Following in the wake of the Detroit Mayor's announcement that they were too poor to pay a ransom, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder has announced that the state plans to deploy "volunteer information security experts" in order to combat attacks on Michigan's information technology infrastructure. This announcement came at the same North American International Cyber Summit. Continue reading
Category Archives: North America
Detroit Hit By Ransomware in April
According to The Detroit News and the Associated Press a city database was hit by ransomware this past April. According to Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan a ransom of 2,000 BTC was requested in order to restore access to the affected database. He also reported the ransom was not paid as the database was apparently not that important. This was revealed at the North American International Cyber Summit at Cobo Center. At the summit the Mayor also presented something else as problematic. Continue reading
Coinbase Rumoured To Raise $50 Million Bezzlars, Down From $150 Million Bezzlars
Coinbase, the company that is well known for locking in the purchase price of your bitcoin.. unless the price happens to go up in the interim in which case the purchase is flagged as a high risk transaction and cancelled, is rumoured to be raising between USD $40-60 million. The round of new investment is rumoured to be lead by Draper Fisher Jurvetson according to an article published by Re/code. Continue reading
CFPB's Proposed Rules Governing Prepaid Cards Include "Virtual Currency"
Last March, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau sort comment regarding potential disclosures to be used on the packaging of prepaid cards such as gift cards and prepaid debit cards. The CFPB have now released their proposed disclosures which, after a brief period of comment, they hope to standardise. Continue reading
NASAA: Top Investor Threats
The North American Securities Administrators Association today released an article titled "Top Investor Threats" in which they state there is an emerging threat of "unscrupulous promoters" illegally offering securities tied to Bitcoin. Continue reading
USPS Hacked: Every Employee's Personal Information Compromised
The Washington Post reports that a security breech at the United States Postal Service has compromised the personal information of all persons employed by the service. Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe the United States Postal Service has not yet seen any evidence the compromised data is being misused.
Trendon Shavers (aka pirateat40) Faces Criminal Fraud Charges
A smaller note in yesterday's busy day for Preet Bharara, criminal fraud charges were announced against Trendon Shavers, also known as pirateat40, for running a Ponzi scheme. In Preet's own words: Continue reading
Buterin's Waterfall, a Likbez
Product: Price of BTC under control. Life for USG. (Examples: Bitstamp and Coinbase)
- BTC dumped by agents on public markets (The Ethereum raincloud)
- A portion of the "energy" sustains the agent's "businesses"
- USG Confiscators such as the National Security Agency and Department of Justice collect BTC pooling at the bottom (Silk Road v1 and V 2.0, Various Chumpatrons like pirateat40, vanilla idiots).
- BTC plundered via Judicial and other means (e.g. malware) goes to loyal agents who know what is expected of them.
- GOTO 1 (via evaporation)
The Blake Benthall Complaint, full text
After the arrest of Blake Benthall for allegedly operating Silk Road 2.o a PDF began circulating which purports to be a copy of the complaint against Benthall. Qntra presents the text of the alleged complaint liberated from its PDF turd: Continue reading
Silk Road 2.0 Seized, Blake Benthall Arrested
Today the FBI announced the closure of the Silk Road 2.0 and the arrest yesterday of Blake Benthall the alleged operator of Silk Road 2.0 who operated under the moniker "Defcon." The charges leveled at Benthall include: Continue reading