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Dozens of AI-Powered Chatbot Tokens Found to Be Part of honeypot schemes
PeckShield, a company that specializes in blockchain security, has sounded the alarm after discovering hundreds of tokens that falsely claim to be tied to the artificial intelligence (AI) powered chatbot ChatGPT.“
In a post dated February 20, the company disclosed that at least three "BingChatGPT" tokens seem to be part of honeypot scams. A honeypot strategy is a kind of smart contract that deceives a user into contributing Ether (ETH), which the attacker subsequently captures and collects.
In what is commonly known as a "pump and dump" scheme or a "rug pull," PeckShield reports that at least two of the identified tokens have already lost nearly 100% of their value, while a third is at a loss of 65%. This type of scheme involves the purchase of an asset with the intention of quickly selling it at a higher price.
Typically, the organizers of a pump-and-dump scheme would orchestrate a campaign of deceptive claims and hype to entice investors to purchase tokens, and then they will discreetly sell their interest in the plan as prices go up. This is done in order to make a profit from the scam. Read More
Bitcoin Lightning Network growth is organic, coming from real-world adoption
Bitcoin Lightning Network adoption receives a boost with the launch of U.S. dollar payments and the decentralized social media platform Nostr.
The capacity of Bitcoin’s Lightning Network (LN) recently surpassed an all-time high of 5,000 Bitcoin.
The Lightning Network is a neutral protocol built on top of Bitcoin, and it currently does not have a “native” token attached to it like many decentralized finance (DeFi) platforms.
Although the Lightning Network’s total liquidity is less than 0.5% of the Ether in DeFi contracts, the uptrend in Bitcoin’s LN capacity versus a downtrend in the amount of ETH locked in smart contracts is encouraging for LN development.
While the liquidity on the LN has been rising consistently, the number of channels on the peer-to-peer network dropped drastically in November following the FTX collapse. It could be due to an exodus of miners operating LN nodes besides running mining clients.
However, the likely end of miner capitulation and the rise of Bitcoin-based applications like nonfungible tokens could mark an end to LN channel capitulation. Since the start of 2023, over 2,000 new channels have been added to the network. Read More
Coinbase Drops Free Ethereum NFT via Zora to Mark Base Network Launch
The free NFT has become Ethereum's biggest gas guzzler with 24,000+ editions minted, and flippers are already finding eager buyers.
Coinbase announced a major new project today in the form of Base, a layer-2 scaling network for Ethereum built in collaboration with Optimism. To mark the news, the crypto exchange dropped a free open edition Ethereum NFT for anyone to mint—but it's not through Coinbase’s own struggling NFT marketplace.
“Base, Introduced” is a free NFT that Coinbase made available through Zora, an NFT minting platform and startup focused on Web3 creator tools. It’s an open edition NFT, which means that anyone can claim one of the identical collectibles until the minting window ends on Sunday, with a limit of one NFT per wallet.
Already, more than 24,000 of the Ethereum NFTs have been minted since this morning’s announcement of Base. As a result, the NFT’s smart contract—which contains the code that powers the project—has become the largest “gas guzzler” on the Ethereum network, with over $271,000 worth of gas (or network transaction fees) used over the past three hours. Read More
Crypto and blockchain education becomes priority at top universities
As crypto adoption rises, more universities are offering crypto courses.
In a world where cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology make direct peer-to-peer transactions possible and transcend traditional financial norms, more people want to learn about them to keep up with the times.
Universities worldwide are beginning to offer cryptocurrency-related courses to cater to this new paradigm. Due to rising demand, many of the world’s top universities offer crypto-related courses.
There’s been a lot of hype regarding cryptocurrencies — mainly due to their disruptive potential — and the rise of crypto education has strongly coincided with this. According to a 2022 survey from Study.com, about two-thirds of American parents and college students conversant with cryptocurrencies thought the topic should be taught in schools as mandatory.
A recent poll conducted by Grayscale Investments, in conjunction with The Harris Poll, revealed that approximately 53% of Americans viewed cryptocurrencies as the future of finance.
Such positive perspectives regarding cryptocurrencies have given credence to introducing related courses in institutions of higher learning. Read More
What Does The Wallet Do? What Does It Mean For You?
The launch of the Markethive wallet is approaching, so it’s time to start beating the proverbial drum. It is the start of an exciting time with the advent of many integrations to follow the release of the wallet that will bring Markethive into prominence as an unprecedented platform. The combination of inbound marketing, social media, digital broadcasting, video, conference rooms, e-commerce, gamification, etc.
Markethive is a blockchain-driven crypto economy, all-inclusive, with a distributed database system required for this decentralized, monolithic global project. We’re almost there with the release of the wallet that will initiate entrepreneurial sovereignty and open the floodgates of this divine enterprise with its plethora of systems and services, including the new interface and dashboard.
We now have a complete working wallet with the Solana Network, and we also have a fully functional crypto merchant account. The Markethive wallet is being polished with the finishing touches, keeping mindful that it’s not just a simple wallet but a comprehensive, dynamic engine centralized for you that powers your platform and business.
Markethive is fundamentally a sophisticated inbound marketing and storefront platform, integrated with a social network, and not just another social media platform you see popping up to counter the media tech giants we’ve come to know as oppressive, censoring you and using your personal data for their own gain. Read More
Recycle-to-earn, a new frontier for blockchain technology toward ESG goals
Circularr won the European Blockchain Convention’s award for blockchain startup of the year for its pitch focused on recycling with blockchain.
“Recycle-to-earn”: This was the motto presented by Eric Vogel earlier this month while pitching his startup at the European Blockchain Convention, decades after he started recycling plastics and cans from his grandmother’s house to earn extra money for a Game Boy.
Vogel’s love for video games and increasing interest in the impact of recycling were his inspirations for Circularr, a London-based company seeking to connect recyclers, manufacturers and brands throughout a decentralized recycling ecosystem.
Proper recycling is a growing challenge. According to the Plastic Waste Makers Index, recycling across the world is not expanding fast enough to keep up with plastic waste, resulting in greater chances of it being disposed of in oceans and rivers or on beaches rather than going to recycling plants. In 2021, over 139 million metric tons of single-use plastic waste were generated worldwide. Read More
Spotify Looking Into Web3 Wallet Integration
The music streaming service is working with different digital asset companies to test NFT-enabled playlists for token holders.
Spotify, which is the world’s largest music and audio streaming platform, is dabbling in an experiment about token-enabled playlists. The feature, if enabled, would allow NFT holders to connect their wallets to the Spotify app and access music collections curated by certain blockchain-based companies, like Overlord and Kingship. The feature is already live for testing for Android users based in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and New Zealand.
A spokesperson for Spotify, who was asked to elaborate further on the news, gave the statement:
“At Spotify, we routinely conduct a number of tests in an effort to improve our user experience. Some of those end up paving the path for our broader user experience and others serve only as important learnings. We have no further news to share on future plans at this time.”
The announcement has led to an increased demand for Web3 music tokens. Blockchain companies like Viberate (VIB), Audius (AUDIO), and Rhythm (RHYTHM) all recorded significant surges in token values since the pilot was announced. Read More
Don’t Call It ‘Crypto’: How Some Blockchain and NFT Projects are Rebranding
As the bear market bites, crypto projects are abandoning terms like NFTs and Web3. Here's how branding experts think they should weather the storm.
It’s the technology that dare not speak its name.
Are you looking for NFTs on Reddit or Instagram? You’ll have much better luck searching for “digital collectibles” instead. Remember when blockchain was briefly sexy? The Bitcoin mining firm formerly known as Riot Blockchain recently rebranded itself as Riot Platforms. The World Economic Forum’s head of blockchain and digital assets, Brynly Llyr, has even suggested that the crypto space rebrand itself entirely around “decentralized systems.”
“For a while, we definitely don't want to call them NFTs,” said NBA All-Star Baron Davis. His photo and video rights management platform, SLiC Images, is shunning any mention of the contentious technology.
Crypto—and all its associated jargon—are now toxic words. Where once simply adding the word “blockchain” to your name increased your company’s valuation, now crypto, Web3, NFT and the rest of the buzzwords that conjured up images of a brave new world are, to paraphrase Charlie Munger, rat poison. Read More
Ethereum Core Devs Planning New Holli Testnet
Ethereum core developers are working on a new testnet called Holli to address issues related to the purchase of ETH on the blockchain’s test networks.
The Holli testnet will look to address the supply challenges faced by ETH on other Ethereum testnets and improve the overall testing environment.
The Ethereum Foundation’s Tim Beiko has stated that core developers on Ethereum are planning a new testnet, slated to be launched later this year. According to Beiko, the testnet, dubbed Holli, is being launched to address the difficulties faced when trying to acquire ETH on Ethereum’s primary test networks, such as the Goerli testnet. Beiko tweeted about the Holli testnet, stating,
“A new testnet, Holli, is planned to launch later this year, and hopefully, we can figure out these things before then! I’ve made two suggestions on the repo, and I would love to hear from application layer devs about how we could better approach this!”
The Holli testnet’s release, expected to happen sometime later this year, will also look to improve the testing environment for client and application developers and node operators on Ethereum. Read More
Disclaimer: These articles are provided for informational purposes only. They are not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or any other advice.
