Crypto lender BlockFi announced its emergence from insolvency this week, just a few days after FTX announced that it successfully reclaimed approximately $7 billion in assets. FTX debtors, comprising FTX and affiliates, estimate that $8.7 billion has been misappropriated from customers. BlockFi has lent FTX more than $650 million, making it one of the exchange’s
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Top Stories This Week Sam Bankman-Fried takes the stand on FTX’s collapse Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried testified this week in his ongoing criminal trial in the Southern District of New York, denying any wrongdoing between FTX and Alameda Research while acknowledging making “big mistakes” during the companies’ explosive growth. Highlights of his testimony include denying directing
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Understanding impersonation scams in crypto In impersonation scams, fraudsters pretend to be reliable individuals, exchanges or services to trick users into sending cryptocurrencies or disclosing personal information. In the context of cryptocurrencies, due to the pseudonymous nature of cryptocurrency transactions and the level of relative secrecy they provide, impersonation scams are common. So, how do
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Stuart Alderoty, the chief legal officer of Ripple Labs, as well as members of the XRP (XRP) community, have expressed their support on X (formerly Twitter) for United States Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) Commissioner Hester Peirce’s stance against perceived “injustice” in the LBRY lawsuit. Alderoty thanked Peirce and suggested that when ongoing injustices occur in non-fraud
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Researchers from Florida Atlantic University and the University of Mississippi recently published research indicating that blockchains with “full” blocks — especially when there’s a transaction queue — appear to have an added layer of protection against nefarious actors, money launderers and would-be fraudsters.  Dubbed “Bitcoin Blocksize, Custodial Security, and Price,” the team’s paper takes a
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A new bridged token from cross-chain protocol LayerZero is drawing criticism from nine protocols throughout the Ethereum ecosystem. A joint statement from Connext, Chainsafe, Sygma, LiFi, Socket, Hashi, Across, Celer, and Router on October 27 called the token’s standard “a vendor-locked proprietary standard,” claiming that it limits the freedom of token issuers. Today, we’re announcing
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Hester Peirce of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has issued a dissenting opinion on the regulator’s lawsuit against blockchain firm LBRY. In an Oct. 27 statement, Peirce described feeling “unsettled” following the SEC’s enforcement action against LBRY in March 2021. In November 2022, a judge ruled in favor of the SEC, stating
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The jury overseeing the criminal trial of Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried listened to the former FTX CEO’s testimony for the first time, which involved largely denying knowledge of fraudulent activities at the crypto exchange. According to reports from the New York courtroom on Oct. 27, Bankman-Fried suggested Wang, the former chief technology officer at FTX, had
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Cryptocurrency hardware wallet provider Trezor is investigating a recent phishing campaign, as users have reported receiving phishing emails. The anonymous blockchain sleuth ZachXBT took to his Telegram channel on Oct. 26 to alert users to a phishing attack targeting Trezor customers. ZachXBT referred to an X (formerly Twitter) post from the account JHDN, which alleged that Trezor
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Cryptocurrency infrastructure firm Fireblocks has identified and assisted in tackling what it describes as the first account abstraction vulnerability within the Ethereum ecosystem. An announcement on Oct. 26 unpacked the discovery of an ERC-4337 account abstraction vulnerability in the smart contract wallet UniPass. The two firms worked together to address the vulnerability, which was reportedly
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On Oct. 25, Taiwanese legislators introduced the Virtual Asset Management Bill to the unicameral parliament, the Legislative Yuan. The bill aims to provide “better protection” for the customers and “properly supervise” the industry.  The 30-page bill appears moderate in its demands for the industry. It suggests some common sense obligations for the virtual asset service
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