Despite the convenience factor associated with credit and debit card payments, there are a lot of drawbacks as well. Despite introducing new security measures to reduce fraudulent payments, Visa forces retailers to swipe cards as well, which are far more prone to fraud. Does Visa Even Care About Its Customers? There are several ways for retailers and merchants to accept credit card payments, as payment terminals have evolved throughout the years. Adding new layers of security to the most common form of payment is of great importance, Especially when considering how card payments have always been subject to high amounts of fraud. When customers swipe their credit or debit card through a payment terminal, the device registers the Track 1 and Track 2 part of the…
Gatecoin, a Hong Kong-based digital currency startup that has cited segregated client accounts as a way to minimize exposure to risks, suffered a breach and lost 250 BTC and 185,000 ETH, 15% of its crypto asset deposits. A cybersecurity firm, Tehtri Security, conducted a forensic investigation and confirmed the breach, Gatecoin announced in a statement by CEO Aurélien Menant posted on its website. The breach took place between Monday, May 9, late night HKT, to Thursday evening HKT, 12 May 2016, the statement noted. The company noticed a disruption of service caused by a server reboot. The company said the breach is linked to this event. Gatecoin Suspends Services On Friday HKT, May 13, Gatecoin detected suspicious transactions and immediately suspended its…
Key Highlights Ethereum price, after trading a few points above the $11.00 level vs the US Dollar, found sellers and moved down. There is a bullish trend line formed on the hourly chart (data feed via Kraken) of ETH/USD, which is currently acting as a support area. The price is now below the 100 hourly simple moving average, which is not a good sign for the ETH bulls. Ethereum price moved below the 100 SMA, but stayed above a support trend line. Can it recover or break the support to move down? Ethereum Price Trend Line Support Ethereum price ETH this past week managed to register a high above the $11.00 level vs the US dollar, and then started to move down. The downside move was sharp, as the price settled below the 100 hourly simple moving average. However,…
Blockchain technology, initially developed to record and confirm all digital currency transactions happening over the bitcoin network is increasingly being used in various industries. Given that bitcoin is a kind of decentralized financial network, the banking, and financial institutions are the ones who are more interested in the technology than rest of the industries. While the interest of these sectors is expected, the education sector has recently started adopting the blockchain technology as well. Blockchain technology offers endless opportunities, some of the educational institutions have already implemented the technology while there are few with plans chalked out for the coming years. With blockchain technology, the education sector plans to use it for…
Bitcoin price continued on Sunday as it had done on Saturday: quiet trade in a $4 range. Today’s price action seems to be coiling up for a larger move. This analysis is provided by xbt.social with a 3-hour delay. Read the full analysis here. Not a member? Join now and receive a $29 discount using the code CCN29. Bitcoin Price Analysis Time of analysis: 15h00 UTC Bitstamp 1-Hour Candle Chart From the analysis pages of xbt.social, earlier today: Another quiet day in the bitcoin price chart with price hugging the 200-hour moving average. Volume remains low but the additional onset of low volatility within a narrow price range gives the impression that a larger move is building pressure in the chart. Longer term constraints remain $449 (Bitstamp) and the horizontal…
Peter Todd, backed by Matt Corallo, has proposed hard-fork changes to the bitcoin network to make “useless” patent pending algorithmic improvements which give mining an Asicboost of 20%, leading to increased profits of some $30 million if used by one of the biggest mining pools. In a striking post to the bitcoin mailing list, Todd states: “As part of the hard-fork proposed in the HK agreement we’d like to make the patented AsicBoost optimisation useless, and hopefully make further similar optimizations useless as well.” Arguing that the patent pending optimization may lead to mining centralization as the license could be limited to only one manufacturer or lead Chinese manufacturers to ignore the patent, but restrict export of the optimized ASICs to USA, Todd…
Dr Paul Ennis is a research assistant at The Centre for Innovation, Technology & Organization at University College Dublin, specializing in bitcoin and blockchain studies. In this opinion piece, Dr Ennis discusses how bitcoin’s scaling debate has thus far evolved, examining the various competing efforts, their processes and what the differences say about the developer community and its culture. Bitcoin’s scaling debate is clearly one of its defining moments. It has pitted the user bases sharply against one another whether through endless Reddit debates, digital media or even at the “top” tier of the development teams. It also raised significant issues around centralization and bitcoin’s somewhat awkward relationship with the mostly…