Carbon Chemist

Tag: blockchain

  • Crypto Magnate Do Kwon Found Liable for Multi-Billion-Dollar Fraud

    Crypto Magnate Do Kwon Found Liable for Multi-Billion-Dollar Fraud

    [ad_1]

    The defense attempted to draw a distinction between the failure of Terraform’s crypto assets, whose risk profile it implied was well understood by investors, and the acts of fraud alleged by the SEC. “Failure doesn’t equal fraud,” David Patton, attorney to Kwon, reportedly told the courtroom in his opening statement.

    The defense also sought to undermine the credibility of the SEC whistleblowers, whom it reportedly suggested were in it only for the financial reward. The defense dismissed the account of the former Jump employee as hearsay and cast the Chai whistleblower as a disgruntled former staffer.

    The defense also contended that Chai had utilized the Terraform blockchain, and argued that the SEC could not prove otherwise without access to the Chai source code. The messages between Shin and Kwon about “fake transactions,” Kwon’s lawyers claimed, related to a different project entirely.

    The jury was ultimately unconvinced.

    Having been found liable, Kwon and Terraform will be dealt a financial penalty, the size of which will be confirmed by the judge at a later stage. They’ll likely be prevented from participating in the US securities market in the future. But the implications of the case spill further afield.

    Before the trial, the defense had called for dismissal on the grounds that the SEC had misclassified UST, LUNA, and other Terraform tokens as securities—a specific class of financial instrument from which investors expect to profit—and, therefore, lacked jurisdiction. The debate over the appropriate classification of crypto is central to multiple ongoing legal disputes in the US, between the SEC and Ripple, Coinbase, and other firms. The crypto industry has repeatedly accused the SEC of “regulation by enforcement”—of wielding legal action instead of articulating clear rules for the road—and making a jurisdictional land grab.

    However, in an opinion issued before the trial, Judge Jed Rakoff, who presided over the Kwon case in New York, rejected the arguments for dismissal. The SEC should be allowed to “resolve new and difficult questions posed by emerging technologies where the technologies impact markets that on their face appear to resemble securities markets,” he ruled.

    The opinion does not establish a rule that other US judges are duty bound to follow, but in combination with the verdict in favor of the SEC, sets a precedent of sorts for a crypto organization having violated US securities laws. “This case is before a well-respected judge who is thorough and careful. He’s influential,” says Lisa Bragança, attorney at Bragança Law and former branch chief at the SEC. “A decision from him will be cited over and over again by fellow judges.”

    Terraform had already signaled prior to the trial its intention to appeal an unfavorable verdict, citing the ambiguity over the proper classification of its tokens. The absence of Kwon from the courtroom, which denied him the ability to “sit at the counsel table, hear the testimony of witnesses, and respond,” says Bragança, could support the appeal bid.

    In the absence of legislative direction from the US Congress, says Silva, the classification question will be settled only when a crypto case moves through the appellate courts, perhaps arriving eventually at the US Supreme Court. “It’s an evolving area of the law,” he says. “It’s crystallizing with each case that comes down. It just hasn’t crystallized yet.”

    From 4,500 miles away in Montenegro, Kwon will have played his part.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • A Crypto Company Thinks It Can Help Fight Climate Change

    A Crypto Company Thinks It Can Help Fight Climate Change

    [ad_1]

    It started at a hackathon a few years ago near Trafalgar Square, in London. Raphaël Haupt and James Farrell got to talking about how to use the growing popularity of blockchain and cryptocurrencies to help combat climate change. The result was Toucan, a project founded by the duo, which aims to revolutionize carbon offsetting.

    To understand what that means you have to start with the voluntary carbon offsetting market. The logic behind it is quite simple. While companies and individuals need to reduce how many carbon emissions they produce, in the short-term at least there will always be a certain amount they won’t be able to get rid of straight away. Carbon credits exist as a way to balance out for that and still reach net zero – “retiring” a credit allows you to emit a tonne of carbon and still technically be carbon neutral. What that credit is created by can range from just cutting down your own emissions to planting a forest or funding the construction of a hydroelectric dam.

    But currently the system is a mess, governed by a close-knit collection of private standards bodies, each running their own carbon credits registries. “This is an unregulated market and it’s a global market,” says John Hoopes, also known as John X in the crypto community, who is in charge of Toucan’s strategy. “Each of these standards bodies have these different registries, differing formats, different methodologies and definitions for a credit and also use different data models. They’re not harmonized, they’re not interoperable; it’s very hard to work with them.”

    Simply put, Toucan is a market infrastructure. It bridges physical carbon credits, found on countless different physical registries, and converts and standardizes them into carbon tokens on one blockchain super-registry. Those tokens are aggregated into “pools”, from which users are then given a tradable crypto token. Toucan’s first carbon pool is called BCT, or Base Carbon Tonne, and it represents a basket of credits of various types – such as those coming from tree-planting or pollution-reduction — to offset one tonne of carbon emissions.

    By having the system on one single registry, Toucan aims to stop projects or companies double-reporting credits. The company can also break down the different carbon credit projects by their age and quality, and can even tailor the type of tokens available to a buyer’s needs.

    “Corporates are looking to align offsetting activities with their brand. Maybe they want to only do nature-based solutions, they only want to do technology-based ones, they don’t want to do stuff in Brazil or Indonesia or wherever they’re based,” says Hoopes. “Our system allows us to create those categories of carbon tokens.”

    As just one example, the group is set to launch a new Nature Carbon Tonne pool – where all credits have to come from nature-based projects such as tree-planting rather than more dubious sources of emissions reductions. The hope is that the system will bring more and more people just interested in crypto into a carbon market traditionally dominated by corporate players trying to balance their emissions for PR reasons.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Craig Wright Is Not Bitcoin Creator Satoshi Nakamoto, Judge Declares

    Craig Wright Is Not Bitcoin Creator Satoshi Nakamoto, Judge Declares

    [ad_1]

    The allegations of forgery are founded on a series of reports compiled by an expert in forensic document analysis nominated by COPA, who analyzed the various materials on which Wright’s claim depends. The reports identified hundreds of alleged instances of forgery and tampering of various flavors, and were largely corroborated by two experts nominated by Wright. In closing, Hough emphasized Wright’s decision not to call his own experts for questioning, meaning their unflattering testimony must be taken at face value by the court.

    Hough also pointed to previously unpublished communications between Satoshi and their early collaborators, which COPA says demonstrate clear discrepancies in Wright’s story. Wright has claimed that Bitcoin was profoundly influenced by the work of cryptographer Wei Dai; COPA says the emails show Satoshi became aware of Dai after having already drafted the Bitcoin white paper. Wright has long said that Bitcoin should not be described as a “cryptocurrency;” COPA says the emails show Satoshi embraced the term. Wright’s account is “so riddled with dishonest features it can confidently be dismissed as a fiction,” Hough claimed.

    Throughout his stint in the witness box, Wright had made repeated allegations about the independence and objectivity of COPA’s forensic expert. In his closing arguments, Wright’s counsel, Lord Anthony Grabiner, argued that the judge should disregard all of the evidence submitted by COPA’s forensic document analysis expert, citing the “unorthodox” way their reports had been produced. COPA’s legal representatives had assisted in the composition of the reports in a highly unusual fashion, Grabiner claimed, thus the expert had become “part of the team” and their independence compromised.

    In its closing rebuttal, COPA rejected the idea that its expert was compromised. The attack on the expert’s credibility, claimed Hough, was a clear example of “playing the man when you manifestly cannot play the ball.”

    Grabiner also turned to a series of private meetings in 2016 in which Wright was able to convince Gavin Andresen, an early contributor to Bitcoin’s underlying software, and Jon Matonis, former director of the Bitcoin Foundation, that he possessed the private credentials associated with known Satoshi transactions. Although Andresen has since walked back his support for Wright’s claims in a blog post, Grabiner called these so-called signing sessions “a key part of the case for Dr. Wright.” COPA counters that the signing sessions were “fixed or in some devious way subverted by Dr. Wright,” said Grabiner. “But the expert evidence focuses exclusively and speculatively on the theoretical possibility of the signing sessions being subverted.”

    Grabiner reserved his final words to argue against the specific relief requested by COPA, beyond the findings that will be documented in the judgment. He wielded various legal precedents and technicalities to object to a formal declaration that Wright is not the author of the Bitcoin white paper, a matter he described as “purely academic.” Grabiner objected to an injunction restraining Wright from claiming he is Satoshi, meanwhile, on the basis that Wright should be free to “tell anyone who he believes he is,” irrespective of whether the court agrees with him.

    Now begins a nervous wait for Wright, for whom there is more at stake than his reputation and ability to carry forward his other litigation. In its closing filing, COPA petitioned for the matter of forgery to be referred to the UK criminal courts. “In putting forward his dishonest claim to be Satoshi and backing it up with a huge number of forged documents, Wright has committed fraud upon the court,” Hough told the judge. If found guilty, Wright could face a fine, imprisonment, or both.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • What’s Behind the Bitcoin Price Surge? Vibes, Mostly

    What’s Behind the Bitcoin Price Surge? Vibes, Mostly

    [ad_1]

    The latest surge in the price of bitcoin is increasing the clamor around it, says Dal Bianco, drawing in yet more speculators and creating a “self-reinforcing cycle.” Likewise, when collective confidence in the prospect of further price growth falters, she says, the resultant downturn can be equally sudden. Under these conditions, demand can vanish as rapidly as it forms.

    On March 3, Michael Green, chief strategist at asset management firm Simplify, entered into a wager with Peter McCormack, host of the podcast What Bitcoin Did. They were betting on the price of bitcoin. Green wagered $20,000 that bitcoin would not reach a price of $100,000 per coin by the end of the year. McCormack wagered $100,000 that it would.

    The bet, Green says, was in part motivated by a desire to highlight areas of weakness in the economic theory presented as dogma by bitcoin evangelists. He takes issue with the way bitcoin is being sold to the investing public as “a store of value designed ultimately to be the currency of the future,” he says. “I think that is a bunch of economic nonsense.” Because the supply of bitcoin will shrink steadily over time as people lose access to irrecoverable wallets, Green argues, it cannot support a system of credit, because the cost of borrowing will eventually rise to a point that almost no one can afford.

    In January, US regulators approved the first batch of bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which give people a way to invest in the cryptocurrency through a brokerage, as they would a regular stock. The arrival of bitcoin ETFs is said to have catalyzed the latest surge in price, by unlocking a wave of pent-up demand among investors—both institutions and regular people—previously unable or unwilling to deal with a crypto exchange or risk storing crypto manually themselves. In approving the new bitcoin funds, says Green, regulators have incentivized financial institutions for whom the ETFs represent a new source of revenue to “spend tons of money on marketing to drive demand,” and in turn disincentivized any emphasis on deficiencies in the logic of bitcoinomics.

    The belief in the future potential of bitcoin has become religious, says Green. That missionary zeal is more likely to influence the price, says Green, than any economic mechanism built into the system. Even if McCormack were to lose the wager, he says, it could be chalked up as a fruitful marketing expense. McCormack told WIRED the wager with Green was not a marketing stunt. “I did the bet to prove him wrong,” he says.

    The influence of evangelism on the price of bitcoin limits the opportunity for good-faith debate about the prospects of the Bitcoin system, says Angel.“Once you drink the Kool-Aid, you have a powerful financial incentive to preach to the world that bitcoin is the most wonderful thing,” he says. “If there were a Nobel prize in marketing, it should be given to Satoshi Nakamoto.”

    Bitcoin’s biggest boosters embrace that dynamic as well. “Bitcoin price appreciation is an advertisement,” says Mow. Investors buy in on the prospect of riches—and then fall down the “rabbit hole” themselves, creating a new generation of believers to spread the Bitcoin gospel.



    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Hackers Behind the Change Healthcare Ransomware Attack Just Received a $22 Million Payment

    Hackers Behind the Change Healthcare Ransomware Attack Just Received a $22 Million Payment

    [ad_1]

    The ransomware attack targeting medical firm Change Healthcare has been one of the most disruptive in years, crippling pharmacies across the US—including those in hospitals—and leading to serious snags in the delivery of prescription drugs nationwide for 10 days and counting. Now, a dispute within the criminal underground has revealed a new development in that unfolding debacle: One of the partners of the hackers behind the attack points out that those hackers, a group known as AlphV, received a $22 million transaction that looks very much like a large ransom payment.

    On March 1, a Bitcoin address connected to AlphV received 350 bitcoins in a single transaction, or close to $22 million based on exchange rates at the time. Then, two days later, someone describing themselves as an affiliate of AlphV—one of the hackers who work with the group to penetrate victim networks—posted to the cybercriminal underground forum RAMP that AlphV had cheated them out of their share of the Change Healthcare ransom, pointing to the publicly visible $22 million transaction on Bitcoin’s blockchain as proof.

    That suggests, according to Dmitry Smilyanets, the researcher for security firm Recorded Future who first spotted the post, that Change Healthcare has likely paid AlphV’s ransom. “You can see the number of coins that landed there. You don’t see that kind of transaction so often,” Smilyanets says. “There’s proof of a large amount landing in the AlphV-controlled Bitcoin wallet. And this affiliate connects this address to the attack on Change Healthcare. So it’s likely that the victim paid the ransom.”

    When WIRED reached out to United Healthcare, which owns Change Healthcare, a spokesperson declined to answer whether it had paid a ransom to AlphV, responding only that “we are focused on the investigation right now.”

    Both Recorded Future and TRM Labs, a blockchain analysis firm, connect the Bitcoin address that received the $22 million payment to the AlphV hackers. TRM Labs says it can link the address to payments from two other AlphV victims in January.

    This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Bitcoin Royalty Descends on Satoshi Nakamoto Trial

    Bitcoin Royalty Descends on Satoshi Nakamoto Trial

    [ad_1]

    Bitcoin was invented by Satoshi Nakamoto, an enigmatic figure about whom almost nothing is known. Fifteen years ago, Satoshi brought the idea of an electronic cash system into being with the help of a small cast of oddballs. This week, some of those early collaborators—now crypto-celebrities in their own right—took to the witness box of a London courtroom. They had come to testify against an alleged imposter.

    Since 2016, Australian computer scientist Craig Wright has claimed to be Satoshi. The claim is widely disputed, yet Wright has wielded it in a series of lawsuits against developers and others in pursuit of establishing intellectual property rights over Bitcoin. The stakes are high: If Wright succeeds, he could prevent developers from working on the Bitcoin codebase and dictate the terms of use for the system.

    Earlier this month, a trial began in the UK High Court, the purpose of which is to challenge Wright’s claim to being the creator of Bitcoin. The case was filed by a consortium of crypto firms called the Crypto Open Patent Alliance, which is asking the court to declare that Wright is not Satoshi, thereby limiting his ability to found further litigation on the claim. COPA claims that Wright has fabricated his evidence and repeatedly changed his story as new inconsistencies come to light. It called on the early bitcoiners to help prove it.

    Among those that testified were Adam Back, Mike Hearn, Martti Malmi, and Zooko Wilcox-O’Hearn, each of whom contributed to the early development of Bitcoin in their own way. With the exception of Hearn, who had a polished manner and dressed sharply, the witnesses had the air of technologists: softly spoken and somewhat awkward, but quietly authoritative. Earlier in the trial, Wright had faced a grueling seven-day cross-examination, in which he rejected hundreds of claims of forgery and misrepresentation. The evidence supplied by the bitcoiners, COPA hoped, would help dismantle his story.

    In 2008, when Satoshi was finalizing the design of the Bitcoin system, they pitched the concept to a niche online community of cryptographers. Discussions about Bitcoin spilled into fringes of the web occupied by anarchists and libertarians, who relished in the idea of a monetary system divorced from the state.

    From these two realms, a misfit band of supporters came together to assist Satoshi. They shared a belief, as Back described it in court, in technology as a “tool for positive change.” Some volunteered their advice, others their code, and others their labor. After Satoshi disappeared, in 2011, they carried Bitcoin forward.

    The figures called upon by COPA to testify each made a distinct mark on Bitcoin. Back created a precursor technology called Hashcash (although Wright disputes its relevance) and corresponded with Satoshi as the Bitcoin creator drafted the white paper. Satoshi tasked Malmi with curating Bitcoin.org, which hosted educational materials. Hearn was one of the earliest contributors to the Bitcoin codebase. And Wilcox-O’Hearn was among the first to blog about Bitcoin, spreading the gospel. As Bitcoin grew, these early collaborators became themselves revered in crypto circles for their place in Bitcoin lore.

    [ad_2]

    Source link