(Mark Van Scyoc/Shutterstock)

Sebastian Sinclair

OCC Economist Cites Benefits of Issuing Bank Charters to Stablecoin Providers

The chief economist of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a banking regulator within the U.S. Treasury, believes issuing national bank charters to “fintech shadow banks” could bring “substantial advantages.”

In a paper titled “Chartering the FinTech Future,” Charles Calomiris set out how stablecoin providers chartered as banks that do not rely on funding from deposits would themselves gain advantages from regulatory oversight.

Such companies would benefit by “coming out of the shadows,” he wrote, with geographic reach and market credibility outweighing the added cost burden of regulation.

 Beware of SPAM/Phishing Emails and Don't Click on Links

Over the last several weeks, we have seen numerous reports of spam/phishing emails that appear to come from olleux. These emails are not legitimate, olleux.io will never spam nor reach you with any closely suspicious looking mail address,(.com, .us, .org, etc) and we strongly encourage you to avoid selecting links or responding in any way. The primary purpose of these unsolicited messages is to extract personal information from unknowing consumers. As your Internet service provider, we have an existing business relationship with you, our customers, and we also have the account information we need. There is no reason to re-acquire that info–when in doubt, delete it or call olleux.io Customer Center at 1-864-409-9499 if you have any questions about this.

There are additional ways to further limit your exposure to SPAM/Phishing emails. See these important tips!

Use an Email Filter - Check your email account to see if it provides a tool to filter out potential spam or to channel spam into a bulk email folder. We offer olleux Internet Guardian to residential users, which detects and removes viruses, spyware and malicious threats from your computer, email, instant messages and downloads. It also secures your home network with a personal firewall and WiFi patrol, among other protections. Call us to learn more.

Limit Your Exposure - Try not to display your email address in public. 

Choose a Unique Email Address - Your choice of  email addresses may affect the amount of spam you receive. 

Reduce Spam for Everyone–Don’t Let Spammers Use Your Computer - Hackers and spammers troll the internet looking for computers that aren’t protected by up-to-date security software. 

Use good computer security practices and disconnect from the internet when you’re away from your computer. Hackers can’t get to your computer when it’s not connected to the internet.

Be cautious about opening any attachments or downloading files 

If you have further questions, please contact olleux.io Customer Center.

 

It’s Different This Time: Bitcoin Searches on Google Surpasses 2017 Bull Run 

Author: Jimmy Aki

Last Updated: 20 November 2020

Bitcoin currently on a trajectory that could see it surpass the highs of the 2017 bull market. With just about every metric ticking up, it appears that more people are keeping tabs on it online. Earlier this week, Brad Michelson, a senior marketing manager at investment platform eToro, confirmed that Bitcoin’s search volumes have been on the rise.

SEMRush vs. Google Trends 

Citing data from the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) platform SEMRush, Michelson explained that global monthly searches for Bitcoin on Google amounted to 8.9 million. The marketing expert compared these numbers to those of November 2017, confirming that they were 356 percent higher.

Comparing the results to those of Google Trends, Michelson noted a significant discrepancy.

“An interesting thing that Google Trends data hasn’t shown is that the monthly global volume for Bitcoin in Dec. 2017 was actually lower than what we’re seeing in Nov 2020.”

It’s worth noting that Google Trends counts metrics differently from platforms like SEMRush. The tracker plots interest against time, assigning every search term an interest score between 0 and 100. Every term gets a value depicting assumed popularity.

Following Google Trends data, Bitcoin’s popularity as November 2017 peaked at 100 between December 17 and 23 – the exact time the asset hit its all-time high. The term currently logs a score of 18, suggesting fewer people are actually keeping tabs on the asset. However, the service also comments that data for the popularity value is currently incomplete.

Google Trends data also shows that Nigerians are the ones searching the most for Bitcoin. In fact, the African country is the only nation with a popularity score of 100 on the trends list. Ghana and South Africa round out the top three with scores of 70 and 59, respectively. This goes to show, once again, that interest in cryptocurrencies on the African continent remains strongest.

A Matured Market Separates This Bull Run from the Last 

Giving reasons for the discrepancy, Michelson noted that Google Trends only shows data based on one keyword. So, anyone searching for “Bitcoin” only gets results for the popularity of the word. Google Trends has exclusive scored searches like “Bitcoin price” and “Bitcoin to dollar.” Both terms have popularity scores of 18 and 33, respectively, on the tracker.

Interestingly, South Africa and Nigeria are the countries with the highest search counts for the two terms.

Going by SEMRush data, it’s understandable that “Bitcoin” searches would have risen. The market has matured significantly since it fell off that $19,700 pedestal in December 2017. It appears to have weeded out some of the weak investors who only saw it as a get-rich-quick scheme.

This isn’t to say that the market hasn’t added more participants as well. Last week, crypto analytics provider Glassnode reported that the number of new BTC addresses hit 25,000 for the first time since January 2018. Some of these will be people looking to capitalize on the market rally, but a vast majority should be serious investors. 

To sum up the difference between this bull market and the last, Nic Carter, the co-founder of crypto data platform CoinMetrics, said in a blog post: 

“To sum up, today’s market is far more mature, more financialized, more surveilled, more orderly, more restrained, less reflexive, more capital-efficient, and more liquid than the market that powered the prior bull run in 2017.”

 

Bitcoin ransoms demanded from Israel

 by Camomile Shumba

 

 November 12, 2020

 

2 min read

• Bitcoin ransoms are being demanded from Israel.
• An American-Israeli cybersecurity firm diagnoses where the Bitcoin ransomers are located and the results came out in their report today.
• The ransomers had managed to work their tricks on a load of companies in Israel over several weeks.

Bitcoin ransoms demanded from Israel

Bitcoin ransoms are being demanded from Israel. An American-Israeli cybersecurity firm diagnoses where the Bitcoin ransomers are located and the results came out in their report today.

The ransomers had managed to work their tricks on a load of companies in Israel over several weeks. There have already been three confirmed Israeli companies that have fallen victim to these bitcoin ransoms, but there might be more victims out there.

Checkpoint and WhiteStream, who is a blockchain forensics organization, managed to trace the ransomware to a crypto exchange called Excoino based in Iran. The two companies could trace back to Iran by tracing the wallet addresses left in the ransomware notes.

RelatedPosts

$10M crypto fraud lands ex Microsoft employee in jail

Spanish Police arrest drug trafficker who laundered $7M in crypto

Ripple loses over 1.15 million XRP in phishing scam

Fake Binance giveaway: Scammers launch Ethereum 2.0 giveaway

 

In late October, the scams in Israel began when the country was targeted by a ransomware project called ‘Pay2Key’. The attacks which occurred in Israel were unique and not connected to any other malware strains.

Check Point’s security alert managed to recognize what was happening only about a week ago. The malware strains that the hackers used were identified on the 6th of November.

The bitcoin ransoms technology converts its victim’s computer information into codes and asks the businesses to pay them. When customers did not pay the criminals, they would leak their information on a website.

The hackers leaked data would be uploaded into a particular file online and come with a unique message. Whoever was responsible for the attack used an EOS photo, but this could have been a random photo from Google.

$29 Million in Bitcoin Seized From Dutch Dark Web Money Launderers

By David Hundeyin

26 October 2020, 20:29 GMT+0000

Updated by Ryan Smith

26 October 2020, 20:33 GMT+0000

IN BRIEF

• A couple from Hilversum, Netherlands have been convicted of money laundering after using bitcoin on dark web services.

• The Rotterdam District Court ordered the couple to forfeit 2,532 BTC and €250,000 ($295,256).

• According to court documents, the convicts swapped cash for bitcoin from anonymous customers in busy fast-food restaurants.

• Want to know more? Join our Telegram Group and get trading signals, a free trading course and daily communication with crypto fans!

The Trust Project is an international consortium of news organizations building standards of transparency.

The Rotterdam District Court in the Netherlands has seized 2,532 bitcoins (~$29 million) from a couple convicted of money laundering on dark web platforms.

According to a court statement, the man and his wife from the city of Hilversum, located in North Holland, were also sentenced to two years and two and a half years in prison, respectively, for money laundering.

The Dutch Public Prosecution Service successfully prosecuted the couple for laundering more than €16 million ($18.9 million) over the course of two and half years after establishing that the source of the large bitcoin sum in their possession came from illegal dark web transactions.

Particulars of the Case

According to the court statement, two separate sums of 1,488 BTC and 1,044 BTC respectively were seized from the suspects, as well as €250,000 ($295,256) in cash. In addition, both suspects were individually fined €45,000 ($53,137) and forced to forfeit €138,000 ($162,955) and $40,000.

ADVERTISEMENT

CONTINUE READING BELOW

The court established that the couple purchased bitcoin to exchange large euro sums in cash from private individuals and companies. These transactions were not disclosed to Dutch authorities and were made using methods to keep the customers anonymous.

The court explained that exchanges usually occurred at a fast-food restaurant in a big city, without any due diligence or KYC. This is typically advantageous for dark web criminals looking to swap their bitcoin for fiat without going through the usual checks of fiat-crypto exchanges.

“Traces of the Dark Web”

The court ruled that the acquired bitcoin bore hallmarks of dark web activity. Bitcoin use on the dark web has been linked to criminal activities like child pornography and murder-for-hire, and authorities often target these underground markets.

An excerpt from the court papers reads as follows:

“Traders did not ask customers for identity papers, while large amounts were often exchanged. The suspects, a man and his wife, came into contact with customers through advertisements on the Internet and a marketplace on the dark web. Much of the bitcoins traded bore traces of the dark web. The court has established that the suspects laundered more than 16 million euros in two and a half years.”

  INDUSTRY

5 BEST CRYPTO CARDS THAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT

BITCOINIST | OCT 26, 2020 | 16:00

---

 

 

 

Crypto cards aim to close the gap between legacy banking and digital assets. They allow users to benefit from holding funds in cryptocurrencies, with the flexibility to convert to cash via ATMs or spend them in the same way they can spend their fiat money from a bank account, at over 53 million merchants worldwide.

---

Crypto cards remove the hassle and slow process of converting crypto to fiat via an exchange and withdrawing to your bank account, mitigating the difficulties of merchant acceptance and lowering the barriers to mainstream adoption. 

14 BTC & 95,000 Free Spins for every player, only in mBitcasino’s Exotic Crypto Paradise! Play Now!

The growing interest in the crypto space, and card payment demand in general, has led to a variety of different crypto card offerings, covering markets around the world and providing a range of functionality for users. 

CRYPTO.COM CARD

The metal Crypto.com Visa Card is available to users in Asia, Europe, and the United States. CRO holders can also stake the native token to receive enhanced cashback and rewards.

The card connects to the Crypto.com mobile app, the wallet service providing access to buy and sell 7 fiat and 53 cryptocurrencies. It also links to the entire Crypto.com ecosystem enabling users to earn interest, access credit, invest, accept payments, and exchange their crypto.

• No minimum balance and no annual transaction fees.
• No fees on ATM withdrawals up to $1,000.
• Zero-fee foreign-exchange.
• Fiat and crypto deposit support, with zero-fee crypto to fiat conversion.
• Up to 8% CRO cash back rewards on each transaction.
• 100% rebate for Spotify, Amazon Prime, and Netflix subscriptions.
• 10% rebate for Expedia and Airbnb purchases.

COINZOOM CARD

The CoinZoom Visa Card offers Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, and other cryptocurrency pairs for the US market, expanding internationally. Behind the card is CoinZoom, a traditional brokerage firm aiming to become a digital banking solution for both crypto and fiat. 

The card and corresponding wallet app are combined with CoinZoom’s institutional-grade secure custody and registered digital currency exchange that expects to become the third US platform to be awarded a BitLicense, following Coinbase and Gemini.

• Apple Pay and Samsung Pay connectivity.
• Up to 5% cashback on all card purchases.
• Up to 50% exchange discounts for ZOOM token holders.
• Earn up to 8% APR on select cryptocurrencies.
• Free “ZoomMe” instant Venmo-style remittance in USD or crypto, up to $10,000 per day.
• Referral rewards of up to $50,000.
• Automatic debit roundups to convert change to cryptocurrencies.

METAL PAY

 

Metal Pay works slightly differently, offering a solution that is connected to existing bank accounts or debit cards, more like a Venmo or PayPal for crypto but providing similar benefits. 

It authorizes the seamless transfer of funds to a Metal Pay account. Users can then create cash and crypto cards in the app to easily buy, sell, send, and receive over 30 cryptocurrencies.

The Metal Pay app supports FDIC-insured banks, so you can essentially get an FDIC insured cash account with Metal Pay. Currently available in the US, it has plans to expand globally.

• “Pop” transaction rewards of up to 5%, paid in Metal token (MTL).
• Instant deposits via linked bank account transfers and debit cards.
• Fee reductions for MTL holders.
• Free to send to friends and family.
• Send funds and make payments using phone numbers.
• Custodial and non-custodial wallets.
• A cash wallet that is FDIC insured (US residents).

BINANCE CARD

The Binance Crypto Card taps into one of the largest global cryptocurrency exchanges, allowing users to automatically transfer crypto from their main Binance wallet to their Binance Card wallet. It follows Binance’s acquisition of Swipe, a leading digital wallet and debit card platform. 

Currently supporting BTC, SXP, BNB, and BUSD, the card is available throughout Europe, with more countries expected soon. 

• Zero subscription or maintenance fees.
• Up to 8% BNB cashback on transactions.
• Google Pay and Samsung Pay integration.
• Funds are SAFU benefiting from Binance’s enhanced security features.
• Auto top-up triggers from your main Binance wallet once the minimum balance hits.
• Less than 0.9% transaction fees.
• Spend up to €8,000 daily.

WIREX CARD

Wirex offers a multi-currency Visa card and dedicated smartphone app, supporting 18 traditional and cryptocurrencies, with a built-in utility token, WXT. Users can benefit from cashback on purchases and the highest level of security protection.

Currently operating in parts of Europe and the Asia-Pacific, Wirex is now seeking to expand into Canada, Japan, and the US.

• Up to 1.5% “Cryptoback” in BTC on all in-store purchases.
• High limits up to $50,000 per day.
• Fiat and crypto deposit support.
• Up to 100% discount on fees using the WXT token.
• Multi-signature, cold storage cryptocurrency accounts.
• Flat fee for ATM withdrawals.
• $1.50 monthly card management fee.

THE FUTURE FOR CRYPTO CARDS

Crypto cards provide a revolutionary step in adoption by simplifying the process of holding, exchanging, and spending cryptocurrencies, expanding market access, and helping entrants navigate a world of growing crypto utility.

The benefits developed so far are just the start, with increasing incentives including staking, interest-earning, and payment acceptance services, only broadening the potential of physical and virtual card-based crypto services in the years ahead.