Texas BTC Miners Face More Problems After Another Storm Hit the State: Report

 The ice blizzard that passed through Texas caused domestic BTC miners to halt activities for a while.

Bitcoin miners located in Texas reportedly suffered severe disruption of their operations due to a blizzard that battered the region.

The extreme weather conditions prompted them to switch off their machines to preserve the local power grid. 

The Cold Winter in Texas Surprised Crypto Miners

As reported by Bloomberg, the ice storm that hit “the Lone Star State” damaged some of the equipment of the domestic bitcoin miners. Electricity consumption surged significantly due to the low temperatures, and those firms had to temporarily shut their businesses to protect the energy network. 

Bitcoin developer says network is not resistant to censorship, questions mining decentralization

 In a recent Twitter thread, a developer questioned the entire idea of Bitcoin’s censorship resistance.

Bitcoin’s censorship-resistance

Bitcoin was built on the idea of offering complete censorship resistance for transactions. However, according to a Bitcoin developer, this coin is far from censorship-resistant.

The developer Luke Dashjr posted a Twitter thread raising doubts about Bitcoin’s censorship resistance, saying the network’s ” hypothetical censorship-resistance is not based on some mere hope miners won’t censor.” 

As he laid down his case, Luke highlighted his problem with the Bitcoin network noting that miners can do whatever they want. For instance, he said, they (miners) cannot be expected to mine the assets or complete validations of transactions they don’t want to. Instead, miners can choose what to or not work on. Based on the developer, decentralization comes in where another miner can choose to work on what one has turned down. 

The developer highlighted that a party interested in a transaction could mine it for themselves in the worst-case scenario. He added that this can change and a transaction failed to be mined in the event of a spam attack.

Phishing attacker moves funds to a laundering address

 According to CertiK Alerts, crypto security tracker, a hacker account, “Fake_phishing7064”, recently sent funds to an Externally Owned Account(EOA) per Etherscan data. The EOA has moved over 100 ethereum (ETH) valued at $165k to Tornado Cash, a crypto mixer. 

Etherscan phishing attack

In a tweet on early Feb.4, 2023, CertiK Alert, the account appears to be moving funds, proceeds from various phishing attacks. As per the crypto security firm, the address moved 981 ETH in the last 97 days.

Lebanon Devalues its Currency by 90%, Snowden Believes Bitcoin Fixes This

 Lebanon’s paralyzing financial crisis highlights the need for a better and more reliable solution such as Bitcoin.

Lebanon is adopting a new official exchange rate, devaluing its local currency by nearly 90%. The new rate is set at 15,000 Lebanese pounds against the U.S. dollar, according to a January 31 report, which cited a statement from the country’s central bank governor, Riad Salameh.

This marks a significant shift from the old rate of 1,507 Lebanese pounds per dollar. The official Lebanese currency has been pegged to the dollar at that rate since 1997.

FTX Bankruptcy Filing Show Higher Cash Balance of $1.43B, Reduced Employees

The headcount declined by nearly 40% during the same period.

An interim financial update revealed that the FTX Group of companies undergoing bankruptcy proceedings held $1.43 billion in cash at the end of last year.

The court filing viewed by Bloomberg showed a higher cash balance on 31st December 2022 than a $1.24 billion tally as of 20th November.

Its now-defunct sister trading company, Alameda Research, recorded a cash balance of $876.6 million versus $401 million in November.

Toyota Taps Astar Network for Web3 Hackathon

Astar will develop the first Proof-of-Concept DAO tool for Toyota’s employees.

Japan’s largest conglomerate – Toyota Motor Corporation – will sponsor the world’s first global Web3 hackathon. Polkadot’s leading parachain, Astar Network, has been roped in to make Web3 use cases for Toyota’s employees.

According to the official press release shared with Crypto Beaver, the car giant is looking to embrace the Web3 space in a bid to improve the company’s operations. The latest online hackathon is expected to serve as an initial step in the process.

As part of the event, developers from around the world are invited. The theme will be to build an intra-company DAO support tool on the Astar Network to enable anyone to create teams, issue governance tokens, and vote without requiring them to understand the details of Web3.

While the multinational automotive manufacturer could use the tools developed during the hackathon for operational transparency and efficiency purposes. Astar Network, on the other hand, will offer the necessary environment for devs and will be tasked with product development support.

Digital Asset Inflows Hit $117M Last Week, Largest in Six Months

The report stated that investment products remain only 1.4% of total volumes on trusted crypto exchanges.

Digital-asset products saw inflows totaling $117 million last week, according to the crypto investment firm CoinShares. This marks the largest inflow recorded since July 2022.

Subsequently, the total asset under management (AuM) increased to $28 billion, recovering by 43% since the lows of November.

Bitcoin-tied investment funds alone recorded $116 million in inflows last week. Minor inflows into short-bitcoin of $4.4 million were also noted during the same time frame.