As with most of the globetrotting crypto and blockchain set, I find myself grounded. Me, in my Manhattan apartment for the past several months, watching the COVID-19 pandemic grow out of control while systems break down in spectacular fashion and frighteningly few politicians provide effective leadership. Compounding the effects of the health crisis is the ensuing economic crisis, which has left historic levels of Americans unemployed and has wiped out entire industries. Many are wondering how the United States, one of the richest and most powerful countries in the world as well as the center of global innovation, managed to …

Several data violations, like the Cambridge Analytica scandal, have brought forth questions regarding how companies and governments should deal with the data entrusted to them, and they have also increased the search for the development of new technologies to preserve the privacy of companies and users. Consequently, countries and regulators have rushed to set new compliance requirements to deal with user privacy and data collection — like the General Data Protection Regulation in Europe or the General Data Protection Law in Brazil, to name a couple. Parallel to that, there has been a new trend to seek new technologies like …

The past decade has produced an eruption in diverse giving channels and options for donating, changing the patterns of how people give. According to Blackbaud, online giving has shown steady increases, growing from 6.4% of all giving in 2013 to 8.5% in 2018. Hundreds of millions of dollars in cryptocurrencies have been donated as well, with notable donations including over $100 million to Fidelity Charitable, $29 million to DonorsChoose, $4 million to The Ellen Degeneres Wildlife Fund and many more. From industry startups designing programs that make donating cryptocurrency easier, to charities being more receptive to actually taking those donations, …

Editor’s note: The week has been remarkably active for policy, possibly as a result of economies showing signs of heading slowly back to normal. While crisis remains, it seems like everyone has gotten numb to crisis mode. Recent news has been quite kind to crypto all over the world. We may in fact be seeing a trend that many predicted back in March when COVID-19 lockdowns first took hold. Beyond the immediate importance that a disease that can be transmitted by cash gave to digital payments — or even the need to send money to hundreds of millions of people …

In August 2010, a bug in the Bitcoin network that allowed large transactions to be added to the ledger without proper verification was identified by a hacker. The hacker generated and siphoned 184 billion Bitcoin (BTC) into three separate accounts. Fortunately, the bug was quickly identified and erased from the blockchain by developers. The existence of blockchain technology would indeed have been threatened if the hacker was successful. Since the emergence of blockchain technology, numerous industries have adapted the technology to store and transfer chunks of data. The technology boasted of an iron-clad defense system that supposedly could not be …

The Austrian government has backed a new blockchain-based research project, aiming to provide secure communication channels between authorities, institutions and citizens in times of crisis. As announced June 18, the QualiSig project, launched by Austrian comms specialist A-Trust, will utilize the Ignis child chain, part of the Ardor blockchain from Swiss company Jelurida. Answering the call QualiSig recently received a grant of 60,000 euros ($67,300) from the Austrian government following an emergency call for companies needing funding for COVID-19 research. The project uses transparent, encrypted communications and secure and decentralized data storage. Citizens will have sole responsibility for control over …

France-based crypto asset issuance platform Tozex claims to have created a new vehicle for crypto financing that can offer firms a way out of the tough economic times due to the pandemic: the “Believers Reward Offering,” or BRO. Tozex claims that the BRO comprises “the first sustainable alternative” to initial coin offerings and security token offerings, allowing businesses to access financing by borrowing stablecoins from investors worldwide. BROs will save SMEs The firm’s announcement makes grand claims for BROs, describing the BRO as an “anti-crisis business solution.” The document claims that the fundraising vehicle will help small- to medium-sized enterprises …

Civic Technologies, a San Francisco-based innovator in digital identity solutions, announced on June 16 that its Civic Wallet is now available in the App Store and Google Play. Civic Wallet has also formed a partnership with Circle Medical, a San Francisco hospital. Together, they will act as a Covid-19 vaccination-proofing tool for Circle Medical’s employees. Five hundred Circle Medical employees will be able to test for Covid-19 at a Circle Medical testing site located in the San Francisco Bay Area. They state that new locations will be added in the future. More than 100,000 people signed up for the app’s …

Due to the crisis caused by COVID-19, millions of people have lost all or part of their income. To support them, governments have been giving out money to victims. Is it possible to make this practice permanent? And if so, why will we need state digital currencies? The COVID-19 pandemic has forced the United States, Canada, Japan, Russia and many other countries to print large budget reserves and to start helping people with direct cash payments. Such measures have, again, led the world to talk about the idea of an unconditional or universal basic income, otherwise known as UBI, an …

Decentralized Infrastructure-as-a-Service company CPUcoin announced a new joint program with Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC). The initiative will devote unused computing power to research regarding the coronavirus. Users who download and install CPUcoin’s CGN Miner platform and the BOINC open-source software support the IBM World Community Grid and Rosetta@home projects with their unused computing power, and in turn, will earn cryptocurrencies. Rosetta@home focuses on researching proteins that comprise the novel coronavirus to produce therapeutics and diagnostics. IBM World Community Grid works on predicting the effectiveness of particular chemical compounds as possible treatments for COVID-19. Users rewarded with CPUcoin’s …

Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, reported on the state of the economy at a Senatorial hearing held on June 16. During the initial report on the state of the economy and the actions taken by the Fed in response to the Coronavirus crisis, the chairman listed all of the extraordinary measures adopted by the bank since March. Part of that included an unprecedented expansion of the Fed’s balance sheet, which purchased securities on the market with newly created money as part of the practice of Quantitative Easing. But the chairman was entirely optimistic about the prospects of …

The coronavirus pandemic has been hugely disruptive to crypto conferences and events around the world, but one company is determined to continue educating businesses and consumers about Bitcoin’s potential. Paxful, the peer-to-peer Bitcoin marketplace, is hosting a series of online sessions aimed at the African market. These one-hour events are designed to offer a compelling insight into cryptocurrencies for those who know little about what they are and their potential impact. Some of the continent’s best-known companies and individuals are also getting involved in the seminars. Championing Africa The first session was an “Ask Me Anything,” with the two co-founders …