Category: Blockchain

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Denmark propose the use of Blockchain Platforms for fighting against corruption on government and institutional levels

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark published a report explaining the use of IT technologies and services including blockchain, e-governance, big data, and crowdsourcing to fight administrative, or day-to-day, corruption as well as political corruption.

Presented during the International Anti-Corruption Conference, or IACC, the report emphasizes the use of blockchain as a technology that will build a more transparent governance and transaction system, further adding that it will also give individuals greater rights over their own data.

According to the report, blockchain can be used as a potential anti-corruption tool as it has the ability to store records immutably and transparently. A public database such as blockchain also provides every individual equal access to the data stored in the ledger, thus allowing individuals to claim their rights over aid, land and money without depending on any middlemen.

The report further says that blockchain “reduces or eliminates the need for institutions” such as banks, land registries, accountants, registry of births and deaths, and vehicle registration whose main job is to validate transactions.

The technology would help entities efficiently and securely share resources with people without formal identities or bank accounts, the report adds.

The public sector may also use blockchain to secure records and certificates from any alterations and use blockchain’s ability to trace all activities to reduce the chances for corruption.

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Farmers Could Soon Be Hedging Their Risks With Decentralized Weather Data

Farmers are likely the hardest hit by weather unpredictability. For many, severe weather conditions can lead to the loss of their livelihood, or even starvation. Although farmer insurance has been around for decades — if not centuries — according to Jha, it is unaffordable for the vast majority:

“If you had less than two hundred thousand dollars in premium to spend, you actually had no real access.”

Arbol blockchain infrastructure. Source: Arbol.

Jha claims that Arbol both lowers the entry barrier and makes hedging less expensive. With blockchain, settlements and payouts can be instant, whereas in the centralized world, participants may have to wait weeks, if not months. 

Farmers can hedge against various adverse weather conditions having a negative impact on their crops. They can buy a hedge — for example, if a temperature in their region reaches a critical level, which will trigger an automatic payout. By adding Chainlink’s oracalized weather data feeds, the company’s platform has become more decentralized and resilient. 

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Online voting platform security and decentralization, global, regional & local solutions to elections

According to a June 7 paper from researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of Michigan, Democracy Live’s popular online voting platform, OmniBallot, is vulnerable to vote manipulation. Many states have tried OmniBallot, which uses Amazon Web Services to lock in votes, but it has faced security issues. A more decentralized online voting is part of the solution to protect ballots, the researchers say. 

Cryptographic end-to-end verifiability plays a key role

The researchers believe that a decentralized approach in which a voter does not need to trust a particular client device or official election software or servers is essential for secure remote voting. 

As a solution, the researchers put forward an end-to-end verifiability protocol like cryptographic E2E-V. They say such a protocol would allow each voter to independently check whether their vote is correctly recorded and included in the election result. They emphasis that: 

“Although experts hold that E2E-V should be a requirement for any Internet voting system, they simultaneously caution that “no Internet voting system of any kind should be used for public elections before end-to-end verifiable in-person voting systems have been widely deployed and experience has been gained from their use” 
Online voting platform vulnerability

Studies found out that the OmniBallot platform’s simplistic web-based approach system and its extensive usage of third-party services and infrastructure is putting voters’ privacy and vote accuracy in jeopardy. 

OmniBallot reportedly has no intention to seek any decentralized solution. The protocol it uses provides no way for anyone to verify that accuracy of the ballout sections. This will lead cyberattackers to gain control of the platform and change recorded votes without anyone even noticing.

In order to make votes more accessible to all, OmniBallot has turned the traditional voting of letting voters print ballouts and returning it through the mail to allowing voters to return their ballouts online. This web-based system handles blank ballot delivery, ballot marking, and online voting. 

As Cointelegraph reported previously, Congress is looking into developing a blockchain-based end-to-end encrypted system to allow remote Senate voting

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ECB official says the central bank is working on a ‘retail’ digital currency, floats decentralized token model

The European Central Bank is working on a “retail central bank digital currency” as part of an investigative task force, according to a member of its Executive Board.

Yves Mersch, who also serves as vice chair of the ECB’s Supervisory Board, made the remarks during an early-morning keynote address for CoinDesk’s Consensus 2020 conference. In a published version of his speech, Mersch talked about the task force and the work it is conducting, mostly notable the retail CBDC versus a “wholesale” focused one.

Mersch acknowledged that such work is taking place against the backdrop of an economy in which the vast majority of euro area transactions – some 76% – are in the form of cash. And to that end, “[t]he ECB’s debate on CBDCs is therefore mainly analytical,” he noted.

“The lack of a concrete ‘business case’ for a CBDC at present should and does not stop us from seriously exploring the optimal design of a CBDC so that we will be well prepared should we ever take a policy decision to issue a digital currency,” he went on to say. “To this end, we have set up a task force on a CBDC within the Eurosystem
— Citește pe www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/64692/ecb-retail-central-bank-digital-currency-token

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Buffett ‘Killed His Reputation’ by Being Stupid About Bitcoin ! His Company Reported $50 billions Q1 loss

On May 2, Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway reported a $50 billion Q1 loss, with Buffett admitting a major investor mistake. Keiser subsequently argued that the legendary 89-year-old investor “killed his reputation by being stupid about BTC.”

He tweeted on May 3:

“Now that Buffett is out of the game and stock buybacks are rightly being called out as fraudulent, investors will ask… If Buffett was dead wrong about so much, was he also wrong about #Bitcoin and Gold? ANSWER: YES. Buffett killed his reputation by being stupid about BTC.”
Keiser further tweeted that it is time to leave Buffett in the past, outlining that millennials and Gen Z should look to Bitcoin. The Bitcoin bull also highlighted that Buffett “was already way overrated,” as he missed not only Bitcoin investment, but also gold, Apple and Amazon.

Pomp says that Buffett has enough cash to “buy every Bitcoin” in the circulating supply

By the end of March, Buffett’s Berkshire had a record $137 billion in cash and equivalent instruments. Anthony “Pomp” Pompliano, co-founder and partner at Morgan Creek Digital, tweeted on May 2 that Buffet is able to buy all circulating bitcoins with that amount. Pomp said:

“Warren Buffett has $137 billion in cash. That is almost enough to buy every Bitcoin in the circulating supply.”

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Facebook Libra 2.0 Explained in 5 minutes, planned for World Payments Systems Disruption in 5 years

What is Libra

Libra is a permissioned, blockchain-based stablecoin payment system.

The Libra payment system will support single-currency stablecoins and a multi-currency coin (LBR) that will be a digital composite of some of the single-currency stablecoins available on the Libra network.

All Libra coins will be fully backed by cash & cash equivalents and short-term government securities held by a geographically distributed network of custodian banks.

History

Libra’s origins can be traced back to 2017 when Libra co-creator and Calibra head of strategy, Morgan Beller, became the first person at Facebook’s secret blockchain initiative. Month’s later, CEO Mark Zuckerberg expressed his desire to “go deeper and study the positive and negative aspects of” cryptocurrencies in his New Year’s resolution post.

On May 8, 2018, Facebook Vice President David Marcus announced that he would be moving from Facebook’s Messenger division to lead Facebook’s blockchain initiative, kicking the initiative into high gear. By February 2019, there were more than 50 engineers working on the project.

In May 2019 it was confirmed that Facebook planned to launch a stablecoin backed by multiple currencies as part of a payments network designed to enable billions of users to make online purchases and transfer money between each other.

Announcement

On June 18, 2019 Facebook officially unveiled Libra: it’s permissioned blockchain-based payment system. It’s token, Libra, would be a stablecoin fully backed by a basket of fiat currencies and government securities, held in the “Libra Reserve.” Facebook also announced that it would develop a digital wallet for the project under its new subsidiary called Calibra, led by Libra co-creators Morgan Beller, David Marcus and Kevin Weil.

The Libra blockchain and Libra Reserve would be governed by the Libra Association: a Swiss based membership organization responsible for the governance of the Libra network and development of the Libra project. The 27 members planned to invest $10 million a piece to receive Libra Investment tokens and become validators of the Libra network.

Although the project would be permissioned at launch, the association aimed to begin transitioning to permissionless governance and consensus within five years.

Regulatory Pushback

Libra received immediate pushback from regulators around the world who expressed concerns over privacy and the potential challenge to various nation’s monetary sovereignty. As a result, just one month after the project was announced, Facebook assured that Libra would not launch until all regulatory concerns were fully addressed. Facebook executives proceeded to go through a series of hearings and meetings with US Congress and various governments in an attempt to alleviate regulatory concerns.

In September 2019, it was reported that the Libra reserve basket would consist of 50% US dollars, 18% Euro, 14% Japanese Yen, 11% Pound sterling and 7% Singaporean dollars. This US friendly composition wasn’t enough to quell anxieties and regulatory pressures persisted. In October 2019, PayPal became the first company to walk away from the Libra Association, with several other high profile founding members following suit, including Visa and Mastercard.

In January 2020, it was reported that the Libra Association was weighing a shift to a multiple stablecoin framework with each backed by their own individual currencies. This differed from their initial approach of a single stablecoin backed by a composite basket of fiat currencies.

Libra’s Revised Plan

On April 16, 2020 Libra unveiled its revised plan. As rumored, Libra transitioned to a framework featuring multiple single-currency stablecoins, in addition to its multi-currency Libra coin. Under the new model, each single-currency stablecoin will be backed by its respective fiat currency and government securities – i.e. the US dollar stablecoin will be backed by a reserve of US dollars and US government securities.

The multi-currency Libra coin on the other hand would be a composite of some of the single-currency stablecoins available on the Libra network. This differs from the initial proposal for a standalone currency backed by a basket of various fiat currencies and government securities sitting in a single reserve. The new Libra Coin proposal looks less like a currency and more like the SDRs maintained by the IMF. Libra Coins represent a claim on stablecoins held in various reserves within the network. This is one step removed from representing a direct claim on multiple fiat currencies and government securities sitting in the Libra Reserve.

According to the revised white paper, these changes were made to address policymaker’s key concerns. The revised plan further includes a more comprehensive compliance framework, the abandonment of plans to transition to a permissionless system and plans for strengthening the Libra Reserve design. Also to the delight of policymakers, t will allow for easier integration of central bank digital currencies to replace corresponding single-currency stablecoins.

According to the head of policy for the Libra Association, Dante Disparte, the Libra network is working toward a late 2020 launch.

Go Deeper

To learn more about Libra’s roadmap, regulatory history, team and participating organizations, the Libra Coin, launch, consensus and emission, underlying technology and governance, read our full Libra profile page.
— Citește pe messari.io/article/libra-2-0-explained-in-5-minutes

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MyEtherWallet to Offer ‘.Crypto’ Blockchain Domains to 1 Million Users

Unlike with traditional domain registration, custody of the domain is tied to the specific wallet and is not controlled by any centralized entity.

The .crypto domain is based on Unstoppable Domains’ smart contracts on Ethereum, which are responsible for assigning the domains and looking up the addresses.

It is separate from the Ethereum Name Service (ENS), which assigns .eth domains, but the functionality is similar. Unstoppable Domains can tie the .crypto domain to an Ethereum wallet, making it possible to send money to human-readable addresses.

Building an uncensorable web

The company is also pushing the .crypto domain as an uncensorable alternative to existing web addresses.

Since it falls outside of the traditional domain name infrastructure, normal browsers cannot open .crypto websites. As reported by Cointelegraph in March, the Opera browser entered into a partnership with Unstoppable Domains to accept blockchain-based domains. 

Opera nevertheless only holds 2.2% of the global market share. For Chrome users, Unstoppable Domains released a browser extension.

The company stresses that blockchain domains are not going to make the web uncensorable by themselves, but they help users bypass restrictions when publishing content.
— Citește pe cointelegraph.com/news/myetherwallet-to-offer-crypto-blockchain-domains-to-1-million-users

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Real Estate Security Tokens Steadily Gain Market Share – properties listed on chain

The nascent real estate security token, or REST, sector experienced consistent growth in Q1 2020.
Three new properties were also listed on RealT during March — doubling monthly real estate token trade.
RESTs now represent nearly half of active security token markets, and 15% of total volume. 
Tokenized real estate quietly garners liquidity
During January, tokens representing fractionalized ownership in three properties in Detroit, Michigan produced $19,950 in monthly volume. The tokens represent fractionalized ownership in rental incomes generated by the property.
Tokens for a home on Fullerton St. represented more than half of trade with $11,150 in volume. A property on Marlowe St. also saw $7,057 in tokenized trade, followed by an Audubon St. rental that produced $1,743. Combined, the three properties represented 10.3% of total security token trade.
February saw the three properties’ pooled volume increase 25% to $24,393, with Fullerton St. tokens seeing a 20% hike in activity. During the same period, Audubon’s monthly volume doubled. 
However, a 70% increase in volume across all tokenized securities resulted in real estate tokens representing just 7.5% of the $329,000 digital securities market by the end of Feb.
New REST listing doubles market share in March
In March, the addition of three active REST markets on RealT saw monthly security token trade almost double to $47,584. 
Newly active markets for properties on the streets of Applione, Leisure, and Patton generated $24,590, while Audubon, Marlowe, and Fullerton produced $22,994.
With overall tokenized security activity plateauing in March, RESTs’ share of security token trade spiked to 14.5%.
4.37 million security tokens to flood tZERO
Overstock is seeking to drive greater activity in the tokenized security markets, announcing that it will airdrop 4.37 million ‘OSTKO’ security tokens to OSTK shareholders at a 1:10 ratio.
The tokens will exclusively trade on overstock’s tZERO alternative trading system — which currently hosts $8,700 in average daily trade. Cointelegraph.com

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World’s Top CRM Platform Integrates Commercial Blockchain

The world’s most popular customer relationship management platform Salesforce has integrated Lition’s commercial blockchain technology.
Lition is one of the few public/private blockchains currently supported by a major cloud provider, Microsoft Azure.
According to Lition, integrating its blockchain will allow Salesforce to leverage data decentralization to make its CRM architecture more secure in the long run. It explained that: 
“Building a dependency upon data that is completely centralized creates operational risks. Extracting that data is not always guaranteed. A GDPR compliant blockchain is a great way to decentralize some of that dependency.”
— Citește pe cointelegraph.com/news/worlds-top-customer-relations-platform-integrates-commercial-blockchain

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Charities Are Turning to Bitcoin Amid the Global Fight Against Coronavirus

In the war against the novel coronavirus, cryptocurrencies are emerging as a much-needed tool for charity and fundraising projects. Already there are a number of large nonprofits accepting Bitcoin donations. Plus, some blockchain and crypto firms are contributing medical supplies to hospitals in an attempt to curb the virus, while others are setting up fundraisers and charities that are aimed at helping its victims.
As a number of nonprofits continue to accept cryptocurrency donations, they are starting to realize that crypto transactions significantly reduce costs in terms of fees. Here are a number of charities and fundraisers that accept donations in crypto.
Red Cross
The rate of coronavirus infections in Italy is astonishingly high. For this reason, the Italian Red Cross moved to accept Bitcoin (BTC) and other crypto donations on March 12 with the goal of using the proceeds from the campaign to set up second-level advanced medical posts. The medical posts would be used to pre-triage coronavirus patients.
The project turned out to be such a success such that its fundraising goal of $10,710 was achieved by the third day of the campaign. Since then, the charitable organization has moved to raise even more funds through Bitcoin and other crypto donations with the goal of $26,000. The funds from the second round of funding are set to be used to buy emergency equipment. So far, the organization has achieved around 85% of its goal.
The Water Project
Apart from social distancing, one of the frequent calls by hygiene experts has been to wash hands. Without a doubt, hand washing is one of the crucial ways of fighting the spread of the coronavirus. Charitable organizations such as The Water Project have been at work installing and repairing water points all over impoverished regions in Africa. 
They have also been teaching communities how to wash hands and how to keep their water sources free from germs and other pathogens, as well as how to begin and maintain other good health practices. With coronavirus spreading through various countries in Africa, charitable organizations like The Water Project are crucial for the containment of the virus. 
For the first time, the organization has launched a fundraising project called WaSH — an acronym for water sanitation and hygiene — with the aim of raising funds to provide clean water and hygiene. Aside from standard methods of donation, the water project also accepts crypto donations in Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Ether (ETH) and Litecoin (LTC).
— Citește pe cointelegraph.com/news/charities-are-turning-to-bitcoin-amid-the-global-fight-against-coronavirus