Is the EU Building a Database of Digital Currency Users?
The European Union's proposal to bring digital currency exchanges and custodial wallet providers under the scope of its anti-money laundering (AML) and countering terrorist financing (CTF) laws has many interesting and important aspects. One of them is a proposed legal definition of "virtual currency", the first such to be introduced in EU law. As we've detailed previously, this has a potential to have a great impact on how laws will be applied to digital currency issues in all member states. But, the definition is far from the only impactful implication. Another controversial....
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A group of students and staff from Trinity College Dublin, which is developing a tradition of research into crypto projects, is building a bitcoin 'credit check' database to make the digital currency more transparent. The team, led by Professor Donal O'Mahony, is hoping that the database will enable potential business partners to identify possible indicators for fraudulent business practices or money laundering, whilst still granting sufficient anonymity. O'Mahony said: "We have been watching the progress of bitcoin and have been fascinated by the market uptake, the uses people have put it....
Russian payments firm Qiwi is currently designing its own proprietary blockchain in an effort to replace its central payments processing database. Called the "Qiwi blockchain system", the company’s development effort focuses on how its core database of customer transactions could be reimagined to reduce costs. Qiwi is one of the largest payment service providers in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) region, with more than 16.1 million digital wallet users and 62 million transacting customers per month. Today, according to the company, all customer transactions are....
The European Commission has submitted their plans to create a central database of digital currency users. The EU quotes the prevention of terrorist financing and money laundering for the reason behind it. The Commission stated that virtual currency transfers, including Bitcoin, are not monitored or observed by public authorities within the EU and thus, a regulatory framework for digital currency platforms must be established. “For that purpose, obliged entities need to collect, process and record personal data, and sometimes to share such data with public authorities (such as FIUs) or with....
When the Patreon database hack was announced, the technology industry was once again reminded why centralized solutions are not the way forward. Not only have customer email addresses been leaked, but also physical addresses and even private conversations on the platform. To make matters even worse, the entire database has now been published on the Internet, available for everyone to see. Whenever a company’s database is hacked, there is a rightful cause for concern. Especially when that company is a crowdfunding platform like Patreon, serving customers from all over the world. According....
Law enforcement agencies do not see eye-to-eye with consumer privacy. The FBI now wants to ensure American can no longer sue them for violating the Privacy Act. That proposal was put on the table by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on May 31, 2016. The law enforcement agency wants to exempt its entire database from citizens having the right to sue the....