evidence the transportation and traceability of their products via a phone app, therefore ensures the removal of layers of proverbial middle men. This connects SMBs with major supply chains in a secure, transparent manner that fosters economic growth.

In light of the disruption caused to revenue by Covid-19, SMEs need to reduce their IT spend by evaluating it. Read here

Blockchain within transport and logistics can also be used to settle agreements between vendors and distributors, without the need for paperwork.

Blockchain has been used to log and authenticate goods, shipment receipts, and other aspects, which in turn triggers payments, said Thethi. If a component has GPS capabilities, location enforcements can be in effect, just as other means of enforcement are possible using various sensors.

For example, IBM and Maersk tested blockchain in shipping container tracking. The goal was to reduce effort and paperwork.

Through the blockchain-based platform, they can access and act upon relevant information. Shippers, freight forwarders, ocean carriers, ports and customs authorities can be future participants.

For distributors, knowing where their products are at any one time is vital, and this is another area where blockchain can be of assistance.

Erminio Di Paola, vice-president, transport & logistics applications at HERE Technologies, explains how combining location data with blockchain can increase accuracy.

Adding location intelligence to blockchain provides numerous benefits for transport and logistics, said Di Paola. By layering reliable location data with the intrinsic security of the blockchain distributed ledger function, it provides 100% certainty that an asset is being used at the right place, at the right time, by the right person.

In the context of a large-scale shipping operation, for instance, there may be thousands of containers filled with millions of packages or assets. Using a system that can track every asset with full certainty, any concerns can be eliminated about whether the items are where they are supposed to be, or if anything is missing.

A recent Information Age and Information Builders roundtable discussed how the transport and logistics sector is harnessing the power of data. Read here

Lastly, blockchain can be utilised within fraud detection practices, with it being able to help distributors determine the legitimacy of delivery details.

Layering mapping capabilities and rich location data to a blockchain record also enables fraud detection, continued Di Paola. Without blockchain, it cannot be certain that the delivery updates provided are in fact accurate.

Blockchain makes transactions transparent and decentralised, enabling the possibility to automatically verify their accuracy by matching the real location of an item with the location report from a logistics company.

As every computer in the network has its own copy of the blockchain, this helps to eliminate a single point of failure or fraud.

Read this article:

Blockchain use cases within transport and logistics - Information Age

Blockchain in BFSI is also called as FinTech blockchain. Wide dissemination of blockchain by financial organizations from the past years has witnessed rise in popularity of cryptocurrencies, and the initial coin offering (ICO).

As well as blockchain is panacea for all fintech companies digital concerns such as security. Blockchain as a technology was developed to serve as the public transaction ledger for cryptocurrencies, which uses distributed databases and cryptography to record transactions. This characteristic of blockchain provides a high level of safety while transmitting and storing data, open and transparent network infrastructure, decentralized ledger, and low cost of operations benefits. Moreover, blockchain in FinTech anticipates in changing the paper-intensive international trade finance process to a digital decentralized ledger.

Factors such as increase in need for transactions transparency and accountability, and greater adoption in cross-border payments drive the market growth. In addition, increase in investment by banks in blockchain-based solutions across the globe is also expected to boost the market growth. Moreover, increase in demand for distributed ledger technology and rise in cryptocurrencies market cap are also some of the factors that fuel the demand for blockchain solutions and services across global banks. However, scarcity of skilled workforce is expected to impede the market growth during the forecast period.

Request For Report sample @ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/sample/13284

Furthermore, growth in demand for increased scalability, transaction speed, and reduction in processing costs are expected to provide major growth opportunities for blockchain in BFSI market in the upcoming years. Also, rise in demand from developing economies for blockchain solutions is also anticipated to be opportunistic for the market growth.

The global blockchain in BFSI market is segmented based on component, application, organization size, industry vertical, and region. Based on component, the market is bifurcated into platform and services. Based on application, the market is divided into digital currency, record keeping, payments & settlement, smart contracts, compliance management, and others. Based on organization size, the market is classified into large enterprises and small & medium enterprises. Depending on industry vertical, the market is segmented into banking, insurance, and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs). Based on region, the market is analyzed across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and LAMEA.

The report analyzes the profiles of key players operating in the market. These include Alphapoint, Auxesis Group, Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), Bitfury Group Limited., Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (HPE), International Business Machines Corporation (IBM), Infosys Limited, Microsoft Corporation, Oracle Corporation, and SAP SE.

KEY BENEFITS The report provides an in-depth analysis of the global blockchain in BFSI market, outlining current trends, key driving factors, and potential areas for product investments. Key players are analyzed with respect to their primary offerings, recent investments, and future development strategies. Porters five forces analysis illustrates the potency of buyers and suppliers operating in the industry. The quantitative analysis of the global blockchain in BFSI market from 2018 to 2026 is provided to determine the market potential.

KEY MARKET SEGMENTS

BY COMPONENT Platform Services

BY APPLICATION Digital Currency Record Keeping Payments & Settlement Smart Contracts Compliance Management Others

BY ORGANIZATION SIZE Large Enterprises Small & Medium Enterprises

BY END USER Banking Insurance NBFCs

BY Region North Americao U.S.o Canada

Europeo Germanyo Franceo UKo Rest of Europe

Asia-Pacifico Japano Chinao Indiao Rest of Asia-Pacific

LAMEAo Latin Americao Middle Easto Africa

KEY MARKET PLAYERS PRofILED IN THE REPORT Alphapoint Auxesis Group Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) Bitfury Group Limited. Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (HPE) International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) Infosys Limited Microsoft Corporation Oracle Corporation SAP SE

More Info of Impact Covid19 @ https://www.trendsmarketresearch.com/report/covid-19-analysis/13284

Excerpt from:

Blockchain In BFSI Market Growth Analysis By Manufacturers, Regions, Types and Application Forecast - Kentucky Journal 24

Limestone Network, a Singapore-based blockchain project for building smart cities, has announced on July 23 it will list its native token-LIMEX on Bitrue crypto exchange for trading.

According to the report, LIMEX will integrate an entire smart city's applications such as property management, retail malls, payments, financial services, transportation, parking, F&B and entertainment, to create an intelligent urban ecosystem.

Limestone Network started with a 100-hectare private development project in Phnom Penh, the capital city of Cambodia. It plans to have 10,000 tenants and a daily population of 190,000 people on board.

Limestone Network has reportedly adopted blockchain technology to enable data collection via residents daily touchpoints and sharing without invading consumers' privacy. They also expect this will give a more in-depth understanding of the city's functions, including road traffic, power and water consumption, resident movements, and more.

The project plans to include third-party partners such as ride-hailing apps, telcos and financial institutions to strengthen the ecosystem later on.

Limestone, a permission-based network, is said to allow consumers to manage consent for their data and usage. Service providers and merchants will be able to verify consumers' identities by requesting the data via private smart contracts. Eddie Lee, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Limestone Network said that: "The beauty of blockchain is the ability to give power back to consumers,"

Secure data portability also removes the need for intermediaries such as agencies between service providers and consumers. These cost savings can then be transferred to consumers.

Limestone also has a mobile app that will be an interface for residents to register for a digital passport. Once their identities are verified after screening against global databases, they gain access to features such as digital payments, building access, applications for microloans and more.

Cointelegraph reported that South Koreas capital plans to launch its own digital currency as part of its bid to transform into a blockchain-based smart city. China has also introduced an independently developed blockchain-based identification system for its smart city infrastructure.

See the original post here:

Blockchain-Based Smart City Project LImestone Plans for Token Listing - Cointelegraph

Often hackers and web criminals use cryptocurrency due to its pseudonymous nature. Law enforcement, government and investigation agencies now have access to specialised analytics tools that can scan otherwise hard to track the trail of transactional data on public blockchains. Blockchain analytics makes it possible to follow who is buying what and paying for which product and services utilising cryptocurrency.

Many blockchain analysis tech players help to create these insights by turning blockchain raw data into searchable and executable data that individuals and businesses can easily search and build services on top of.

With blockchain analytics, we can have real-time alerts on the highest-risk activity allowing compliance teams to focus on the most urgent cases and report suspicious activity. Further, the transaction graph also enables digging deep into the transaction activity, patterns and trends, all in one clear graphical view.

These companies can analyse public blockchain transactions using traditional data analytics strategies and try to track transactional data for insights. In this article, we list down the leading companies that provide institutional-grade data collection and processing systems of blockchain data across exchanges, assets, markets for analytics queries.

Chainalysis is the worlds leading cryptocurrency and blockchain data analytics and transaction monitoring solutions company. It provides blockchain data and analysis to government agencies, exchanges, and financial institutions across 40 countries. In July 2020, Chainalysis announced it raised an added $13M to expand its Series B round to $49M with an investment from Sound Ventures and Ribbit Capital.

What do they do?

Its blockchain data and investigative product, Chainalysis Reactor, gives insights into how and why people move funds across the world on public blockchain networks and has helped increase revenue from new government customers by almost 400%. The companys compliance offerings, Chainalysis KYT (Know Your Transaction) and Chainalysis Kryptos, are now utilised by over 180 organisations across 44 countries including Europol, Square, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Barclays and many more.

Elliptic is another major analytics company working in crypto-asset risk management solutions for blockchain businesses and financial institutions worldwide. Recognised as a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer and backed by investors including Wells Fargo Strategic Capital, SBI Group, and Santander Innoventures, Elliptic has assessed risk on transactions worth several trillion dollars, uncovering activities related to money laundering, terrorist fundraising, fraud, and other financial crimes.

What do they do?

Elliptics dataset draws on an extensive number of both public and privately accessible sources of information in order to identify real-world identities on the Bitcoin blockchain. This information is fused with its core graph data engine to provide instant insights that can drive compliance decisions. Elliptical recently came to prominence when it tracked the bitcoin transactions involved in the recent Twitter hack based on on-chain analytics.

CipherTrace was one of the worlds first blockchain analytics firms targeted towards protecting financial institutions from virtual asset laundering risks and crypto-related threats. CipherTrace blockchain analytics de-anonymise funds flow by actively collecting millions of data points every week, and then implementing machine learning to its huge data pool to track flows to legitimate entities and also criminal activities. The firm was founded in 2015 to productise blockchain data analytics through its blockchain intelligence API product. The team at CipherTrace first began tracking illegal activity on Bitcoin in 2011.

What do they do?

CipherTrace develops cryptocurrency Anti-Money Laundering, cryptocurrency forensics, and blockchain threat intelligence solutions. Big exchanges, banks, regulators and crypto firms utilise CipherTrace to trace transaction flows on public blockchains and comply with regulatory anti-money laundering provisions, thus promoting trust in the cryptocurrency economy. Its quarterly CipherTrace Cryptocurrency Anti-Money Laundering Report has become an authoritative industry data source. The US Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology and DARPA initially funded CipherTrace, and it is supported by leading Silicon Valley venture capital investors.

Home Top Blockchain Analytics Companies And What They Do

Headquartered in New York, Elementus creates insights into blockchain data by providing an enterprise blockchain analytics platform for institutional asset managers, financial service companies, and government agencies.

What do they do?

Elementus gained global prominence by presenting key data for coverage of the Cryptopia hack and QuadrigaCx insolvency in leading financial media publications including Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg and Fortune. Elementus blockchain index methodology intends to work similarly to how Googles web crawler and index methodology disrupted the search engine marketplace in the late 1990s. Elementus has successfully raised a $3.5M seed round led by Morgan Creek Digital with participation from Avon Ventures, a venture capital fund affiliated with FMR LLC, the parent company of Fidelity Investments, Stage 1 Ventures, Robot Ventures, and other key angel investors.

Coin Metrics provides one of the biggest feeds of aggregate on-chain data for fundamental analysis and trading. It was created in 2017 by Nic Carter and Aleksei Nokhrin as an open-source blockchain network data and analytics project.

What do they do?

Coin Metrics delivers transparent and actionable data to various industry stakeholders, including financial enterprises, funds, media and research outlets, and data/application providers. Coin Metrics data aims to help users and the public to create value, use, and better engage with blockchain-based assets. It has become a crucial industry resource for understanding network data all the operational and economic activity occurring on a public blockchain that can be observed by running a full node.

comments

Here is the original post:

Top Blockchain Analytics Companies And What They Do - Analytics India Magazine

Blockchain technology will support Waste Aids mission to share low-cost waste management expertise to communities that need it most around the world, in the charitys new partnership with Edinburgh-based cryptocurrency exchange platform Zumo.

Through the partnership, Zumo users will be able to automatically donate funds to Waste Aid whenever they send, exchange, buy or pay with cryptocurrencies through the new Zumo app. Visitors to the Waste Aid website are also able to make a one-off or monthly donation.

The funds raised will support over 1.7 billion adults who do not have access to modern financial services, as well as further support Waste Aids mission to bring waste management services and expertise to communities around the world.

Ceris Turner-Bailes, Chief Executive of WasteAid, adds commented: One in three people globally do not have a waste management service and have to burn or dump their waste, leading to serious health problems and adding to marine litter and climate change.

This partnership with Zumo will mean we can better support the communities that will benefit most from safe and sustainable waste management and together we can help tackle the issues right at the heart of global waste pollution.

Nick Jones, Founder of Zumo, said: Although blockchain technology and waste management appear to speak different purposes, in reality they share a common vision to empower communities and create long-term sustainable livelihoods for people globally.

There is so much that developed markets can learn from the communities that WasteAid supports from the seamless use of digital payments in everyday life that make access to modern financial services inclusive to taking better care for our planet. Our partnership with WasteAid is one of common values and we cant wait to get started.

This is just one of the partnerships through which Waste Aid is extending its international reach, with the charity having recently launched a new initiative to empower green entrepreneurs in South Africa, India and Vietnam to take control of their local waste situations.

Waste Aid aims to tackle marine plastic pollution and reduce carbon emissions in these countries and beyond: the charitys Widening the Net appeal last year raised over 168,000 to help prevent plastic pollution in the Cameroon estuary, while a recycling centre was set up in Kenya to improve the countrys waste management and sanitation situation.

Recently, the charity ran a virtual safari, which took place during the UKs lockdown with the aim of raising funds for waste collectors in Kenya.

The charitys work in Africa is ongoing, with a two-year plastics recycling project currently underway in The Gambia. Similar projects have been run in Kenya, Ghana and Somaliland, with the aim of improving recycling know-how and developing waste management systems.

Continued here:

Waste Aid to fight plastic pollution with blockchain technology - Resource Magazine

Telos, one of the most active blockchain-based networks in terms of transactions processed per second (which isnt always the best metric to gauge the performance of DLT platforms), announced on July 23, 2020, that it has increased its staking rewards and also allocated more funding for ongoing development.

As mentioned in a release shared with CI, stakeholders had voted to approve additional funding and also to increase staking rewards. Staking, on blockchains, allows network participants to lock a certain amount of funds (usually cryptocurrencies) on a platform in order to earn rewards.

Staking on distributed ledger technology (DLT)-enabled platforms allows users to earn interest on their deposits, but this process is not like traditional banking because network participants are mainly interacting with software which isnt a legal entity.

As noted in the announcement, Telos network stakeholders had voted to increase development funding as part of the Telos Economic Development Plan 2.0, which aims to support the platforms core application developers and to promote the networks adoption.

The release noted that Telos added over 100,000 new accounts during the past 30 days. These new accounts were opened, as new decentralized applications (DApps) have reportedly been using the Telos blockchain, because of its high capacity for transactions, useful technical features, and proper governance.

The released stated that projects such as Epios, a COVID-19 testing app, hackathon platform TAIKAI, social good firm All_EBT, creative platform Newlife, and Transledger, an interoperability platform, have now integrated the Telos blockchain.

The announcement confirmed:

Following the Telos Economic Development Plans approval, staking rewards increased from 13% to 19% APR. The newly established fund supports [new] features including Telos Decide and Telos EVM, [which is reportedly] a 300x faster way to create and deploy Ethereum-compatible smart contracts with zero transaction fees.

Telos claims it can handle around 10,000 transactions per second (TPS), meanwhile, Ethereum can only manage to perform 14 TPS (however, TPS is not always the best way to assess network performance). For non-core developers, Telos said it would create feature bounties that should help others with gaining access to the additional development funding.

The release further noted:

All Telos community members were able to vote on the new plan using Telos on-chain, smart contract-based governance engine, Telos Decide. Voting was conducted on several interfaces over a 29-day voting period, and Telos Economic Development Plan 2.0 was passed on July 8, 2020. The approved changes were then coded, tested, and enacted by Telos block producers on July 11, 2020.

In May 2020, Transledger revealed that it would use Telos to perform cross-chain digital asset transfers. In June 2020, Telos launched an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) testnet on an EOSIO blockchain

Also in June, Telos teamed up with TAIKAI to bring virtual hackathons to the blockchain.

Visit link:

Telos, the Second-Most Active Blockchain Behind EOS, Increases Staking Rewards, and Development Funding - Crowdfund Insider

Murphys law states: Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. It always happens with centralized services. A year ago, we saw how half a million Facebook accounts were leaked online, exposing personal data. We will see it many times more with other services. The recent Twitter hack underscores this once again. The accounts of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Mike Bloomberg, Joe Biden, Barack Obama, among others, were hacked to push a fraudulent offer with Bitcoin (BTC).

Writing for the BBC, cybersecurity commentator Joe Tidy opined: The fact that so many different users have been compromised at the same time implies that this is a problem with Twitters platform itself. All accounts were vulnerable; it was just a matter of choice for the hackers: Using celebrities is better to endorse scams.

The problem is that even if Twitter or any other service with similar architecture continues building the cybersecurity walls around its system, it will become more complicated and expensive, but not safer. The current paradigm of centralized services cannot offer a safer solution for users authentication.

I have recently written about new technologies that could protect data and digital identity, using the example of Australia and the European experience and how public key certificates could be protected with blockchain technology against distributed denial-of-service and man-in-the-middle attacks. Although my analysis was quite technical and thorough, perhaps it would be better to take a step back and comb through some general yet pertinent details that may enhance data protection.

Here is some terminology for you to use when asking your service provider, your online store or your government about whether they are protecting your personal data:

To put things into perspective, lets go through a hypothetical situation.

Alice generates her cryptographic pair: a private and public key. The private key encrypts transactions, using a digital signature; the public key decrypts them. The public key is used to verify whether Alice signed in, signed the contract, signed the blockchain transaction, etc.

To protect the private key, she will store it on a secure hardware device with PIN protection, for instance, on a smart card, a USB authentication token or a hardware cryptocurrency wallet. Nevertheless, a cryptocurrency address is a representation of a public key, meaning Alice can use it as her coin and token wallet.

Although the public key is anonymous, she can also create a verified digital identity. She can ask Bob to certify her identity. Bob is a certificate authority. Alice will visit Bob and show her ID. Bob will create a certificate and publish it on a blockchain. Certificate is a file that announces to the general public: Alices public key is valid. Bob will not publish it on his server the same way other traditional certificate authorities do now. If a centralized server were ever disabled in a DDoS attack, no one would be able to confirm whether Alices digital identity is valid or not. In the MITM attack someone can fake her identity. This would be impossible if the certificate or at least its hash sum were published on-chain.

With a verified ID, she can perform official transactions, for example, registering a company. If Alice is an entrepreneur, she may want to publish her contacts, such as a telephone number. Using a blockchain is a safer choice because when data is published on social media, a hacker can break into an account and replace it to redirect calls to another number. None of this would be possible on a blockchain.

If Alice goes to a liquor store, she can use her verified DID. The seller, Dave, will use his app to verify and confirm Alices DID instead of her paper ID. Alice does not need to disclose her name and date of birth. She will share with Daves app her identifier, which Bob certified, her picture and an Above 21 y.o. statement. Dave trusts this record because Bob is a certificate authority.

Alice can create various pseudonyms for online shopping, social media and crypto exchanges. If she loses her private key, she will ask Bob to update his record on the blockchain to announce that Alices public key is invalid. Therefore, if someone stole it, everyone who interacts with her public key will know that they should not believe transactions signed with this key.

Of course, this is a simplified scenario, but it is not unrealistic. Moreover, some of these processes already exist. For example, the Estonian e-Residency card is nothing more than a smart card with the users private key. With this card, you can remotely register a company in Estonia or even sign contracts. Being integrated into a larger market, Estonian digital signatures are recognized across the European Union. Unfortunately, its governments still do not protect certificates on blockchains.

Knowledge is power. Users should know that their cybersecurity is not only in their hands, as one might say. Software and social media giants ought to make the shift to improve security standards, and users ought to demand it.

The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

Oleksii Konashevych is the author of the Cross-Blockchain Protocol for Government Databases: The Technology for Public Registries and Smart Laws. Oleksii is a Ph.D. fellow in the Joint International Doctoral Degree in Law, Science and Technology program funded by the EU government. Oleksii has been collaborating with the RMIT University Blockchain Innovation Hub, researching the use of blockchain technology for e-governance and e-democracy. He also works on the tokenization of real estate titles, digital IDs, public registries and e-voting. Oleksii co-authored a law on e-petitions in Ukraine, collaborating with the countrys presidential administration and serving as the manager of the nongovernmental e-Democracy Group from 2014 to 2016. In 2019, Oleksii participated in drafting a bill on Anti-Money Laundering and taxation issues for crypto assets in Ukraine.

Continued here:

Twitter Wouldnt Be Hacked if It Were Backed by Blockchain Technology - Cointelegraph

Rob Coole, vice-president, cloud technologies at IPC, provides a round-up of developments that blockchain has undergone in 2020

The technology has come on leaps and bounds over the course of the year.

It may have had a slow start, but 2020 has been the year weve really seen the true potential of blockchain. The true benchmark is in the implementation of real-life deployments, be that in the form of blockchain start-ups or new infrastructure projects. Only then can blockchains true value to the financial industry be measured. Sure enough, 2020, despite its unprecedented challenges, has heralded a new dawn for blockchain.

Nevertheless, the slow uptake of blockchain adoption isnt unusual due to the fact that its value lies in highly regulated, complex markets, such as the financial services industry. It would be unfair to compare adoption to the rise of cloud, Internet of Things and AI, simply because blockchain is suited for complex, collaborative, multi-party, and critical application use-cases.

We are seeing an increase in optimism of blockchain in the financial industry, particularly in the enterprise space, with customers truly seeing the practical purposes in deployment, leading to more investment in time and money in blockchain. Gartner predicts that blockchain will be fully scalable by 2023. IPCs sense of the future of blockchain, particularly in the enterprise space, is just as positive.

The technology behind Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has a growing use of applications for a number of industries. Here, four experts explore the strategic business value of blockchain in finance and beyond. Read here

Next-generation blockchain organisations are leading the way in showing how the technology can be used intelligently for the world we live in today. For example, R3, an enterprise software company, is working with an ecosystem of over 200 financial institutions, regulators, trade associations, professional services and technology companies to develop Corda. This is a blockchain platform designed specifically for businesses to deliver two interoperable and fully compatible distributions of the platform which addresses issues such as transactional certainty, data privacy, and the scalability limitations.

Both application service providers and subscribers should partner with respective service and product providers at an operational level, prioritising integration to stay ahead of the blockchain curve. Real value is provided with the integration and support from the hyper-scale platform community such as Microsoft Azure and AWS together with open industry platforms, such as IPCs Connexus Hub, creating end-to-end solutions that solve business problems. The importance here is APIs. We believe in an API partner integration approach, which gives institutions the ability to easily access data, provide insights and inspire innovation for the company/market need.

Service providers, like IPC, can play a critical role here by supporting operationalisation in the systems-oriented context. Such providers are a natural connector embedding connectivity to key market participants. IPC, for example, has access to all asset classes and trading methods with over 2,000 sell-side, 4,000 buy-side and over 75 exchanges.

Covid-19 has provided unprecedented circumstances and situations that has impacted every aspect of our lives. Though this pandemic is devastating from a health, societal and economic perspective, blockchain may help the global economy rebound. The World Economic Forum believes technology such as blockchain will benefit all countries currently impacted by Covid-19, as it provides an efficient approach to reduce trade cost on a global scale.

The digitisation accelerated by Covid-19 has changed the insurance industry forever but how will traditional companies adapt? Read here

Digital initiatives such as blockchain is non-partisan and open to all, which allows users to act quickly at low cost with low barriers for innovation all valuable factors in supporting the economy in an economic downturn. So, although blockchain adoption was slow in its early stage, 2020 seems to be the year blockchain comes of age.

Written by Rob Coole, vice-president, cloud technologies at IPC

Go here to read the rest:

2020: the year blockchain came of age - Information Age

From CryptoKitties to the NBA,

Dapper Labs has paved the way

for blockchain popularity

beyond speculation thats purely monetary

and now with Dr. Seuss Enterprises

another collectible application arises.

Featuring the Lorax, Thing One and Thing Two

The Cat in the Hat and Horton too,

fans of Dr. Seuss can collect

characters who in retrospect

may prove to be more valuable

than almost any other collectible.

As the world moves increasingly online, so has consumers desire for discovering and collecting digital memorabilia that brings them one step closer to their favorite athletes, musicians and iconic characters, said RohamGharegozlou, the chief executive and founder of Dapper Labs, in a statement. With our new Dr. Seuss digital decal experience, we are marrying the best of both worlds allowing fans to interact and discover something entirely new, while tapping into our collective nostalgia for the characters that mean so much from our childhood. We are thrilled to be working alongside Dr. Seuss Enterprises to launch this first of its kind endeavour that is bound to bring joy to Dr. Seuss fans around the globe.

In September, Dapper Labs raised $11 million in financing from a slew of investors, including Andreessen Horowitzs crypto fund, with participation from investors including Accomplice, AppWorks, Autonomous Partners, Fenbushi Digital and Warner Music Group.

Those investors followed on a slew of other venture firms like Union Square Ventures, Venrock, Digital Currency Group, Animoca Brands, SV Angel, Version One and CoinFund, among others.

That whos who of investors are buying in to the underlying platform Dapper developed called Flow, a specialized blockchain designed for the entertainment industry, according to Gharegozlou.

Go here to see the original:

Dr. Seuss comes to the blockchain thanks to the maker of CryptoKitties - TechCrunch

July24, 20204 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Blockchain is the cannabis industrys answer for stealing market share from the unlicensed market.

While we wait for government regulators to catch up to the speeding train called cannabis innovation, consumers needprotection from rogue growers and distributors. Blockchain is capable of many use cases, but its a perfect fit for supply chain management.

RELATED:NBA Players Are Smoking A Bunch Of Marijuana In The Playoff Bubble

So what is blockchain? Blockchain is a digital ledger that records and tracks data and physical assets from point A to B in the supply chain. The information on the blockchain is cryptographically secure and tamper-proofwhich means that no one can change data once it has been entered and verified.

The blockchain technology can strengthen consumer confidence in the cannabis industry by verifying product origin, compliance, seed verification, proof of ownership, cultivating and manufacturing processes, transactional information, location tracking, and supply chain paper trail.

Lets break it down:

Lets get the technical stuff out of the way first- A smart contract is the mechanical function of the blockchain that controls how the information recorded and received on the ledger. Miners play a role too, but thats for another day.

A smart contract is a computer code of instructions that sets the terms of who, what, where, and when transactions occur in the supply chain. This automated system gathers signatures, enters time stamps, tracks shipping and deliveries, and any other actions required in the process. Smart contracts execute accurate transactions and eliminate human error that currently afflicts the paper and manual based system.

RELATED:How Did Oklahoma Become The Country's Hottest Cannabis Market?

In addition to automating tasks, the smart contract code triggers payments between parties. It works on the if/then system- if this happens, then that happens. For example, once a shipment of goods has been delivered, payment for the goods will get released automatically.

Like biotech and drug companies, cannabis growers need to follow strict manufacturing guidelines for safety and quality assurance. Blockchain offers proof of standard operating procedures (SOP).

There are safety issues, like controlled pesticide use, accurately measured nutrient solutions, storage temperatures, and sanitation measures that need adhering.

For instance, the manager of a plant and horticulture staff, together, would verify and record on the blockchain, a nutrients solution recipe, or the amount of pesticide used.

Cannabis cultivation is a delicate process that requires consistency and nurturing. Blockchain will validate SOP processes as they occur; plant care is monitored through all stages of the plants life cycle to verify product outcome and authenticity.

The USDA 2018 Farm Bill legalized Hemp cultivation and extraction for commercial use, but there are still many areas that need legalization for the CBD consumer product industry to move forward. The FDA for one.

Because of the absence of laws governing the cannabis space, everyone along the supply chain from grower to seller is in danger of breaking the law if they do not stay in step with it.

The Schedule 1 law impedes the progress in research, but once the government declassifies cannabis as an illegal substance, more opportunities will open up.

Companies also benefit from blockchain as a way to document activities and paperwork in a time-stamped method. Its as a sure-fire defense in a court of law in the case of lawsuits or compliance accusations.

Blockchain also tracks the physical property of cannabis as it moves through the supply chain by attaching a GPS tracking device to the shipment. The device communicates the location to the blockchain as a monitor in real-time.

RELATED:Planet 13 Gets Massive Cultivation Deal

HEFTY fines will occur if a company does not comply with KYC (Know Your Customer) or AML (Anti-Money Laundering) laws. Verified client data on the blockchain is immutable and eliminates the worry of falsified records and nefarious activity.

There is the opportunity to enter false information, but its unalterable once recorded.

Consumers have the right to know the origin of the product, manufacturing process, and how it landed in stores. Currently, they go on blind trust that growers and retailers will deliver on their claims.

The GPS tracking device system verifies where cannabis came from and who handled it along the supply chain. Smart contracts collect signatures, documents, certificates, time stamps, and other data as evidence of product authenticity.

Thanks to the discovery of smart devices paired with blockchain technology to make the supply chain more efficient and transparent.

Many believe that blockchain technology is ushering in the fourth industrial revolution and impacting our economy for the better.

Visit link:

From Seed-To-Sale With Blockchain Technology - Green Entrepreneur

Finding a coronavirus vaccine is key, but finding a way to distribute it on a global scale will be equally crucial. This effort will take building a manufacturing and supply chain capacity larger than ever before, more quickly than ever for vaccine distribution. That success also requires leveraging tools and capabilities such as blockchain in a way never seen before in the history of fighting pandemics.

Scale and the challenge ahead

Decades of running immunization programs by UNICEF and Gavi Alliance tell us that vaccine supply chain and delivery takes years to stabilize depending on the geography. For instance, polio immunizations in India took more than a decade to cover 100% of the populations children 175 million under age five. The Pulse Polio immunization program was launched in 1995 with the last case reported in 2011.

Additionally, UNICEF, worlds largest vaccine buyer for children, procured 2.43 billion doses of vaccines in 2019 to reach approximately less than half of the worlds children under five for an effort covering a range of diseases (including measles, diarrhoea, pneumonia and polio).

The unique challenge of scale is greater in the COVID-19 pandemic and that challenge is precedent setting. This vaccine must cover every country in every continent and every person in every age group. Assuming the approved vaccine requires just one dosage per individual, at least 7 billion doses of the vaccine will need to be in the hands of healthcare workers. Assuming a 20-30% loss during transit and storage, this could mean close to 10 billion doses in the supply chain. Should the vaccine administration require two dosages per individual, the volume needed could top 19 billion vials.

The different stages of coronavirus vaccines being developed.

Image: Nature Reviews

Building an equitable, responsive system

A supply chain for COVID-19s vaccine will also be unique. While multiple geo-political, economic and nationalistic interests will influence who discovers the cure, who manufactures it, who funds it and who needs it, the supply chain must be equitable. There must be a global consensus on who should get it first, one not based on who can buy it first. Such an equitable supply chain can only be built on a doubtless, openly verifiable, consensus-driven system having immutable integrity of data with no single source of control. To achieve the global optimum, instead of a national or regional optimum, vaccine access will critically depend on an information system with the highest possible integrity, capable of avoiding forces of vested interests. Thus, blockchain and distributed ledger technology will be essential for an equitable COVID-19 vaccine distribution.

Additionally, the COVID-19 vaccine supply chain information system must be built with real-time tracking capability and updates on parameters such as vaccine storage levels, temperature control, stock-outs, quantities of ancillary supplies (diluent, syringes and needles, glass vials, rubber stoppers, plungers, wicks and kerosene for refrigerators etc.). This becomes imperative in calculating the most important parameter, vaccine wastage rate a key input to anticipate demand, plan manufacturing and supplies, and reducing stock-outs/over-stocks. At the scale of ~10 billion units, estimates of wastage at every stage of the supply chain and its accuracy can be the key in ensuring or denying access to the vaccine for large segments of population. Here again, blockchain will be critical.

Blockchain and distributed ledger technology will be essential for an equitable COVID-19 vaccine distribution.

Even now in our current scenario, we dont have accurate estimates of wastage rates. In the absence of national figures, WHO issues Indicative Vaccine Wastage Rates and a tool for estimation. However, the tool itself acknowledges a lack of accurate and appropriate data at the country level, thanks in part to overburdened systems reporting data that are late or incomplete, and the difficulties in identifying a vaccines target demographic. A report on immunization information systems by WHO under project Optimize, a WHO-PATH project to facilitate an efficient vaccine supply chain, hints that even the Gavi Alliance has seen its attempts to make financial support proportional to performance targets get limited by questions regarding data variances. For the COVID-19 vaccine, we would need live tracking of every vial with all the storage and handling environment parameters with doubtless integrity and open accessibility by all stakeholders which can only be done with a decentralised open ledger.

Efforts leveraging blockchain technology have been undertaken across the globe, in context of supply chain at ports, in retail and logistics. Blockchain has been mostly used in these pilot experiments to enable real-time tracking of shipments and shared access of data between consortium members, building trust. The learnings from these pilots can now be utilized to enable a truly global ledger for the COVID-19 vaccine supply chain.

Efforts to leverage blockchain for vaccines are already in development. One UNICEF Innovation Fund and Gavi Infuse portfolio startup, StaTwig, has been building and testing a vaccine supply chain management platform which ensures all stakeholders have complete visibility of all vaccines at national, state and district levels and at different stages of the supply chain. The platform uses QRcodes [Barcodes/Serial Numbers] printed at unit-levels to track the vaccines from the manufacturer to end-consumer on an open source blockchain platform. At each touchpoint in the supply chain, the platform records data such as quantity, temperature record, timestamps, chain of custody and price against the unique QRcode. The platform supports aggregation and disaggregation so that the number of QRcode scans can be reduced exponentially at pallet, box-levels. This process also simplifies tracking of the products in the extended supply chains which includes last-mile deliveries. StaTwigs teams have been testing the solution with UNICEF program teams in the Middle East, North Africa and in India as well.

The World Economic Forum has produced a report on Inclusive Deployment of Blockchain for Supply Chains A Framework for Blockchain Interoperability. This report, in collaboration with Deloitte, helps organizations understand the importance of interoperable blockchains and outlines a decision framework to support their development and execution. The report is the seventh in a series, offering analysis that helps organizations responsibly deploy blockchain and distributed ledger technology in supply chains, to maximize the benefits and minimize the risks of the technology.

Helpful in these efforts is a recently released Blockchain Deployment Toolkit. Developed by the World Economic Forum Centre for Fourth Industrial Revolution, the toolkit helps in building a shared truth in supply chains depending on trust, transparency and integrity, informing the deployment of new use cases.

Still, more needs to be done. Such an effort would require global coordination of digitizing the vaccine supply chains, retraining and digi-skilling of the involved workforce and aligning all the players manufacturers, suppliers, buyers, frontline health workers and governments towards a consensus to use such a system. Large scale deployment of IoT devices would be required across the whole inventory and logistics, to maintain real-time tracking without too much manual intervention. Since a shared tracking of data may also give rise to concerns around privacy (for both individuals and enterprises alike), privacy preserving techniques would need to be fundamentally coded into the information system.

Such efforts to build an open system to track and trace every vaccine dose accurately and transparently will be required to build a global consortium of vaccine researchers, pharmaceutical companies, manufacturers, distributors, healthcare workers and governments. Blockchain technology allows us to do this at scale, building trust and transparency which will reduce the vaccine wastage rates, eliminate stockouts and ensure a truly equitable distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine to the entirety of human population.

Weve reached an important juncture in technology evolution where the right tools, resources and optimism are present. Leveraged correctly, it is an unprecedented opportunity to capture the minds of innovators to build a first-ever solution to save human lives around the globe.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.

Written by

Punit Shukla, Project Lead, Blockchain and Digital Assets, World Economic Forum, Centre for Fourth Industrial Revolution India

Amey Rajput, Fellow, Blockchain and Digital Assets, World Economic Forum, Centre for Fourth Industrial Revolution India

Sid Chakravarthy, Founder & CEO, Statwig

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Originally posted here:

Blockchain's potential role in the history-making plan to deliver the COVID-19 vaccine - World Economic Forum

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--As millions around the world face the new normal of conducting routine business virtually and working remotely, the new user-friendly blockchain-based platform DocuWalkTM launched today with its innovative virtual negotiating and collaboration room. The subscription-based technology service allows all types of businesses to store documents, negotiate transactions and finalize contracts in a transparent, blockchain-secure online ecosystem.

DocuWalk is the latest platform from the leading blockchain Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) company ShelterZoom. The DocuWalk platform reduces layers of facilitation in the document, contracting and transaction process by turning documents into easily accessible intelligent assets that are stored in a secure space which can easily be collaborated on or shared in real time, with privacy top-of-mind. With DocuWalk, the world now has a fully integrated, fast communication, document and contract management platform they can trust. A brief 60 second video demonstration of how the platform works can be found https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHQi2U7xlco&feature=youtu.be

The early adopters of DocuWalk include a variety of small businesses, real estate, consulting, legal and media companies, as well as individuals who are adapting to the new way of conducting business or managing personal, confidential records.

Before DocuWalk, I was using almost a dozen different applications to facilitate investor relations, corporate communications, vendor contracts and employee agreements. Since I started using DocuWalk myself as a test case, the platform has consolidated all those different applications into one easy-to-use platform that has reduced so much cost, saved time and increased our organizations productivity, said Chao Cheng-Shorland, CEO and Co-Founder of ShelterZoom.

Security, trust and efficiency are all paramount and needed when working in the public sector. DocuWalks platform provides all three needs by delivering safer, more transparent transactions, documents and communications at a quicker and less expensive pace. DocuWalk has the ability to transform how the public sector handles any transactions where documentation is needed, said Robert J. Kovey, Managing Partner of The Credo Company, a leading public sector consulting firm.

DocuWalk creates a level of ease and efficiency that real estate and many other industries can use to lower their costs and increase their profit margins, said John Featherston, CEO of RISMedia, a major real estate information and media publication company and one of the early adopters of DocuWalk. Agents, brokers, and their clients can have a much smoother transaction process by managing all the back and forth for every document or contract involved in a property sale. As real estate adapts to more virtual closings and remote operations as a result of COVID-19, DocuWalk provides an end-to-end solution for everyone involved in the transaction.

There are a variety of subscription-based packages available for DocuWalk users, including a free basic version that includes a blockchain signature. For the virtual negotiating room and expanded capabilities, monthly packages range from $9-19 per month, including options for enterprise entities. All DocuWalk contracts can be signed with blockchain-based security.

Organizations can also license the platform for their proprietary use, giving them a jump start in using ShelterZooms patented blockchain-based technology with a minimum upfront cost.

DocuWalk has created an exciting new paradigm that brings all types of documents into one integrated ecosystem on the blockchain, said Allen Alishahi, President and Co-Founder of ShelterZoom. In anticipation of a more virtual-centric work environment and e-commerce-driven economy, we plan to introduce more features and product lines to allow companies to conduct e-business as usual in line with our vision.

To create a FREE DocuWalk account or to find out more information on ShelterZoom and its latest expanded platform, please visit http://www.docuwalk.com.

For more information or to schedule interviews please contact Josh Knoller at Nicholas & Lence Communications: 212-938-0836 or Josh@nicholaslence.com.

About DocuWalk and ShelterZoom

DocuWalk is ShelterZooms second-generation, industry-agnostic, smart-contract-based SAAS platform that transforms records, documents, and contracts into fully digital, interoperable and intelligent assets with unprecedented efficiency, security and data privacy. A market leader in blockchain, ShelterZoom is more than just a software company. ShelterZoom is changing the way the global market thinks about remote operations and collaboration. For more information, visit http://www.docuwalk.com.

The rest is here:

Announcing the Launch of DocuWalk from ShelterZoom, a Blockchain-Based 'Virtual Negotiating Room' and Secure Document Management Platform - Business...