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Binance User Loses 2 BTC After Hacker Steals Password, How to Prevent Theft
Amidst the brutal market conditions, a Reddit user, BeanThe5th, has somehow managed to get in more trouble than the market is currently in, reportedly losing two Bitcoin in a hack.
Reddit User Loses Two Bitcoin In Binance Hack
Yesterday, BeanThe5th made a thread in the popular /r/cryptocurrency subreddit, regarding a theft that has occurred on his or her Binance account. Many users who saw this Reddit thread were quite surprised, as it has become common knowledge that Binance is one of the most reputable and secure exchanges that exist.
According to the aforementioned Reddit user, the thieves took two Bitcoins from their account. However, Binance has a daily withdrawal limit in place for unverified users, which stopped the criminals from taking all ,000 worth of cryptocurrencies from the account. Although some larger investors may see this as a restriction, in this situation, this limit luckily saved a majority of the user’s funds.
The hackers also managed to take control of all of the user’s social media pages, along with any other accounts associated with the hacked email addresses. The user also had cryptoassets on other exchanges but confirmed that the funds on the other exchanges were safe and locked on these exchanges.
How Did This Occur?
The hacker(s) managed to get past the often secure two-factor authentication (2FA) by using a ‘SIM swap’ method. This method of intrusion requires the criminals to pretend to be the targeted individual. The criminal will then need to contact the individual’s phone provider, getting the provider to move all SIM information onto the hacker’s phone. This allows for all two-factor security messages to be sent to the hacker’s phone instead of the original user’s device.
As well, the attackers also managed to take control of the user’s Google Authenticator account, which Binance uses as another layer of security.
Due to the fact that they also had access to the passwords of the individual, it became an easy task to get funds withdrawn from Binance after taking control of the 2FA accounts.
With all these factors in mind, it has become apparent that this attack was meticulous and most likely required an immense amount of planning prior attack’s execution.
A representative from Binance quickly responded as the post skyrocketed to the front page of the most popular cryptocurrency subreddit. Jager, Binance customer support team member, asked for the affected user to procure their support ticket ID, to help expedite the case.
Bean answered with his ticket ID as requested, with the representative from Binance confirming that the account had been locked just a few minutes later.
Security Methods
Some Reddit users suggested alternative methods to make sure that an attack on a cryptocurrency user’s funds won’t happen again.
Reddit user JohnnyK10 recommended a security method to the affected user, saying:
Dont keep 50k worth of coins on a exchange. A cold hardware wallet is your safest bet.
Many cryptocurrency experts, along with large holders, believe that it is best to hold large amounts of cryptocurrencies in a secure hardware wallet, like the Ledger Nano. This greatly reduces the risk of hacking, some saying removing all risk of attack entirely.
Products like the Ledger and Trezor are easy to use and support a wide variety of popular cryptocurrencies. As well, most hardware wallets cost under 0 U.S. dollars, making them a logical security method for users who are aware of these fantastic devices.
Due to the severity of the attack, others speculated that there must have been an attack on the user’s computer, with a keylogger or activity tracker implanted being the most likely scenario. When using a hardware wallet, it removes any risk of a keylogger attack, even if the hardware wallet is plugged into the computer. Hardware wallets keep all sensitive information on the device, using extremely secure channels to help verify transactions using a private key.
If users do not opt-in to buy a hardware wallet, it is suggested by many to keep up to date with the proper computer security programs, which have become increasingly secure.
Think about it, buying a 0 hardware wallet or 0 security program will help many users mitigate the risk of an attack on thousands of dollars worth of their cryptocurrencies.
As more attacks like this occur, it will only begin to make even more sense for investors to keep their funds under lock and key.
Featured Image from Shutterstock
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Verge Loses $1.7 Million as Hackers Double Down on Vulnerabilities
Verge, a cryptocurrency that boasts security, anonymity, and privacy as it’s strong points has been hit by another so-called 51% hack.
Same Hack Different Day
Only a day after announcing a new partnership with the medical supplement company DIOXYME to allow customers to pay with its XVG cryptocurrency, Verge has lost an estimated 35 million coins worth .7 million in an attack that lasted just a few hours.
This latest attack was recognized and reported on Bitcointalk.org by the same user who goes by the online name ocminer that reported a previous attack in April which exploited the same vulnerability in Verge’s code to mine a large number of blocks and reap the rewards over a short period of time according to TNW.
The April attack dubbed by the company as a “small hash attack” on Twitter is what is known as a 51% attack which wiped out 22% of XVG’s value at the time. Though Verge switches between five different cryptographic algorithms for each new block mined, in both attacks, the hacker found a way to fake the timestamps allowing the majority of the network’s mining power to be captured using far less than normal computing power.
Verge hard forked in response to the last attack but apparently failed to remove the glitch which allowed this second identical hack to happen. For its part, the company has downplayed the hack as a ‘denial of services attack affecting some XVG mining pools’ on Twitter.
Verge has been busy since that first hack creating a crowd sale of tokens worth million as it worked toward signing a partnership with Mindgeek which owns porn giants Pornhub and Brazzers. A move they tried to leverage in order to convince online music provider Spotify to include the privacy based cryptocurrency onto their platform and access to their 70 million subscribers.
Unlucky Streak for Privacy Coin
Still, Verge has traveled a bumpy road starting in March when their Twitter account was hacked and a would-be scammer sent out Tweets to its followers offering double back on any XVG they sent to a fraudulent wallet. The scam netted its perpetrator all of about dollars but that and the two 51% attacks coupled with a persistent rumor that there is another vulnerability in their system which exposes users IP addresses does not bode well for a privacy coin.
A recent listing on Bitfinex hasn’t helped the XVG value much as it has been siding steadily over the month trading today at $.045 down 13.6% in the past 24 hours according to coinmarketcap.com.
Image from Shutterstock
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Cryptocurrency Market Loses $50 Billion as South Korean Exchange Is Suspected of Fraud
The cryptocurrency market turned upside down on Friday, having lost about billion market capitalization overnight.
With the exception of only Augur, Nuls, and Tether, the whole list of top 100 digital currencies are on the red. The dreadful sentiment seems to be a reaction to reports that South Korea’s exchange Upbit is suspected of fraud.
Cryptocurrency Market Plunges as South Korea’s Upbit Exchange Suspected of Fraud
The price of Bitcoin dropped below the ,000 mark and Ethereum failed at the 0 handle within the period of 24 hours as South Korea’s cryptocurrency ecosystem awaits further news regarding the suspected fraud executed by one of the largest operators in the country, Upbit.
What is now known is that local mainstream media outlets have reported that a joint action between the Korean Financial Intelligence Unit (KIU), the Financial Services Commission, and Seoul Police, has resulted in the raid of Upbit’s offices. The authorities suspect the management team has falsely reported its deposited funds.
Ran Neu-Ner, the host of the Crypto Trader show on CNBC Africa, has confirmed the cryptocurrency market is being drained as concerned users take their funds out of the Upbit exchange. As digital currency investors are very likely withdrawing their assets only to deposit them with another operator, the billion lost in a period of a few hours might return very swiftly.
Korea: This selling is coming from people taking their funds out of Upbit as they are concerned. These people are crypto investors and won’t leave crypto- they will go to other exchanges and buy there… expect a huge bounce.
— Ran NeuNer (@cryptomanran) May 11, 2018
The cryptocurrency exchange has notified its clients on the matter and explained that its platform and services are continuing operation. Customers are still able to make transactions and withdrawals, according to the company who ensures that client assets are safe.
“Upbit is currently under investigation by prosecutors and is cooperating.”
The South Korean operator dealt approximately .6 billion of digital currency trades in the last 24 hours, which makes it the largest cryptocurrency in the country and the fourth in the world by daily trading volumes.
Following a number of regulatory discussions to curb excessive speculation and money laundering, Korean authorities have banned initial coin offerings (ICOs) as well as foreigners and financial institutions from using local exchanges. The financial watchdog also raided a number of venues to enforce the legislation put in place, especially after the infamous Coincheck hack.
Featured image from Shutterstock.
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Indian Bitcoin Exchange Loses $3.3 Million in Heist, Investors Confused
Coinsecure, one of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges in India, announced the biggest heist in the country so far, valued at .3 million. The CEO of the bitcoin exchange, Mohit Kalra, has accused his Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) of stealing 438 Bitcoin from the operator’s main wallet.
Coinsecure Reports .3 Million Worth Theft
Coinsecure has fallen victim to a cryptocurrency theft worth .3 million, as 438 Bitcoin were stolen. The New Delhi-based exchange reported the incident after customers submitted complaints to the platform regarding difficulties in withdrawing funds. The company sent out emails to users and released an official statement explaining the occurrence: “We regret to inform you that our bitcoin funds have been exposed and seem to have been siphoned out to an address that is outside our control”.
Coinsecure added a scanned copy of a police complaint CEO Mohit Kalra filed with New Delhi police. Kalra filed an FIR (First Information Report) with the Cyber Cell of Delhi. According to the exchange, the Chief Strategy Officer Amitabh Saxena is at the center of the incident. The company claims the funds were lost while he was extracting Bitcoin Gold to distribute to their customers.
“Our system itself has never been compromised or hacked, and the current issue points towards losses caused during an exercise to extract BTG [Bitcoin Gold] to distribute to our customers”, said the statement.
“The current issue points towards losses caused during an exercise to extract BTG to distribute to our customers. Our Chief Strategist officer (CSO) Dr. Amitabh Saxena was extracting BTG and he claims that the funds have been lost in the process during the extraction of the private keys”, Coinsecure added.
Saxena claims the Bitcoin was stolen “due to some attack”. CEO Mohit Kalra, however, wrote in the police complaint that Saxena is “making a false story to divert attention and might have a role to play in this entire incident. The incident reported by Dr. Amitabh Saxena does not seem convincing to us.”
Only the CSO and the CEO have access to the private keys of the company’s official wallet. CEO Kalra has asked New Delhi police to seize the CSO’s passport on fears that he “might fly out of the country soon.”
Coinsecure was founded in June 2012 with the mission of promoting awareness and attract newcomers to the cryptocurrency space. Media outlets and meet-ups organized across India have provided the momentum needed to take further steps. Coinsecure was acquired in June 2014 by Delhi-based industrialist, Mohit Kalra, who joined as Chief Executive Officer. “Connecting India to Bitcoin”, the company’s motto, has enabled the team to work on next-generation offerings for the cryptocurrency ecosystem in India.
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Verge Cryptocurrency Hit By 51% Attack, Loses 250,000 Tokens
The cryptocurrency Verge — which prides itself on “security/anonymity/privacy” — was hacked yesterday. In a short period of time, the attacker made off with around 250,000 coins.
The hack was discovered by “ocminer,” a poster on Bitcointalk forums, yesterday afternoon. According to ocminer, the attacker took advantage of “several bugs” in Verge’s code to mine an extraordinarily large number of new blocks on Verge’s blockchain, in turn rewarding him/herself with a large number of coins over a very short period of time.
Despite registering large gains as of late, the cryptocurrency experienced what’s been dubbed a “51% attack” which wiped more than 22% of its value. The company came to its defense, calling the breach a “small hash attack” that has been “cleared up now” on Twitter. This isn’t the first time the coin developers have been in hot water. Just a few weeks ago their official Twitter account was hacked.
51% Attack
Ocminer and several media outlets called this a 51% attack, which is notable because this type of attack is theoretically possible on other blockchains which rely on proof-of-work (PoW) validation mechanisms. That said, even though this attacker technically managed to capture the majority of mining power on Verge’s network, this type of attack is unlikely to work with Bitcoin.
Typically, PoW-based cryptocurrency systems are quite robust. The problem is that if one miner (or mining pool) were to capture the majority of the network’s mining power — as has happened with Verge — they can have a huge impact on the network, including spending coins that were already spent in what’s called double spending.
Verge uses five different cryptographic algorithms for mining, switching to a new one for every block, but the attacker figured out a way to fake the timestamps of his/her blocks, permitting them to be mined all with one algorithm. Because of this, he/she was able to capture the majority of the network’s mining power with far less computing power than would normally be required.
The attack is particularly serious as it requires a hard fork to exclude the blocks the attacker has mined. It’s also notable because it shows that even a seemingly foolproof PoW system can be compromised. Ethereum has already had one hack of large magnitude in its history, while Bitcoin, on the other hand, has mostly stood the test of time through its nine years of existence.
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Ripple Loses Battle Over XRP Dispute in California
Ripple Labs Inc, a San Francisco-based blockchain developer famous for the XRP token, lost a home-court battle with rival R3 Holdco over ownership of its cryptocurrency, XRP. With San Francisco’s state appeals court denying Ripple’s request, it means that a New York court should decide the fate of the dispute against the NY-based R3.
Ripple Loses Battle Over XRP Ownership on Home Turf
Once together in partnership, it all fell down with Ripple accusing R3 of misleading representation. In turn, R3 claims that Ripple illegally declined to hand over 5 billion of its cryptocurrency XRP as originally agreed. 5 billion XRP is currently worth approximately .75 billion.
In September 2017, the R3 consortium filed a lawsuit in Delaware and New York against Ripple. The option contract dividing the two companies represents nearly 10% of the approximately 55 billion XRP (out of a total supply of 100 billion) currently controlled by Ripple. It would allow R3 to buy up to 5 billion XRP at a price of .0085 each before the end of 2019. The Delaware suit was thrown out in October.
Ripple’s counterclaim presented before court in California says:
“Rather, R3 had misrepresented its resources and current ability to perform solely to induce Ripple into executing the Agreements. For example, although R3 represented to Ripple that it would have access to its large consortium of leading banks, R3 knew and had reason to know that several key banks that would be instrumental to Ripple’s success would soon be departing from its consortium.”
Additionally, Ripple’s claim includes an email from David Rutter, Chief Executive Officer of R3, to Ripple’s CEO Brad Garlinghouse, that was used as evidence to allege R3 was not invested in the partnership:
“Brad I really like you guys and I have been clear about that. Love to see you win the payments space and even better I would love to be involved in that journey. BUT I am personally being crushed by a ridiculously complicated funding round.”
Ripple has previously said it will face “irreparable injury” if it has to battle R3 on its home turf in New York. Now, a court dispute in the “Big Apple” is the most probable outcome according to Bloomberg. Ripple’s (XRP) is down by -4.19% to .75 at the time of writing. It is still unclear what all of this means to the future of Ripple, the company, and Ripple, the token.
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Alexander Vinnik of BTC-e Loses Extradition Battle
The supposed ring leader of an international cyber crime scheme has lost his appeal against his extradition to the US. Alexander Vinnik of the now defunct BTC-e exchange is wanted on 21 counts of money laundering and other offences in the United States. Some of the illegal funds go right back to the infamous Mt. Gox compromise scandal in 2013. The other charges relate to drug trafficking and computer hacking.
Vinnik was arrested whilst holidaying in northern Greece this July. He’s one of seven Russians indicted by the US this year for charges relating to cyber crime. According to American authorities, he masterminded the laundering of over billion using Bitcoin. He denies the allegations against him, stating that he was never the operator of BTC-e, but rather their technical consultant.
He faces extradition to the US where he would have to defend himself against the counts of money laundering against him. He denies responsibility and has appealed to the Greek authorities to deny his deportation. Today, however, he lost his case.
Vinnik also faces additional charges in his native Russia. These are much less severe being as they amount to around 10,000 euros fraudulently obtained. It is not uncommon for Moscow to attempt to step in when one of their nationals is wanted by the US. Since his arrest, Vinnik has agreed to be returned to Russia but adamantly refutes the charges he faces in the States. However, the Greek Supreme Court rejected his appeal earlier today.
Things are looking bleak for Vinnik, certainly. However, all is not lost yet for him. The final decision over where he’ll end up being sent to stand trial is up to the Greek Justice Minister. It’s typical that they step in when such disputes arise. Whether he’ll be returned to the his native land or face a lengthy jail sentence in the United States remains to be seen.
Image: PixaBay
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Nicehash Loses $70m Worth of Bitcoin Due to Security Breach
Cryptocurrency and related activities have attracted the attention of many cybercriminals. In most cases, these criminals go after exchange users or online wallet services. However, they will target any other service which stores Bitcoin balances at some point. In the case of Nicehash, a security breach took place this week, and its Bitcoin wallet has been emptied. This is another major blow for the Bitcoin ecosystem as a whole. Nicehash Hack is a Major Setback Most cryptocurrency users will have come across the Nicehash platform at some point. It was one of the first public marketplaces where anyone could buy and sell
BitNewz.net