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Nomad, Solana hacks show DeFi’s inherent flaw

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Good morning, and welcome to Protocol Fintech. This Thursday: the “hack me” sign on crypto’s back, Aparna Chennapragada leaves Robinhood, and a new bill could boost the CFTC’s role in crypto regulation.

Off the chain

Economist Frances Coppola dove deep into the filings generated by Three Arrows Capital’s liquidation proceedings and came back with a picture of a deeply troubled company — even before the luna-UST meltdown sent it over the edge. “Its entire balance sheet is a massive unhedged bet that crypto prices will always go up,” she wrote. The Monetary Authority of Singapore comes out well in Coppola’s account, moving quickly to investigate the firm in June, but authorities were slow to freeze the firm’s assets, which may have given the founders time to move crypto tokens and NFTs to wallets that may now be offline. Only $40 million has been recovered against $2.8 billion in claims, a liquidator reports.

I’m taking a vacation, so “Off the chain” will return next Friday. Until then!

— Owen Thomas (email | twitter)

Crypto’s ‘hack me’ sign

You’d think after the crypto market shed $2 trillion in value in the last eight months, hackers might move on to more promising targets. But even a smaller market is providing tempting prey. News that criminals made off with $190 million after hacking the Nomad crypto bridge protocol was followed by Solana reporting that unknown attackers had drained more than 7,500 wallets of about $4 million worth of crypto tokens.

Bad code leads to bad outcomes. The Nomad and Solana breaches were “perpetrated through vulnerabilities in the coding of a contract and the software on which wallets run,” said Michael Fasanello, chief compliance officer at LVL.

  • Experts blame the Nomad hack on a flawed update which created an opening for hackers, making it easy to simply copy and paste transactions with a new address to access tokens.
  • The Nomad attack exemplified the problems with crypto bridges, which have come under increasing attack in recent years. They play an important role in crypto, but have also served as a weak link that hackers routinely exploit.
  • The Solana hack involved a “cohort of wallets” which were “compromised in the breach,” according to Slope Finance, whose software enables Solana users to access their wallets. Phantom Wallet, a popular Solana wallet, also pointed to Slope.

Crypto has turned into a hacker’s paradise. Sam Curry, chief security officer at Cybereason, said the recent attacks show how hackers now have “a plethora of tools” to take on a space with “poor cyber standards” and “high value and fungible targets.”

  • New crypto ventures are particularly attractive to hackers since they practically “have a ‘hack me’ sign outside,” Curry told Protocol. “The typical startup mentality of getting the code out there and fixing it on the fly is a recipe for disaster — and isn’t acceptable.”
  • Nomad raised $22 million in April and recently touted its high-profile investors along with its goal to “create a safer crypto ecosystem.”
  • Blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies promise a new financial system where users have complete control, free from intermediaries like banks and regulators, and transactions are totally transparent. But that also means there are few protections. The Nomad and Solana hacks highlight how, in DeFi, “there are few arbiters of the space beyond a project’s customer base, and the group in charge of running the project,” Curry said.
  • DeFi proponents argue that having open-source code and many eyes on transactions serve as safeguards, but how well is that working out in practice?

It’s ironic, then, but centralized crypto exchanges — CeFi — are looking safer for customers willing to compromise their DeFi ideals. There’s a real “disparity in security” between DeFi and CeFi, Fasanello said. In crypto, “no individual or party [is] 100% responsible for security.” Fasanello isn’t sure DeFi can ever be made 100% secure. Buyer beware, hacker rejoice.

— Benjamin Pimentel (email | twitter) and Tomio Geron (email | twitter)

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On the money

Crypto miners could get a tax reprieve. A Senate proposal would exempt crypto mining firms from being considered “brokers” under a 2021 law, which could trigger requirements to collect information on customers’ capital gains and losses and other transaction data.

A carbon-credit registry operator has proposed crypto token rules. Verra, a nonprofit organization that runs the world’s biggest registry by carbon credits issued, laid out a slate of rules for trading carbon credits on cryptocurrency exchanges to address concerns about the anonymity of digital-token holders.

Bankrupt Celsius wants to rehire a former executive. The crypto lender is seeking a judge’s permission to pay its former chief financial officer $93,000 per month while the bankruptcy filing makes its way through court, citing the “need for stability” and his financial expertise in its request to keep him on board.

Text-marketing startup Attentive and Shopify have teamed up for pay-by-text. Retailers using Shopify’s Shop Pay checkout system will be able to take payment from customers directly through customer service text chats powered by Attentive.

The CFTC’s Capitol backers

A new Senate bill would give the Commodity Futures Trading Commission authority over the markets for bitcoin and ether, the two largest cryptocurrencies. The bill is the latest attempt in Washington to set more clear federal rules for digital assets. It was introduced Wednesday by Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Michigan Democrat, and Sen. John Boozman, a Republican from Arkansas.

The CFTC and Securities and Exchange Commission have been battling for position in overseeing cryptocurrencies; tension heightened recently when the SEC declared a list of crypto tokens as securities within an insider trading complaint, prompting a public rebuke from CFTC Comissioner Caroline Pham.

The new bill could provide some level of clarity. It would give the CFTC direct oversight of tokens that qualify as “digital commodities.” That includes bitcoin and ether, according to a bill summary. Online exchanges and other services that facilitate trading of the tokens would be required to register with the CFTC.

Read the full story on Protocol.com.

— Ryan Deffenbaugh (email | twitter)

Moves and hires

Robinhood’s Aparna Chennapragada stepped down as chief product officer. “ … the world has changed. As Robinhood adapts to this new context, it’s time for me to move on,” she wrote in a tweet. She’ll remain as an adviser to CEO Vlad Tenev. She cleared around $10 million in stock sales in her 16 months as an executive at the company.

PayPal has named Blake Jorgensen as its next CFO. Jorgensen, who held the same role at Electronic Arts, will succeed John Rainey, who left PayPal earlier this year to become Walmart’s CFO.

Michael Saylor is dropping the CEO title at MicroStrategy and becoming executive chairman. Saylor will “focus more on our bitcoin acquisition strategy and related bitcoin advocacy initiatives,” he said in a statement. The business-software company’s large bitcoin holding led to a $917.8 million impairment charge last quarter. But hey, Saylor once lost $6 billion of his personal net worth in a single day during the burst of the dot-com bubble.

Meghan Welch is Plaid’s new chief people officer. Welch was previously executive vice president, head of enterprise HR and chief diversity officer at Capital One.

Jim Magats has been named CEO of MX, an open-finance technology company. Magats was most recently PayPal’s senior vice president for omni-payments solutions.

Yieldstreet has named Timothy Schott its first chief financial officer. Schott was previously CFO of Associated Capital Group, an alternative investment adviser.

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Thanks for reading — see you tomorrow!

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Tulip Protocol Officially Integrates Chainlink on Solana Mainnet

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Tulip Protocol Officially Integrates Chainlink on Solana Mainnet

Today, Tulip Protocol made the announcement that they have integrated Chainlink Price Feeds in order to better secure their yield aggregating platform that is running on the Solana mainnet. The team had previously stated their intention to integrate Chainlink Price Feeds, and at this point, the connection has been completely put into action. Chainlink is the premier decentralized oracle network in the world, safeguarding tens of billions of dollars in smart contracts. It has diversified its offerings across other blockchains, notably Solana, Fantom, Polygon, BNB Chain, and others.

In a recent blog post, the team behind the Tulip Protocol explained that they had integrated Chainlink to provide users with more confidence that leveraged positions will be liquidated equitably using extremely accurate price data and that the protocol will continue to be completely collateralized at all times.

According to Tomasz Wojewoda, Head of Global Sales at Chainlink Labs:

“We’re pleased that Tulip Protocol has integrated Chainlink Price Feeds on Solana, helping secure its yield aggregation protocol with highly robust, decentralized market data. With the high-throughput performance of Solana and the strong security guarantees of the Chainlink Network, Tulip Protocol is able to empower users with a performant and secure platform.”

Tulip Protocol Seeks To Take Advantage Of Solana

Tulip Protocol brings together lenders who receive a return on their deposits and borrowers who are interested in gaining access to leverage. Users who initiate leverage positions are responsible for maintaining a loan-to-value (LTV) ratio that has been previously established. The Tulip Protocol then uses the asset price data that is provided by Chainlink Price Feeds to verify that this ratio is accurate. If the value of the collateral falls below the threshold that was established by the protocol, then their position will be immediately liquidated to assist in guaranteeing that the lenders will be repaid.

Tulip Protocol intends to capitalize on Solana by giving users the ability to more regularly reinvest their income and grow their assets without having to pay exorbitant amounts of gas expenses. Chainlink oracles can now be natively integrated on Solana, making it possible for Solana-based applications to benefit from enhanced levels of security and transparency. Yesterday, OpenOcean made the announcement that they would be integrating Chainlink Price Feeds in order to help secure the limited order functionality on many chains. These chains include Avalanche, Ethereum, Polygon, Fantom, and BNB Chain.

According to Senx, Co-Founder of Tulip Protocol:

 “We’re excited to be using Chainlink Price Feeds on Solana to help secure our yield aggregation platform. By leveraging the most secure and reliable on-chain data available, we’re able to provide our lenders and borrowers with greater assurances that liquidations are based on accurate price data, and the protocol will maintain a healthy loan-to-value ratio through all market conditions.” 

Allowing Stakers To Benefit From Higher APYs

Natives of the blockchain as well as newcomers to the technology are beginning to understand that decentralization does not necessarily equate to a secure platform. Given that Web3 services are currently disclosing their susceptibilities to attacks from both within and outside the network, further initiatives should be undertaken to improve the safety of user assets. Fortunately, a growing number of blockchain businesses are beginning to add various levels of security to their services in order to solidify the trust of their existing customers and attract additional investors in the near and distant future.

Tulip Protocol is the very first yield aggregation platform to be built on Solana, and it features auto-compounding vault techniques. The dApp was developed to make use of Solana’s blockchain, which has a low cost and high efficiency, hence enabling the vault techniques to compound frequently. Stakeholders are able to reap the benefits of greater APYs as a result, without the need for active management.

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Is your SOL safe? What we know about the Solana hack

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On this week’s episode of “The Market Report,” Cointelegraph’s resident experts discuss the latest updates concerning the recent Solana (SOL) hack.

To kick things off, we broke down the latest news in the markets this week:

Bitcoin realized price bands form key resistance as bulls lose $24K, significant whale activity between $22,000 and $24,800 adds to the complexity of the current spot market setup. Bitcoin (BTC) consolidated lower on Aug. 9 after familiar resistance preserved a multi-month trading range. When will we finally break out of this price range and make the move towards $30K?

Institutions flocking to Ethereum for 7 straight weeks as Merge nears: Report, “Greater clarity” around the Merge has driven institutional inflows into Ethereum products, according to a CoinShares report. Is the ETH merge finally around the corner and will it bring new all time highs to ETH or has the price already been factored into the current price?

Circle freezes blacklisted Tornado Cash smart contract addresses, Crypto data aggregator Dune Analytics said that, on Monday, Circle, the issuer of the USD Coin (USDC) stablecoin, froze over 75,000 USDC worth of funds linked to the 44 Tornado Cash addresses sanctioned by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control’s Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons (SDN) list. Could this mark the end for Tornado Cash or is there a way they can redeem themselves?

Next up is a new segment called “Quick Crypto Tips,” which aims to give newcomers to the crypto industry quick and easy tips to get the most out of their experience. This week’s tip: Have some funds ready to buy further downturns.

Market expert Marcel Pechman then carefully examines the Bitcoin and Ether (ETH) markets. Are the current market conditions bullish or bearish? What is the outlook for the next few months? Pechman is here to break it down. The experts also go over some markets news to bring you up to date on the latest regarding the top two cryptocurrencies.

After Marcel’s market analysis, our resident experts discuss whether your SOL is safe and the latest updates on the Solana hack. We also discuss why the network has been victim to so many hacks and downtimes. What exactly do these exploits mean for the Solana platform and if you should be worried.

Lastly, we’ve got insights from Cointelegraph Markets Pro, a platform for crypto traders who want to stay one step ahead of the market. The analysts use Cointelegraph Markets Pro to identify two altcoins that stood out this week: Radicle’s RAD and DigiByte’s DGB.

Do you have a question about a coin or topic not covered here? Don’t worry. Join the YouTube chat room, and write your questions there. The person with the most interesting comment or question will be given a 1 month free subscription to markets Pro worth $100!

The Market Report streams live every Tuesday at 12:00 pm ET (4:00 pm UTC), so be sure to head on over to Cointelegraph’s YouTube page and smash those like and subscribe buttons for all our future videos and updates.

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Web3-Based ZepetoX to Build on Solana

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Web3-Based ZepetoX to Build on Solana

Singapore, Singapore , Aug. 09, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Today, the ZepetoX team (ZTX, ZepetoX.io) announced its foray into the web3 space, sharing its vision to build an open world that empowers creators and communities to build, play and earn.

ZepetoX is the crypto metaverse initiative jointly incubated by ZEPETO – Asia’s largest metaverse platform with over 320 million registered users – alongside leading global blockchain organizations including Jump Crypto.

As the sole blockchain project comprehensively backed by ZEPETO, ZepetoX will have exclusive ties to ZEPETO in terms of IP including technological, design, and content assets as well as bridges to facilitate user onboarding between the two platforms. ZepetoX’s blockchain development efforts will be advised by Jump.

“ZepetoX is our official venture into the blockchain industry. We feel that web3 opportunities should be advanced through a crypto-native approach, which is why we are excited to have Jump as a contributor to developing a new platform that would have exclusive connections to ZEPETO. Overall, we believe that ZepetoX can build the ideal web3 platform to not only bring blockchain to our existing users but also to expand our footprint in the blockchain space through various disruptive initiatives,” said Daewook Kim, CEO of Naver Z – the operating entity of ZEPETO.

“We are excited to support ZepetoX’s efforts aimed at onboarding new audiences into the rapidly growing crypto space. ZEPETO’s expertise and technological know-hows accumulated over the past years from building an immersive social platform will serve as a springboard for ZepetoX,” said Saurabh Sharma, Partner at Jump Crypto.

Building on the Solana network, ZepetoX will offer a web-based 3D open world with varying levels of gamification integrated as well as opportunities for users to monetize via ownership of digital assets and social interaction. Ultimately, ZepetoX aims to empower self-expression through customizable avatars and lands that can be equipped with NFTs from a rich collection of assets created by diverse creators, DAOs, or communities.

“I am thrilled to see IP powerhouses like ZepetoX choosing to build their metaverse on Solana,” said Anatoly Yakovenko, Co-Founder of Solana. “Projects like ZepetoX create new pathways for onboarding millions of users to web3.”

“Our global team brings a depth of crypto native experiences and our goal is to build on the foundation of ZEPETO to spearhead the adoption of blockchain among metaverse users, developers, and creators,” said co-CEO of ZepetoX, Chris Chang.

In the coming months, ZepetoX will launch its first land sale. The lands will be tradable on the ZepetoX marketplace, which will feature a variety of different NFTs as the open world project evolves. Further details on the sale will be available on the ZepetoX website in the coming weeks.

# # #

About ZepetoX: ZepetoX (ZTX) is a web3 company building an immersive content-driven platform for users to create, trade digital assets and enjoy social interaction. Founded in 2022, ZepetoX is the blockchain initiative of ZEPETO, widely regarded as the largest Asia-based metaverse platform boasting over 320 million lifetime users with over 2.5 billion virtual fashion items sold.

Contacts:

Vera: vera@ztx.foundation

News Via KISS PR Crypto Press Release Distribution Media Contact az@kisspr.com

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