Month: January 2018

Velix.ID — a RegTech Blockchain startup, working in the Identity Verification Space — is partnering with Cryptocurrency Exchanges in India to improve upon the existing KYC processes. The initial cryptocurrency exchanges to confirm the partnership with Velix.ID are Coinsecure & Bitxoxo, two of the largest Bitcoin exchanges in India.

On the partnership with Velix.ID, Mohit Kalra, the CEO of Coinsecure, said:

“The current process of KYC and identity verification is too troublesome and tedious for us as a Cryptocurrency Exchange and a cause of significant loss of business. I personally believe that with Blockchain Technology, this process can be improved upon drastically. When the idea of Velix.ID was presented to me, I was left impressed with the idea and the technical soundness of the execution plan. In fact, I wholeheartedly believe in —not just the idea— but the actual ability of the Velix.ID team to be able to execute this project successfully”

The current procedures of KYC are a cause of major concern for both the Cryptocurrency exchanges and their customers causing a significant business loss for the exchanges.

There are multiple faults in the contemporary KYC methods that make the process of signing up on the exchanges very inefficient:

Too time consuming: It takes a least of 3 days to 5 days normally for an individual KYC process to be completed at the moment with any exchange. There are huge backlogs with many cryptocurrency exchanges because of the pending KYCs, which is causing huge business loss on daily basis for the exchanges.

Loss in Customer Acquisition: The requirement to sign up with basic information, then make copies of your identity documents, uploading them, and then waiting for the verification process to be completed is a discouraging process for the Users, and incurs a loss in customer acquisitions for the businesses.

The Velix.ID Solution: Revamping KYC

The Velix.ID Ecosystem is a decentralized solution to the KYC problem. As a business partner, the exchange can simply request the verified identity of the User over the Velix.ID blockchain from a business/authority that has already verified it. This Verified-Identity Provider can be the User’s bank, another cryptocurrency exchange, or any other authentic organization from which the exchange is willing to obtain the identity from. This transaction is carried out in a secure, efficient, and private manner utilizing technologies such as Smart Contracts, Stellar Consensus Protocol, zSNARKs, HD Wallets (BIP32), and PoeT. This transaction of identity using Velix.ID is blazingly fast as the transaction is verified through multiple nodes on the Velix.ID blockchain, who are rewarded for these transactions.

Velix.ID offers free verification stamps to the business partners so that they can test out the Velix.ID Ecosystem to see if their business costs improve with the Velix.ID improved KYC process. Other than the already secured partnerships with Coinsecure and Bitxoxo, Velix.ID is currently in talks with all major cryptocurrency exchanges in India for their KYC processes.

The KYC process is, however, only one of the many use-cases of Velix.ID Ecosystem in the Identity Verification space, which covers many industry verticals including  cryptocurrency trading, real-estate, Travel & Hospitality, Banking & Insurance, Employment, Commerce, Transport.

 

The Velix.ID Presale begins January 27, 11:59 PM UTC at 35% discount, you can register now.

 

Velix.ID Website: https://www.velix.id/

Whitepaper: https://www.velix.id/assets/Velix.ID%20White%20Paper.pdf

Connect on Telegram: https://t.me/velixID

Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/VelixId

Check out the Blog: https://blog.velix.id

Read the BitcoinTalk Thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2721724

 

Media Contact

Contact Name: Neer Varshney,

Contact Position: Head of Communications & Outreach,  

Contact Email: [email protected], Telegram:https://t.me/neerv Skype: neer.varshney.

This is a sponsored press release and does not necessarily reflect the opinions or views held by any employees of The Merkle. This is not investment, trading, or gambling advice. Always conduct your own independent research.

Venezuela’s economy is in deep trouble, and the government is planning to create a token, the Petro, in attempts to dig itself out. This Tuesday, President Nicolás Maduro signed the Petro white paper, revealing its plans to create an oil-backed cryptocurrency for Venezuela.

Controversy has surrounded the Petro, the price of which will be pegged to the value of Venezuela’s oil per barrel — roughly $60 in early January — since day one. Opposition legislators in Venezuelan Parliament see the currency as an illegal attempt by President Maduro to basically get advance payment for the eventual sale of its oil reserves (the country is currently amid quadruple-digit inflation).

Cryptocurrency enthusiasts, meanwhile, have argued that a centralized government creating a decentralized currency defeats the purpose of the technology entirely. And the United States is apprehensive, too, earlier this month it warned investors curious about the Petro, saying dealing in it may be troublesome because “the Petro digital currency would appear to be an extension of credit to the Venezuelan government.”

The country will create the token on the Ethereum blockchain, the white paper reveals, and mining centers are being set up at educational institutions to produce it. This, apparently, has been revised from an initial draft proposal that stated the Petro was going to be pre-mined before its launch. The country will issue 100 million tokens, each valued at and backed by the equivalent of one barrel of Venezuelan crude. That would put the value of the entire Petro issuance at just over $6 billion. The President, on state TV, said the following: “The Petro will have a great impact in how we access foreign currencies for the country, and in how we obtain goods and services that we need from around the world.”

One thing to consider is that tokens are not cryptocurrencies, they are digital assets and their value is only whatever people are willing to pay for them. Most token sales on Ethereum are used to raise money to fund development, but the real fundraiser for Venezuela will be the public offering of Petro itself. Instead, according to the white paper, the token pre-sale “will promote and guarantee demand for the Petro Initial Offer, which will be made later.”

The post President Maduro Outlines Venezuela’s Plans For Own Cryptocurrency: The Petro appeared first on NewsBTC.

Red or green? See who wore it best. #PRICE_ANALYSIS

This week the firm Coinshares Group has announced two new investment vehicles tethered to cryptocurrencies. Coinshares was the first organization to launch publicly traded bitcoin and ethereum-based exchange-traded-notes (ETN), and the firm’s new funds will offer retail investors more “familiar channels” to invest in the growing digital asset economy.

Also Read：Chinese Investors Continue to Obtain Bitcoin Using Thriving OTC Platforms

Two New Coinshares Crypto-Investment Funds: The ‘Active’ and ‘Large Cap’

Coinshares Group is a well-known company that offers two globally traded ETNs based on the decentralized cryptocurrencies bitcoin (Bitcoin Tracker One and BTC Tracker Euro) and ethereum (Ether Tracker One and ETH Tracker Euro). The firm focuses its energy on providing investment vehicles tied to the emerging market of crypto-assets. The ETN provider is approved by the Swedish FSA (Finansinspektionen), and average retail investors can purchase the ETNs which are listed and sold on Nasdaq Nordic in Stockholm. Coinshares is now launching the ‘Active’ Fund and ‘Large Cap’ Fund which offer two types of digital asset fund investment.

The ‘Active’ Fund will follow an alpha-generating ongoing strategy with multiple crypto assets. The ‘Large Cap’ fund will be more a more passive and significant larger basket fund. The Chairman of Coinshares Group, Daniel Masters, believes the firm has a great experience with crypto-investment products and says the company looks forward to offering the new funds.

“As a group, we have developed a deep expertise in bringing new, fit-for-purpose crypto-investment products to market; products which offer traditional investors proper, familiar channels to access the crypto-asset ecosystem,” explains Coinshares chairman.

We are particularly excited for these two new funds as they represent the latest evolution of our expertise and are built on key learnings from the last three years of managing crypto-asset investments.

Investor Education, a New London Office, and Working With Regulators

Additionally, Coinshares has been offering investor education called, “a framework for analyzing crypto assets,” and is also opening a new London-based office. The firm says it plans to expand in global jurisdictions where regulatory policy is shifting with these emerging new technologies. Ryan Radloff, the CEO, and founder of Coinshares says the company still has a lot of work to do regarding dealing with regulators investigating digital assets. Moreover, the company has created a “representative relationship” with Sapia Partners LLP, part of the Lawson Conner Group.     

“As one of the European leaders in crypto-finance, we have a responsibility to lead by example; and as a group, we believe that the crypto-finance community should seek more regulation, not run away from it; this London office is a proper step in upholding that belief,” Radloff details during the announcement.   

There is still a lot of work to be done on regulation in crypto-finance and we look forward to working with regulators throughout the process.

Coinshare’s existing ETNs have had a very successful year much like the rest of the cryptocurrency economy. The product Bitcoin Tracker One (COINXBT:SS) is up 881.22 percent over the past year. The first Ethereum tracking ETN on Nasdaq Stockholm launched this past October hold an excess of $350Mn USD in just a few short months.

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Images via Nasdaq OMX Stockholm, the Coin Rush broadcast, and Coinshares XBT. 

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Want to learn how to purchase and obtain the decentralized currency Bitcoin Cash (BCH)? Check out Bitcoin.com’s “Learn how to buy Bitcoin Cash with a credit card” Guide here. 

The post Coinshares Group Plans to Launch New Crypto-Investment Funds appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Taxing cryptocurrency gains have always been a puzzler for the taxation authorities, but, with coins like Bitcoin hitting the mainstream, and enough time elapsing, the tax man is catching up. #ANALYSIS

Financial Times

Markets, prices and a quantity theory of bitcoin Financial Times Sir, We often read in your pages the view that bitcoin has no value and therefore, in a rational market, would have no price. But that surely is wrong. Bitcoin was developed as a form of money (the clue is in the name), and money has value even though ...

South Korea’s finance minister Kim Dong-Yeon has said that the government has no plans to shut down or ban cryptocurrency trading. The news is a welcome respite for investors worried that authorities might go as far as China in out-right banning cryptocurrency trading and investment platforms.

“There is no intention to ban or suppress cryptocurrency,” Dong-yeon said in a statement reported by Reuters. He added that the government’s immediate task is to regulate exchanges.

The comment from the Finance Minister comes as traders and investors around the world have been spooked by conflicting comments from government officials in South Korea — a major global hub for cryptocurrencies — about whether the country was planning to ban exchanges, something originally proposed by the country’s Justice Ministry. Over the past few weeks, government officials from several different ministries have come out in both support of and opposition to the potential ban.

On the same day of proposing it, in fact, the Justice Ministry was forced to soften its stance (that of an out-right ban), which many argue was unlikely to succeed from the beginning. It found little support from other governmental ministries, including the Ministry of Finance which refused to endorse a ban on cryptocurrency trading and exchanges.

In a public radio interview this month, Korea’s Fair Trade Commission chairman Kim Sang-joo also disputed the very notion of a ban, effectively stating it would be illegal for the government to enforce such measures. “[Shutting down cryptocurrency exchanges] is not realistically possible. Based on electronic commerce law, the government does not have the authority to close down cryptocurrency trading platforms.”

All these conflicting statements provoked an industry backlash, which led to the Executive Office of the President weighing in on the matter in attempts to cool fears of a blanket ban. The industry was right to have worries, as Korea notably followed China’s example in introducing bans initial coin offerings (ICOs) earlier this year.

South Korea has been at the forefront of pushing for broad regulatory oversight of cryptocurrency trading, as many locals, from students to housewives, jumped into a frenzied market despite warnings from some policymakers around the world of a cryptocurrency bubble.

The post South Korean Finance Minister Reiterates Stance: No Ban appeared first on NewsBTC.

Cryptocurrency exchange Huobi is about to open an office in the US, the company has announced at the Blockchain Connect conference. #NEWS

New York Times

Worries Grow That the Price of Bitcoin Is Being Propped Up New York Times A growing number of virtual currency investors are worried that the prices of Bitcoin and other digital tokens have been artificially propped up by a widely used exchange called Bitfinex, which has a checkered history of hacks and opaque business ... Bitcoin Prices React to Tether Subpoena and South Korea NewsInvestopedia (blog) Bitcoin backlash: The legal rules and what you need to know if you want to investTelegraph.co.uk Facebook ban on bitcoin ads is the latest in a very bad day for cryptocurrenciesCNBC Business Insider -TNW -Bitcoin News (press release) -New York Times all 120 news articles »

The 58 billion yen worth of XEM tokens are on the move, according to the NEM Foundation, but no attempt to sell them on exchanges has been made.

Taipei, Taiwan is seeking to become a ‘leading’ smart city by utilizing the power of Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) through IOTA’s Tangle system. #NEWS

This article originally appeared on Bitcoin Magazine.

What are your thoughts on Facebook’s cryptocurrency advertising ban? #ANALYSIS

In an announcement released earlier this week, Facebook has confirmed it will no longer carry advertising for Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) and cryptocurrencies. Said Facebook  Product Management Director Rob Leathern. “Two of our core advertising principles outline our belief that ads should be safe, and that we build for people first. Misleading or deceptive ads have no place on Facebook.

Cryptojackers have been hijacking YouTube ads to harness viewers computer processing power in order to mine digital currencies, in this case, Monero. The issue was reported by technology publication and science Ars Technica after people took to social media to report that antivirus programs had detected cryptocurrency malware on YouTube. 

Attackers abused Google’s DoubleClick, which develops and provides internet ad serving services for traffic distribution. According to data from the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network, affected countries include Japan, France, Taiwan, Italy, and Spain. Google has now blocked the ads from being displayed on YouTube.

Unfortunately, most victims are unaware of what is going on – the process is carried out secretly without users having the opportunity to opt out. Even though a download isn’t required, hackers devised an approach where cryptojacking can continue even after users close the tab itself. And unfortunately, since it is a relatively new concept, hackers can innovate, changing their methods in an attempt to continue their devious plan.

90% of the time, the malicious adverts would launch a miner called Coinhive, and in the other 10% of cases a private web miner would be used. Each would covertly use up 80% of victims’ computer processing power for mining, resulting in the machine running much, much slower than normal. These recent ads have helped drive up the volume of cryptojacking incidents involving Coinhive by almost 285%.

“Mining cryptocurrency through ads is a relatively new form of abuse that violates our policies and one that we’ve been monitoring actively,” a Google spokesperson told The Independent. “We enforce our policies through a multi-layered detection system across our platforms which we update as new threats emerge. In this case, the ads were blocked in less than two hours and the malicious actors were quickly removed from our platforms.”

Despite these claims from Google that the process is “relatively new,” cryptojacking has become increasingly popular over the years —  and YouTube’s ad problem was not an isolated incident. Research has shown that in the top 3 million websites, 2,500 are running a form of cryptojacking software, consuming users’ processing power without their knowledge or consent.

The post Malicious YouTube Ads Secretly Used By Cryptojackers To Mine Cryptocurrencies appeared first on NewsBTC.