International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde says it's only a matter of time before cryptocurrencies come under government regulation. "It's inevitable," she said. "It's clearly a domain where we need international regulation and proper supervision."
Pyeongchang Winter Olympics organizers confirmed that the Games had fallen victim to a cyber attack during the opening ceremony, but they refused to reveal the source. The Games’ systems, including the internet and television services, were affected by the hack two days ago but organizers said it had not compromised any critical part of their operations.
The U.S. Internal Revenue Service, fresh off its success in uncovering U.S. assets hidden in Swiss banks, has assigned elite criminal agents to investigate whether Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are being used to cheat the taxman. A new team of 10 investigators is focusing on international crimes. In addition to following undeclared assets that are flowing out of Swiss banks after a crackdown, it will also build cases against tax evaders who use cryptocurrency.
An Italian cryptocurrency exchange called BitGrail said that it lost about 17 million tokens of a cryptocurrency called Nano, with a market value of about $170 million. In a note on its website, the exchange said “internal checks revealed unauthorized transactions which led to a 17 million Nano shortfall, an amount forming part of the wallet managed by BitGrail.”
The Department of Homeland Security is warning Americans planning to attend the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in Pyeongchang that cybercriminals are likely to be targeting the Games. At the Olympic Committee’s Security Command Center in an unmarked facility in Pyeongchang, security experts from around the world are monitoring threats from North Korean hackers who have been probing the computer networks that manage South Korean finance, media and critical infrastructure systems for years.
Twitter left hundreds of Russian propaganda videos, with millions of views, on its video platform Vine for months after it should have known they were posted by a Kremlin-linked troll group. The discovery raises new questions about the nature of the company's effort to find and remove content produced by Russians trying to meddle in American politics, and how comprehensive it has been.
Apple has responded to security concerns surrounding leaked iPhone source code, pointing out that any potential vulnerabilities would be outdated. "Old source code from three years ago appears to have been leaked," Apple said in a statement, "but by design the security of our products doesn't depend on the secrecy of our source code."
Russian trolls pushed pro-Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and anti-Hillary Clinton content on Tumblr around the time of the election. Kremlin-linked accounts used the blogging platform to pose as black activists to promote their messages, according to researcher Jonathan Albright and BuzzFeed News.
Consumer Reports has found that millions of smart TVs can be controlled by hackers exploiting easy-to-find security flaws. We found that a relatively unsophisticated hacker could change channels, play offensive content, or crank up the volume, which might be deeply unsettling to someone who didn’t understand what was happening.
The U.S. charged 36 people in a take-down of an international cybercrime ring that prosecutors say used the slogan “In Fraud We Trust” and stole $530 million with the help of pilfered identities and malware.The Justice Department on Wednesday announced the racketeering conspiracy along with the arrest of 13 people, eight of whom the government will seek to extradite from Australia, the U.K., France, Italy, Kosovo and Serbia.
Two of the nation's top financial regulators said that Congress may need to grant them new powers if they are to protect consumers from fraud on cryptocurrency exchanges, the digital trading platforms where investors swap dollars for bitcoin or other virtual currencies. Asked by federal lawmakers whether they had enough authority to shield cryptocurrency investors from scams, market manipulation and abuse, top officials from the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission said that the agencies were still consulting with other U.S. officials but that they may need more legislative authority.
Apple Inc.’s takeover of music-identification service Shazam may threaten competition and should be reviewed by the European Commission, the regulator said.Apple will be told to file to the Brussels-based antitrust authority. It was originally required to file only with Austria’s regulator, and didn’t have to involve the EU, which usually takes large deals that affect Europe.
Apple Inc. has seen “strong demand” for replacement iPhone batteries and may offer rebates for consumers who paid full price for new batteries, the company said in a Feb. 2 letter to U.S. lawmakers. In the letter, amid nagging allegations that it slowed down phones with older batteries as a way to push people into buying new phones, the company said it was considering issuing rebates to consumers who paid full price for replacement batteries.
Gov. Phil Murphy signed an executive order requiring that New Jersey establish its own net neutrality protections after the Federal Communications Commission repealed Obama-era regulations late last year. The order directs all internet service providers that do business with the state of New Jersey to follow the principles of net neutrality or lose the ability to do business with the state.
The Senate voted unanimously to confirm President Trump’s nominee to head the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Andrei Iancu. Iancu’s vote was met with no pushback from Democrats, even though some voiced opposition over another Trump tech nominee, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai, last October.
Digital currencies such as bitcoin demand increased oversight and may require a new federal regulatory framework, the top U.S. markets regulators will tell lawmakers at a congressional hearing. Christopher Giancarlo, chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and Jay Clayton, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), will provide testimony to the Senate Banking Committee amid growing global concerns over the risks virtual currencies pose to investors and the financial system.
Apple Inc. and Cisco Systems Inc. have teamed up with insurer Allianz SE to offer discounts on cyber insurance to businesses that primarily use equipment from both technology companies, they said. The arrangement, which also includes insurance broker Aon Plc, will help businesses fortify their cyber security defenses and make them eligible to score more favorable terms for cyber coverage, such as lower or no deductibles, along with support services in the event of attack, the companies said.
Facebook has patented a new system that could help it estimate a user's socioeconomic status.The patent, according to CBInsights, shows a decision tree that collects data points on a user's education level, travel history, the number of devices they own, homeownership and where they live to guess the probability of them falling in a given socioeconomic class.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Bank of America Corp., the nation’s two largest banks, said they’re halting purchases of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies on their credit cards. JPMorgan doesn’t want the credit risk associated with the transactions, said Mary Jane Rogers, a spokeswoman for the firm.
YouTube will now add a label to videos that come from state-funded media outlets, the Google-owned company announced. A notice will appear under the videos for any outlets that received some level of government or public funding.
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