Technology
People
Why Big Tech is losing talent to crypto, web3 projects
Big Tech companies, in Silicon Valley and elsewhere, are seeing an increasing number of their best talents and high profile employees moving into crypto, blockchains and web3. The driver is a combination of incumbent big tech, ideology, exciting tech and incentive models never seen before.
Price Watch
BTC below 40k, short-term holders drive volatility while geopolitics spook markets
Bitcoin (BTC) market price fell under $40,000 during the weekend. Short-term Holders are the most likely cohort to spend their coins in response to volatility.
Crime
OpenSea phishing attack, here’s what happened
The phishing attack against users of the popular OpenSea NFT marketplace, was planned well ahead of the actual theft of user’s NFT. The attacker utilized both phishing email tactics and exploited dated smart contracts.
Opinion
The U.S. already have a CBDC, just skip the “CB”
Let the private sector come up with a solution to the CBDC dilemma. Maybe you heard it before, but the U.S. already has a, or rather several, digital dollars. They’re called stablecoins, and all the U.S. government basically has to do, to leapfrog China, is to say okay.
Exchanges
Canadian Police to block cryptocurrency transactions amid truckers protest
In an attempt to block funding of the Freedom Convoy protest in Canada, the Canadian police RCMP have sent letters to crypto exchanges effectively ordering them to stop donations to the protesters.
Technology
Is Polygon safu? Critics: Multisig isn’t secure enough, $5B in jeopardy
A debate around the safety of the Polygon network is on the rise. Critics accuse the Polygon network to be insecure and centralized. Polygon is aware multisigs are not ideal and is planning to remove them.
Exchanges
Binance ditches the “Binance” in Binance Smart Chain
In a move that suggests that Binance no longer wants to be directly associated with the BSC blockchain, Binance is removing the “Binance” from the BSC acronym, renaming the blockchain BNB chain.
Hacks
Build Finance DAO hostile takeover, treasury drained
The Treasury of the Build Finance DAO appears to have been completely drained after a hostile takeover of the DAO governance by an attacker voting himself into power.
Culture
Coinbase’s Super Bowl QR code, site crash, scammy codes
Few, at least in the U.S, missed Coinbase's Super Bowl commercial featuring a QR code bouncing around the screen. The ad was so successful it forced Coinbase to throttle the site not to overwhelm it. But QR codes are also highly criticized.
Analysis
Winter Sale: Ethereum gas price at 6 months low
The demand for transactions on the Ethereum blockchain is at its lowest level since summer. This low demand comes when the price of ether once again drops below $3,000.
Hacks
Critical bug in Ethereum L2 Optimism, $2M bounty paid
Announced today, the Ethereum layer-2 chain Optimism was alerted by a white hat hacker of a critical bug in a smart contract. The bug was fixed and $2 million in bug bounty was paid out to the hacker.
CBDCs
Digital euro bill set to come in early 2023
While the Chinese digital yuan is being rolled out during the Beijing Winter Olympics, the European Union is now planning to propose a bill for a digital euro early next year.