Items tagged with cryptocurrency
There might be a filthy 'RAT' (remote access trojan) lurking inside your PC, but do not bother calling pest control. We are not talking about the actual rodent, but a trojan that security researchers are calling InnfiRAT. This nasty bit of code is written in .NET and is designed to access and steal personal data from infected PCs, and specifically cryptocurrency wallet information. That includes Bitcoin and Litecoin, two of the more popular forms of cryptocurrency. According to security researchers at Zscaler, InnfiRAT also helps itself to browser cookies to steal stored usernames and passwords, along with session data. Those activities are concerning, but the malware is even more nefarious in...
Read more...
Sometimes, news reports regarding free money can sound a bit too good to be true – especially anytime cryptocurrency is involved. That was most definitely the case when we first heard about Satoshi’s Treasure, which is an online scavenger hunt that will net the winner a sweet prize worth $1 million in Bitcoin. The $1 million scavenger hunt first kicked off back in April, but along the way, there have been side quests with additional payouts in Bitcoin. Today, a fourteenth clue that will lead to the jackpot prize has been released, and it is worth an additional $70,000 in Bitcoin. The key to unlock this side quest is found in the image below: (Click to Enlarge) The clue provided...
Read more...
The cryptocurrency market is full of peaks and valleys but at the moment, it appears that Bitcoin has hit a peak. Bitcoin surged past $11,000 USD for the first time in a year. The value of Bitcoin has jumped by 13% in the last 24 hours. Although the cyrptocurrency’s value dropped slightly once the heat of the excitement wore off, it is currently sitting pretty at roughly $10,600. Other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum have also hit a ten-month high. Bitcoin reached an all-time high in December 2017 at nearly $20,000. Its value dipped by 74% at the beginning of 2018, thanks to a slew of cryptocurrency regulations. A Bitcoin was only worth roughly $3,100 at the end of December 2018, but...
Read more...
The era of cryptocurrency is not behind us, apparently. One look at Bitcoin's value—it sits at around $9,143 currently—indicates that there is room for at least one type of digital coin, even after the crypto-bubble burst last year in general. It is not just Bitcoin, though. Facebook is making a major move into the cryptocurrency space and has the backing of some major payment firms. Facebook's new and open-source digital currency is called Libra. It will be managed by Calibra, a newly formed Facebook subsidiary, with the goal of providing financial services all around the globe while leveraging blockchain technology. The first product that Calibra will introduce is a digital wallet...
Read more...
It has been a tough year for cryptocurrency mining, following what had been a banner year in which several digital currencies skyrocketed in value, before plummeting (and in some cases, disappearing altogether). Is the ride over? For some, yes. But not for everyone, and Apple is introducing a feature in iOS 13 that could give the cryptocurrency market a kick in the pants. Maybe. It's called CryptoKit, and we will know more about it later today when Apple discusses it at WWDC. In the meantime, there are some details that we already know. In the early going, Apple describes CryptoKit as a new Swift framework that is supposed to make it easier and safer to perform cryptographic operations. That...
Read more...
Authorities in the U.S. have announced that they have been successful in breaking a ring of hackers who had been running a scam to hijack SIM cards and steal cryptocurrency from the victims of the crime. Court documents in the case allege that the group, known as "The Community," had stolen about $2.4 million in cryptocurrency. Six people from the hacking ring were named in court documents in the case. The indictment came from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan, and it alleges that six people living around the U.S. and Ireland were part of The Community. The SIM hijacking scheme that the group pulled off involved them using bribery or trickery to convince mobile phone...
Read more...
The cryptocurrency market has taken a beating over the past year, but if there is a Rocky Balboa among the bunch, it is undoubtedly Bitcoin, the virtual currency that just will not stay down. In fact, Bitcoin saw a sudden increase in value on Tuesday, rising 15 percent to $4,800. That is the highest value Bitcoin has seen since November. At least one cryptocurrency exchange had Bitcoin trading even higher, at $5,000. As it stands at the time of this writing, Coinbase has it going for $4,745.62, which is up 14.73 percent (+$609.06) in the past 24 hours. If nothing else, this further underscores how volatile the cryptocurrency market has always been since it swung onto the mainstream radar. So,...
Read more...
The Bitcoin boom has generally gone bust, and as a result, we just don't hear as much about cryptocurrency as a major market mover as we used to. The value of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies crashed last summer, leaving many investors hurting and lots of crypto mining rigs with expensive GPUs running idle and unused. The good news for gamers is that the crash of crypto meant graphics cards were finally available at reasonable prices. Further, a new report has been published today that throws more shade on the legitimacy of Bitcoin trading as a currency itself. The analysis was published by Bitwise this week and found that unregulated currency exchanges actually fake 95% of Bitcoin...
Read more...
Hold onto your wallet. Researchers at ESET have discovered the first known instance of a relatively new strain of cryptocurrency-stealing malware, called a "clipper", on the Google Play Store. They reported their findings to the Play Store's security team on February 1st, who quickly took down the offending application. The attack uses a remarkably simple trick to part users with their digital funds. Cryptocurrency values are assigned to a long, unique string of characters known as a wallet. In order to make a transaction, a sender typically needs to enter the recipient's wallet address in their app. This is similar to how you would put a real-world address on an envelope in order for it to be...
Read more...
Facebook might be joining the blockchain party in a potentially big way, by developing its very own cryptocurrency that would enable users to transfer money over WhatsApp, the cross-platform messaging service the company acquired in early 2014 for $19 billion. On the surface, blockchain and WhatsApp seem like a natural fit. The appeal of WhatsApp is that it utilizes end-to-end encryption and is viewed as a secured messaging platform. It's also available to the public at large and boasts over 1.5 billion monthly users, who collectively send 60 billion messages every day, according to data Mark Zuckerberg provided for the fourth quarter of 2017. Those figures are undoubtedly even higher today....
Read more...
Cryptocurrency has been a hot topic in 2018, and Google claims that “What is bitcoin?” was one of its top questions this year. A lot of people (and companies) jumped on the cryptocurrency train, including Razer. The company is now offering users store credit in exchange for cryptocurrency mining. But is this program too good to be true? Many argue that the Razer SoftMiner rewards program is misleading and exploitative. How does this rather confusing program work? Users are asked to download SoftMiner, a blockchain-based app that has been integrated into Razer’s software. The software is supposed to run silently in the background and draw upon a user’s idle GPU resources....
Read more...
HTC is accepting pre-orders for a new flagship phone, though there is a caveat. Users can only purchase the Exodus 1, as it's called with cryptocurrencies—specifically either Bitcoin or Ethereum, the two most popular blockchain currencies in existence. It is, for all intents and purposes, a blockchain phone and not a typical Android handset. That would not be evident at first glance of the specs. The Exodus 1 sports a 6-inch HD+ display with an 18:9 aspect ratio, and is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor and 6GB of RAM. It also features 128GB of onboard storage, dual 8-megapixel cameras on the front with "natural Bokeh," 12-megapixel and 16-megapixel cameras on the rear, and...
Read more...
At least for the time being, it looks like the mad rush to buy graphics cards for cryptocurrency mining and leave gamers with overpriced options is in the rear view mirror. That doesn't mean cryptocurrency mining doesn't still present an annoyance in some sectors, though. Security researchers warn that cryptocurrency malware is currently hiding in a fake Adobe Flash update that is making the rounds. Adobe Flash can't disappear fast enough. In the meantime, it continues to present security issues, sometimes directly through discovered vulnerabilities, or in this case preying on the vigilance of users who aim to keep it updated to prevent the very sort of thing caused by the fake and malicious...
Read more...
Let's start with the good news. Cryptocurrency mining on GPUs has waned considerably, and the shortage of graphics cards that made it nearly impossible to score a mid-range or high-end GPU at or near MSRP is over (for the most part). Are you ready for the bad news? Be that as it may, cryptocurrency mining hacks are on the rise, and a leaked tool by the US National Security Agency (NSA) may be partially to blame. That's the takeaway from a new report by Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA), a cybersecurity association with some major names among its members, including Cisco, Juniper Networks, McAfee, Sophos, Symantec, and others. The tool in question is "EternalBlue," developed by the NSA and leaked last...
Read more...
