Recent Exchange Hack Calls For Better Safeguards For Bitcoin
The recent bitcoin exchange hack underscores the vulnerability of bitcoin exchanges, an issue that needs to be addressed if bitcoin is to gain a larger following, according to Megan McArdle, a Bloomberg columnist. (McArdle most likely referred to Bitfinex.) Safeguards have been considered, such as a virtual “exploding dye pack”, but it remains to be seen if such safeguards will be accepted. It took banks many years to develop safeguards that ultimately made bank robbery undesirable to criminals. Bitcoin Theft Is Profitable. McArdle noted that bitcoins are comparatively profitable for....
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Following the temporary closure of trading and the subsequent downtime of the website in its entirety, bitcoin and digital currency exchange ShapeShift has now revealed that the instigating hack stemmed from an insider who previously worked with the exchange. In a new Reddit post that followed a steady, transparent cycle of updates from the time of the initial hack, CEO Eric Voorhees revealed details of the exchange’s investigation. The exchange had suspected that the hack was an insider’s job, a former employee who isn’t with the exchange anymore. The chief executive revealed: Since the....
BitGo has declared that its systems were not breached, and its software functioned correctly during the Bitfinex hack. Co-founder and CEO at BitGo, Mike Belshe, wrote on the company’s blog saying: Our job is to protect your Bitcoin and continue to improve the security of the service. BitGo systems were not breached in this attack and our software functioned correctly. This may seem like an inadequate explanation, because everyone wants to know “what needs to change to avoid what happened in this case,” and we understand that. Fortunately, the Bitfinex configuration was unique and other....
David Gilson over at CoinDesk tries to offer a balanced perspective on traditional banking and the safeguards they implement for security. These he contrasts with the safeguards Bitcoin lacks and suggests that some improvements could be made to the digital currency. First, he suggests that the UK’s financial institutions’ safeguards against fraud and retail disputes offer a level of security that Bitcoin does not. Next, he discusses savings accounts and how government guarantees protect against losses of up to 85,000 GBP per customer, per institution. So, if a bank goes bankrupt, the....
Crypto.com has revealed that 483 user accounts were compromised in the recent hack that resulted in unauthorized withdrawals of about $34 million in cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin and ether. Nonetheless, the company stressed that customer funds were never at risk. Crypto.com’s Hack Postmortem and CEO’s Comments Crypto.com revealed Thursday the number of users affected by the unauthorized crypto withdrawals that occurred on Jan. 17 and the cryptocurrencies stolen. The company wrote: The incident affected 483 Crypto.com users. Unauthorized withdrawals totaled 4,836.26 ETH,....
Storing personal wealth in bitcoin, or any other cryptocurrency, is clearly revolutionary. So much so, it's going to take a long time for mainstream consumers to actually understand the concepts and potential behind these currencies. One of the areas people should rightly be concerned with is the safeguards that are in place when making purchases with digital currency. The UK's established financial institutions already provide certain guarantees and safeguards against fraud and retail disputes. None of these are currently offered by bitcoin services. Here are some of the services that....