BitcoinInsider

A South Korean university has announced that it's building a blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI) campus in the city of Daegu. The campus will take a year to construct, with admission set to begin in 2021. Suseong University partnered on the initiative with the Korea Artificial Intelligence Association (KORAIA). In an announcement on local outlet Money Today, the university revealed that the campus will also focus on other emerging technologies such as big data and cloud computing. A number of technology companies based in Daegu have already signed up to be part of the project. They will provide training to the students, as well as practical experience. They include Wooshin Co. Ltd, an AI company based in Daegu. The COVID-19 crisis has created a need for more robust systems, and combining blockchain with AI is the best way to respond to this need, according to Kim Kun-woo, the university's Planning and Coordination Division director. Kun-woo further revealed that the uni...

The instability of the rupee combined with high remittance fees is driving digital currency adoption in India, according to a new report. The report from exchange OKEx in partnership with Coinpaprika found an increasing share of global digital currency business in India, projecting significant growth relative to other countries over the coming two years. The problem of remittance fees is particularly acute in the country, with 17 million Indian employees working overseas and remitting money home. Of the $80 billion remitted from overseas workers in 2018, some $5.67 billion in fees were incurred. According to the report, increasing liberalization of digital currency rules in India could set the country on a similar path to Mexico, where digital exchange Bitso has grown to account for 2% of U.S.-Mexico remittance. The growth in digital currency uptake has accelerated since the Supreme Court ruled against the Reserve Bank of India's ban on banks serving crypto businesses. OKEx has rep...

Happy Pizza Day! And this year, please make mine extra spicy. Yes, it's May 22 again, the day all Bitcoiners celebrate by ordering a pizza. Any pizza is good, but to make it special you'll need to buy it with Bitcoin—don't make the mistake of using BTC these days though, because at the time of writing the average transaction fee on the BTC network is US$6.28. What is Pizza Day and why is it significant? Today is actually the 10th anniversary of Bitcoin Pizza Day. It's significant because it marks the first (or at least, the first documented) purchase of real-world goods with Bitcoin. Before then, mining and transacting with Bitcoin was largely a hobbyist pursuit, so the purchase proved that Bitcoin could have a real-world dollar value. This in turn sent a price signal to the nascent "market" for Bitcoin, and became the first benchmark for BTC value. The rest, as they say, is history. On May 18, 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz of Jacksonville, Florida, posted on the Bitco...

Steem is going to freeze roughly $5 million in Steem tokens that belong to supporters of Hive.IO, a hard forked version of the Steem blockchain. The battle between Justin Sun's Steem and Hive has been going on for more than three months now, and the trouble began when Justin Sun acquired Steemit. Sun purchased Steemit, the blockchain-based blogging and social media website that rewards its users in Steem for publishing and curating content, on February 14. As part of his purchase, Sun became entitled to millions of pre-mined tokens (called the founder's reward) that belonged to former Steemit owner Ned Scott. However, the Steem community viewed Sun's acquisition as problematic. Steem is a delegated Proof-of-Stake blockchain that is governed by the community and the community's votes—the more Steem tokens a user holds, the more voting power they have. Sun's Steem inheritance represented about 20% of the total supply of tokens, which made him one of the most powerful ...

ABTCoin, a digital currency startup that was found guilty of violating federal securities laws, has just told New York federal judge Vernon S. Broderick that they cannot pay the $250,000 settlement that they agreed to pay plaintiffs. $20 million ICO but financially struggling On May 12, ABTCoins lawyers from Reitler Kailas & Rosenblatt LLC wrote a letter to U.S. District Judge Vernon S. Broderick saying the company was not able to pay the settlement cost that they proposed "due to a change in circumstances." The lawyers also added that ABTCoin was not able to cover their legal costs, and therefore, Reitler Kailas & Rosenblatt LLC lawyers were requesting to withdraw from the case. This news comes as a surprise considering that ABTCoin raised more than $20 million in its 2017 initial coin offering (ICO). Before hosting a token sale, ABTCoin told potential investors that it was going to use the funds that they raise to create "the fastest blockchain in the world....

Almost a year after Facebook's Libra was first announced, the outlook for the stablecoin looks starkly different. Once hailed as a game-changer for digital currency, the project has been beset by delays and regulatory difficulties. Now, fake Libra scams are presenting an increasingly pressing new challenge for Libra and Facebook, with a proliferation of websites claiming to offer investment schemes denominated in fake Libra tokens. Dante Disparte, Deputy Chairman and Head of Policy and Communications for The Libra Association, said the organization was now constantly working to suppress fake Libra scams: "As we become aware of these sites, we work diligently to address them. We respond to inquiries concerning the validity of these pages, indicating that the only official website is Libra.org." "We are still in the early stages of this project and work to address issues like these as they arise," Disparte told Finance Magnates, urging people to report the scams. ...

ErisX has become the latest digital currency company to make an entry into New York after Eris Clearing, its clearing and settlement arm, obtained the coveted BitLicense. The license, issued by the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), allows digital currency firms to legally offer their services to New Yorkers. ErisX is now licensed to offer its services in 47 states and jurisdictions in the U.S., the company revealed in a press release. In granting the BitLicense, the NYDFS has recognized the high standards that ErisX applies to its trading platform, CEO Thomas Chippas believes. ErisX has borrowed these standards from the existing capital markets and applied them to digital currencies, ensuring the industry adheres to globally accepted standards, he said. He added, "Our technology stack as well as regulatory framework, operations, and transparent marketplace are building blocks from the established commodity markets bringing familiarity, reliability and conventional...

Chinese processing hardware manufacturer Bitmain has admitted there are problems with its Antminer S17, following a growing number of complaints posted to social media. The company acknowledged that some users were experiencing problems, the first time it has acknowledged the difficulties many of their customers had been reporting online. According to a spokesperson for the company, Bitmain was beginning to negotiate with customers who had run into difficulties with their hardware. Antminer is paying close attention to the issues of some products from the 17 series, which has recently been mentioned by the media. The issue first raised its head earlier this month, after an entrepreneur started a Telegram group to highlight what he described as a "bad batch" of S17 units. According to the group, some 30% of the models delivered had experienced serious glitches or failed within a single month of operation. Having grown to some 160 members, the group now contains several other m...

Major changes are happening in the cryptocurrency space in Japan as new cryptocurrency regulation enters into force today. Among notable changes are the regulation of crypto custody service providers and crypto derivatives businesses. Japan has 23 regulated crypto exchanges; unregulated platforms have modified their terms of service affecting Japanese residents. Japan Adopts New Way to Regulate Crypto Industry The amendments to the Payment Services Act (PSA) and the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA) that revise the regulatory framework for cryptocurrency in Japan go into effect on May 1. They were proposed by the country's top financial regulator, the Financial Services Agency (FSA), and adopted by the Diet on May 31 last year. The finalized rules were published on April 3 along with the FSA's answers to public comments. International law firm Morrison & Foerster described: The regulations coming into effect as of May 1, 2020, represent a significant change in t...

Times have changed for BTC block processors in China. Once considered a pariah by many Chinese government officials, the sector is now finding itself in demand by local municipalities as attitudes towards blockchain have shifted this past year with central government regulators. The city of Ya'an, located in China's mountainous Sichuan province, is publicly encouraging blockchain industry firms to come set up shop and consume excess hydroelectricity ahead of the summer rainy season. This encouragement comes in the form of recently jointly issued public guidance by the Municipal Economic and Information Bureau and the Municipal Development and Reform Commission. The Sichuan region is well known for its abundance of digital currency processing facilities, which are estimated to account for over 50% of the BTC network's computing power. Although not expressly mentioned in the guidance, BTC processing is the primary activity with the sector which consumes the most electricity. ...