In March 2017, Equifax, one of the credit reporting companies that evaluate the financial health of almost everyone in the United States, suffered a data breach that exposed the personally identifiable information of hundreds of millions of people.
Numerous scandals and controversies resulted from the incident: Equifax was condemned for everything from their negligent security posture to their clumsy response to the leak, and key executives were charged with corruption in the days that followed. The issue of who was responsible for the breach also has significant political ramifications on a worldwide scale.
What information was compromised, and how many people were impacted?
Attackers targeted a third-party online gateway that had been patched for a known vulnerability, but Equifax had not updated to the most recent version. For around two and a half months, the hackers had access to the companies' servers, during which time they stole millions of documents containing private data.
As per reports, Equifax spent $1.4 billion on legal costs and bolstering its security measures as a result of the breach. The company paid a $700 million fine levied by the United States Federal Trade Commission and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in July 2019.
The information that was stolen and compromised by the attackers was fairly detailed and covered a large number of people because Equifax especially deals in personal data. Names, addresses, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, and driver's license numbers were disclosed, possibly affecting 143 million people or more than 40% of the US population. Only a small portion of the records—on the order of 200,000—also included credit card numbers; these individuals most likely paid Equifax directly to view their credit reports.
Equifax is Developing the Web3 KYC Solution
To create a Know Your Customer (KYC) solution, blockchain company Oasis Labs has teamed with credit reporting business Equifax, which is well known for having experienced one of the biggest customer data breaches to date. On October 26, Equifax and Oasis announced that the latter would develop a ddddddddddddd identity management and KYC solution for the industry on Oasis' platform, utilizing application programming interfaces (APIs) to aid with checks and user identification.
The release made no mention of the precise technology that will support this service, and neither business immediately responded to Cointelegraph's request for comment.
The term "Web3" alludes to the subsequent iteration of the internet, which its supporters predict would be more decentralized, based on blockchain networks, and employ cryptocurrencies.
Both companies contend that there hasn't been a KYC solution specifically designed for Web3 that offers "high privacy protection," and their suggested product is intended to fill this gap by sending wallets of users anonymized KYC credentials.
According to the statement, his credentials will be regularly updated, and Oasis promises that its "privacy-preserving features" will ensure that data is processed in confidence while keeping a record on the company's blockchain.
Dock and Quadrata are the two Web3 companies that provide comparable solutions based on decentralized identification and each of their products is based on a decentralized identity. Few Web3 natives might be wary of the alliance in light of the serious data leak Equifax experienced in 2017.
Conclusion
As a result, the two businesses will collaborate to develop a solution by sending "anonymous KYC-ed credentials" to customers' Web3 wallets. When Decrypt contacted Equifax and Oasis for more information regarding its technology, neither company answered right away.
In a news statement, Professor Dawn Song, the founder of Oasis Labs, stated, "We are trying to not only construct a better, more efficient decentralized identification and on-chain KYC solution but to help speed the adoption of Web3 and provide more trust to the sector."
In the crypto industry, as in every other industry, when one starts a trend that seems to be beneficial or has the potential to lead to positive results, others tend to follow it too. This article deals with one such event wherein the Indian exchange WazirX, led on in the footsteps of Binance and tried to adopt its ways. It has also decided to come up with new ways and intermix them with the ways Binance chose for delisting USDC. It is planning on employing BUSD auto-conversion for keeping a track of the USDC, and USDP balances. These are supposed to be done in a 1:1 ratio.
Let's take a look at WazirX steps for delisting USDC
After thorough consideration, WazirX has come up with a plan to delist coins coin. These coins are therefore supposed to be evicted from the platform and whatever remains of them shall and must be converted into Binance USD stablecoin. This announcement was made by WazirX on a Monday. In this announcement, he further stated that it has put an end to the deposition coins such as USD, Pax dollar, TUSD, etc. It has put an end to it all for good and has decided to adopt the new or to be more specific Binance.
Reasons for introducing BUSD to users
It is obvious that when something goes on in the crypto market, the authorities feel obligated to share the news with the people to help them make informed decisions. The main reason for the introduction of BUSD stablecoin is primarily to give liquidity a little more boost up as well as help users are more capital efficient. It is also planning upon applying this technique to convert the balance that is already existing in the account of the users.
The authorities have further stated that the users can be able to see their stablecoin only in the account that is under BUSD. It is to be done after the conversion is fully completed. The Indian exchange assets, WazirX is still tet to reach a decision regarding the list of stablecoin that is appropriate for conversion.
What are its plans with another stablecoin?
To shed further light upon this aspect it has also been stated that the withdrawal related to USDC, USDP, etc shall exist there on the WazirX for a very few days. After a period of a few days, this stablecoin shall permanently be delisted from their spot trading pairs. There have been various reports that have suggested in what way WazirX used to handle USDC. It has already delisted several stablecoins and the only surviving one includes, USDC trading against Tether, which is there on the platform.
However, when compared between the two one can see that BUSD is present on the WazirX platform, in not only one but two pairs. Thes two parts of BUSD have been trading at the same time, One against USDT stablecoin and the other against the Indian rupee. The amount of total trading volume has been estimated to be around 5,700 to 5,200 dollars.
Conclusion
Before everything, it is important to also undertake the original USDC. It was created by the fintech firm Circular as well as the Coinbase crypto exchange. It has also established itself as one of the most popular stablecoins which are also referred to as the second largest stablecoin. The decision to remove USDC by WazirX has been taken right after Binance published its decision saying that the USDC shall henceforth be eradicated from its platform.
It also stated the same things under the changes that users might expect. Even though the two, Binance and WazirX sound similar in their ways, they are both unrelated to each other which was even made clear properly.
Maximalists in the Polygon [MATIC] community have been having a nice time as a result of the recent occurrence of a variety of new advancements on the network. Lark Davis, a reporter with cryptocurrency news outlet Crypto reporter, revealed that MATIC had reached two billion transactions in its existence.
This is very important news for Polygon, which has been one of the scaling solutions for Ethereum [ETH] that has performed very well. However, this is not the end of the story since transactions based on polygons are quickly catching up to and even passing Ethereum.
Definition of Polygon
Polygon is a scaling solution that operates beside the Ethereum blockchain and is referred to as a "layer two" or "sidechain." It enables transactions to be completed quickly and at a cheap cost. The native cryptocurrency of the network is called MATIC, and it is utilized for a variety of purposes including fees, staking, and more. Exchanges like Coinbase allow for the purchase and sale of MATIC.
What is meant by MATIC?
Polygon has its cryptocurrency known as MATIC, which is used for staking on the Polygon network, paying fees on the Polygon network, and for governance purposes (which means that MATIC holders get to vote on changes to Polygon). In addition, Coinbase and other exchanges make purchasing and selling MATIC possible.
During an early phase of Polygon's development, the company was known by the moniker MATIC. After first debuting as Matic Network in October 2017, the creators changed the name of the platform to Polygon in the early part of 2021.
Polygon vs Ethereum: Who is doing better in the market?
Despite this, Polygon's performance throughout this quarter has been better than Ethereum's. According to Polygon Daily, the scaling solution completed around twice as many transactions on average as Ethereum did during this quarter.
In addition, the network reportedly achieved a new benchmark for Polygon-based NFTs, as stated by the Twitter feed for Polygon news known as Polygon Daily. According to this tweet, the monthly sales volume of NFTs on Polygon achieved an all-time high of $100 million in August.
Since February 2022, when the company had its last greatest performance, this is the first time Polygon has been able to break beyond the $50 million resistance barrier. OpenSea, the biggest NFT exchange, has just made it possible for users to list native tokens on Polygon and buy them using those tokens.
Where does the market stand now?
Having said that, Polygon released a statement on September 5 stating that they have welcomed Senken to their team. Senken is a marketplace for tokenized carbon credits that operates on the blockchain and enables users to purchase, sell, and retire tokenized carbon credits. These are produced via on-chain carbon infrastructure and services built using Polygon's platform.
Where does MATIC intend to go?
After falling from its peak of $1 in August, MATIC was trading at $0.89 at the time of this publication. According to CoinMarketCap, the governance token used by Polygon saw gains of over 2% in the previous day, adding to the 5.2% increase it had had in the previous week. This puts Polygon in an excellent position to gain from the Merge since the increased scalability that Ethereum will experience as a result of the Merge will also be favorable to Polygon. Polygon's expansion, on the other hand, faces significant challenges from the development of L2 scaling solutions like Arbitrum and Optimism. There is a lot of speculation going around that these two procedures will be in the driver's seat when the L2 season rolls around again.
The recent reports stated that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of Thailand has brought new regulations about advertising for crypto businesses. It is the result of raising government scrutiny of the sector.
The SEC noted in a recent announcement that the new regulations will properly display investment hazards in marketing and offer a balanced index of expected risk and returns.
The Guidelines Of ASCI :
"Operators must provide details of advertisements and spending including the use of influencers and bloggers to the SEC along with terms and time frame," stated SEC, saying that operators had 30 days to become comfortable with the new rules.
India's rules and regulations for crypto ads
In February 2022, ASCI (Advertising Standards Council of India) kept a set of 12 guidelines regarding the advertisement and promotion of virtual digital assets (VDAs) and services. It included cryptos and non-fungible assets (NFTs) also. All advertisements that have been released or published on or after April 1, 2022, have to have adhered to the guidelines.
Thailand cryptocurrency businesses randomly promote their products on several social media platforms. There are also billboards to promote the sector all over the city of Bangkok.
According to the ASCI standards, cryptocurrency commercials must have added warnings regarding the unsafe atmosphere of the asset class. It should be much like mutual fund advertisements.
Background Information :
Notably, the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, conducted a discussion about the regulatory prospects of cryptocurrencies in November 2021. According to media reports, a significant agreement took place at that time among the members. That aimed to take steps against ads that attempt to mislead the youth using over-promising and non-transparent ads.
Mentionable, In June 2022, a report of ASCI disclosed that over 400 crypto-associated advertisements violated advertising and promotion guidelines for virtual digital assets (VDAs) including guidelines for influencer advertising in the early five months of this year.
According to Manisha Kapoor, CEO of ASCI, "Some influencers discussed crypto confidently without total understanding of it. It creates an impression that it is secure, it's fine and a cool thing."
The recent data shows that 419 out of 453 complaints ASCI handled between January and May 2022 required revisions.
Previous Scenario :
Notably, Thailand had restricted the use of cryptocurrencies as a means of payment for goods and services. It was said that the wider use of digital assets would be unsafe for the nation’s financial system and economy.
Business operators along with crypto exchanges, must not offer such payment services. They were banned from providing such services that promote the use of digital assets to pay for goods or services. Was said by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Though, it was expected that the new regulation would not affect trading or investments in digital assets according to the agency.
The restrictions on the use of digital currencies for goods and services exchanges came into force starting April 1. Companies in Southeast Asia’s second-largest economy aimed to have until the end of April to be comfortable with the new rules as the regulator stated. It was said that the hurdles on cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin for commercial transactions are in series with regulations in Europe, the U.K., South Korea, and Malaysia. Mentionable, countries like Japan, Canada, etc. are very much serious about crypto use among the public. Those countries are not only enthusiastic to use it on personal devices but also it is quite legalized in those countries. They also came up with crypto ATMs. Crypto ATMs are now one of the significant topics over the internet. Along with several uses, they balanced it through regulation and guidelines.
Tether has submitted a motion to exclude Roche Freedman from the class action lawsuit. In addition, the legal counsel for Bitfinex and Tether has requested that the law firm ensure that any defendant-issued papers have not been shared and either return them or destroy them.
After filing a petition to be removed as counsel in the case, Tether (USDT)-issuer Tether is demanding that the law firm Roche Freedman be "terminated" from its role as counsel for the Bitfinex and Tether class-action lawsuit.
The rise of the dispute
Elliot Greenfield of Debevoise & Plimpton LLP filed a request for a court order on Wednesday on behalf of the legal firm that represents Tether and Bitfinex. The motion asked the court to remove Roche's law company from the case altogether and to confirm that they have either returned or destroyed all defendant-issued papers and have not shared them with any third party, including Ava Labs. Greenfield also demanded that Roche's law firm certify that they have returned or destroyed all.
The request comes shortly after Roche submitted a notice of motion to withdraw from the Tether class-action lawsuit amid the ongoing fallout from a recent CryptoLeaks expose. The expose alleged that a United States lawyer had a secret pact to "harm" Ava Labs competitors in exchange for AVAX tokens and Ava Labs equity.
Greenfield’s remarks
Greenfield said Roche's remarks that were published on the CryptoLeaks website expressed a "severe worry" that Kyle Roche "may be abusing the discovery process" and "misusing material" he obtains via litigation.
Greenfield said that the issues are very pertinent to the case, and he highlighted the fact that Roche Freedman LLP "has issued a series of document requests seeking material that has no obvious relation to the claims and defenses in this complaint."
Greenfield stated that the withdrawal of Kyle Roche from the case "does little, if anything, to address the serious issues regarding the potential misuse of discovery:" Even though Kyle Roche has filed motions to remove himself and others from the case, Greenfield stated that the withdrawal of Roche "does little, if anything, to address the serious issues."
Greenfield further said that the "removal would not disadvantage Plaintiffs" since the plaintiffs would continue to be represented by "two other major and experienced companies," namely Selendy Gay Elsberg PLLC as well as Schneider Wallace Cottrell Konecky LLP.
The class-action complaint that was brought against Tether and Bitfinex in 2019 said that the defendants manipulated the cryptocurrency market by creating unbacked USDT "in an attempt to convey to the system that there was a massive, organic desire for cryptocurrency assets." In the last few days, Roche has withdrawn from the cases that it was involved in against Binance, Solana, Tron, BitMEX, Nexo, and Dfinity.
Exposure of Roche Freedman's 'intoxicating' links to Avalanche/Ava Labs
The legal company that represented Ira Kleiman in his unsuccessful action against Dr. Craig Wright has been exposed for launching nuisance lawsuits against Ava Labs' blockchain competitors.
Roche Freedman is well-known for initiating class action lawsuits against blockchain businesses because they deceived customers by marketing unregistered securities as tokens. Videos published by Crypto Leaks indicate that these lawsuits have nothing to do with protecting common 'crypto' investors. Instead, it seems that the cases are meant to cripple Ava Labs' competitors, so increasing the value of AVAX, of which Roche Freedman's partners were handed substantial amounts in addition to an ownership share in Ava Labs.
Final Thoughts
Roche explains in one video that his company shared office space with Ava Labs beginning in 2019 and that Roche personally resided with Ava Labs co-founder and chief operating officer Kevin Sekniqi after Roche's relocation from New York to Miami. Roche adds that he trusts Gün and Sekniqi "like brothers" and that they have "the same interest."
