Block 860512: Important News of the Week

Tik tok, next block. Grateful for all the support No Bullshit Bitcoin has received lately. September is already the best month we've had in two years since the launch of our Geyser campaign. Huge shoutout to everyone who's supporting the project – it keeps us in check, accountable, and going.

We're pumped for what's coming next, and hope you are too. Freedom tech is not just hope. It's a whole new playing field. Onward.

News

• X banned in Brazil, citizens accessing it via VPNs threatened with a $8,874 daily fine. Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes suspended Elon Musk's social media platform X in Brazil after it missed a 24-hour deadline to appoint a local representative. The judge ordered internet providers and app stores to block X within five days, and the platform will stay blocked until it complies. Users or companies accessing X via virtual private networks (VPNs) will face daily fines of 50,000 reais (~$8,874). X has clashed with de Moraes over its refusal to block users as ordered.
• Telegram changes private group rules as Durov comes out with a public statement. On Thursday night, Telegram expanded its moderation to private chats. Users can now "flag illegal content" for review in these chats, as stated on its updated FAQ page. Previously, Telegram treated private groups as off-limits.

• At the same time, Telegram founder Pavel Durov made his first public statement following his arrest in France. He referred to the arrest as surprising, noting that French authorities had "numerous ways to reach [him] to request assistance." He also announced a personal goal to improve moderation on the platform.
• Telegram also holds ~$400m worth of cryptocurrency. A Financial Times report shows the messaging platform earned $342.5 million in 2023 but had a $108 million operating loss. About 40% of revenue came from digital assets, with $130 million from the integrated wallet and $17.8 million from collectible sales. Telegram holds nearly $400 million in digital assets on its balance sheet, over half of its $774.2 million in total assets.

• Only three examples of 'illicit Tornado Cash use' were cited by the US Treasury. In an appeal hearing on Tuesday, U.S. Circuit Judge Kurt Engelhardt noted that, out of millions of transactions, the agency found only three instances of money laundering using Tornado Cash, questioning why the existing designations for North Korea were insufficient to achieve the agency's purpose, reports Law360. U.S. Circuit Judge Edith Jones also expressed skepticism about the Treasury's categorization of Tornado Cash as sanctionable entity, noting that North Korea could still use the protocol, regardless of whether the sanctions were in place or not.
  • In fact, just earlier this week, there were reports that the hacker entity which stole over $230 million in user assets from the Indian crypto exchange WazirX started to move funds through Tornado Cash in an attempt to obfuscate the trail of funds.
• WazirX customers to lose at least 43% of funds held at the exchange. The Indian exchange users may lose over 40% of their funds after a $234 million hack in July. George Gwee of restructuring firm Kroll informed journalists that the best-case scenario is a return of 55% to 57% of the funds.
• 'Opt-in' Chat Control blitz in EU. The EU Council may soon endorse a controversial draft law on chat control, previously delayed after protests. According to a report by Contexte, the Hungarian Presidency proposes making AI searches for unknown material voluntary instead of mandatory, while still requiring bulk automated searches of private and encrypted chats for illegal content. Users who opt out of "upload moderation" would be blocked from sending or receiving images, videos, and URLs. Private messengers like Signal and Threema have stated they would cease services in the EU if forced to implement such monitoring.
  • If there are no preventive actions from the public, the regulation will likely be endorsed on December 12-13, 2024, warns Lyudmyla Kozlovska. The exact details of the Hungarian proposal have been leaked by Contexte.

• Bull Bitcoin launched in France. The exchange recently acquired Bitcoin Lyon, one of France's oldest brokers. "Our mission is to equip you with the tools to reclaim your freedom and sovereignty. It started more than 10 years ago in Canada, continued in Costa Rica, and now we open a new chapter in our fight against central bankers, alongside the French people," the company stated in a blog post.
• Re-launch of the Bitcoin Product Community. "After a year hiatus, we are excited to re-launch our community activities with a series of interviews focused on Bitcoin product contributors whom we connected to Bitcoin projects last year," announced the project.
• Business adoption of Bitcoin grew 30% in a year. A report by River finds that businesses hold 3.3% of Bitcoinʼs total supply, or 683,332 BTC, as of August 18, 2024. It has grown by 587% since June 30th, 2020, and by 30% in the last twelve months.

• The report finds that five companies—MicroStrategy, Block.one, Tether, BitMEX, and Xapo—hold a total of 559,000 BTC, which accounts for 82% of all corporate holdings. Based on publicly available information, private companies hold at least 23,000 BTC more than public ones.
• The number of publicly traded companies with Bitcoin holdings grew by 40% from September 2023 to August 2024.
• River estimates that "business bitcoin holdings will grow at a rate of between 204 and 519 BTC per day until the year 2026, equivalent to a range of $12.2 million and $31.1 million per day at a $60,000 bitcoin price."
• August was the worst month of 2024 in terms of profitability for bitcoin miners, reports Atlas21. In August, miners' revenue hit $827.56 million—a 10.5% drop from July’s $927.35 million but 5% higher than August 2023. Compared to $1.93 billion in March 2024, it's a 57% decline. Miners produced 13,843 BTC in August, down from 14,725 BTC in July, mostly due to lower transaction volumes and increased mining difficulty. Transaction fees accounted for just about 2% of the block reward last month.

• Nine bitcoin miners stop operating in Paraguay following power fee hikes. The National Electricity Administration (ANDE) suspended multiple mining operations due to non-payment of their invoices following new financial policies raising miner energy costs by 9-16%. Fernando Arriola of the Paraguayan Fintech Chamber warned this could render the country irrelevant in the industry. Some companies are already considering relocating to Brazil.
  • The country has managed to attract over 60 bitcoin mining sites in the last three years. ANDE generates some ~$12 million a month from mining activities.
• Galaxy Digital to aid bankrupt bitcoin miner Rhodium. Rhodium Enterprises, a distressed bitcoin miner with 5.6 EH/s under management, received court approval for a loan of up to $30 million in cash or 500 BTC from Galaxy Digital. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on August 25th and sought debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing. The DIP loan carries a 14.5% interest rate for cash or 9.5% for a bitcoin loan, a novel approach in bankruptcy cases.
• Blockstream Mining is raising third round for its hashrate token. The hashrate-backed note lets investors lock in the hashprice for up to four years. Priced at $31,000, it gives investors a share of the bitcoin produced by the mining company. The first two rounds of the BMN notes raised a total of around $7 million, reports CoinDesk.
• Nigerian court postpones decision on Gambaryan bail application. A Nigerian court deferred bail for Binance's Head of Compliance, Tigran Gambaryan, whose health has worsened since his jailing earlier this year, a family spokesperson told CoinDesk. The next hearing is set for October 9. Gambaryan, along with Nadeem Anjarwalla and Binance, faces charges of laundering $35 million and separate tax evasion accusations.

• Nigerian SEC approves several local exchanges in a push for regulation. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in Nigeria announced Approval in Principle (AIP) to two cryptocurrency exchanges under its Accelerated Regulatory Incubation Program (ARIP) and admitted five other Digital Assets Firms into its Regulatory Incubation (RI) program. The institution added that all firms that lack a license are operating illegally and advised the public to refrain from using such platforms and services.
• Japan mulls tax cuts for digital assets. Japan's Financial Services Agency is considering taxing Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as financial assets. Currently, crypto profits are taxed as income, with high earners facing up to 45%, while financial securities have a flat 20% capital gains tax.
• Qatar has released a regulatory framework for digital assets. The Qatar Financial Centre (QFC) in Doha has introduced a regulatory framework for digital assets amid rising cryptocurrency activities in the region.

"The QFC Digital Assets Framework 2024 establishes the legal and regulatory foundation for digital assets, including the process of tokenization, legal recognition of property rights in tokens and their underlying assets, custody arrangements, transfer, and exchange.  The framework also provides for the legal recognition of smart contracts," QFC said on Sunday.

• Robinhood fined $3.9 million for not allowing cryptocurrency withdrawals. Between 2018 and 2022, Robinhood restricted cryptocurrency operations to buying and selling, without permitting customers to withdraw their digital assets. The California Department of Justice claims that this practice violated state commodity laws by allowing purchases but blocking direct ownership transfers.
• More Bitcoin miner state seizures:
  • Russia: The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the Irkutsk region raided Priangarye, an agricultural community, confiscating 238 Bitcoin mining machines. Authorities allege the miners caused over 68 million rubles (about $758,000) in damages by using electricity meant for domestic use.
  • Thailand: Authorities raided an illegal Bitcoin mine west of Bangkok after residents complained of frequent blackouts for over a month. Bitcoin miners are considered manufacturers and must pay taxes, but illegal mining has been increasing for years.
  • Paraguay: The National Power Administration (ANDE) recently discovered an illegal Bitcoin mining operation in an evangelical church. Last week, ANDE and local police dismantled a massive illegal mining farm near Hernandarias, seizing nearly 700 machines and a transformer.

• Actual Nostr billboard in the Netherlands. In what may a first, Nostr user Sebastix put up a real Nostr ad besides the A58 highway in The Netherlands. It will be displayed from September 2 to September 16, 2024. The campaign was inspired by Spiral's hypothetical 2024 hack week billboard project, and materials used are available here.
• Turkey's oldest exchange BtcTurk integrates Lightning Network. The exchange now supports both Lightning deposits and withdrawals. Withdrawals are currently free of charge, said the platform.
• Switzerland‘s fourth-largest bank launched Bitcoin trading. Zürcher Kantonalbank (ZKB) has launched bitcoin trading and custody services. The bank has partnered with Crypto Finance AG for trading and is developing an in-house solution for custody, reports Atlas21.
• Mercuryo launches a Bitcoin debit Mastercard for payments from personal wallets. The euro-denominated Spend card, issued by Quicko, bridges personal use wallets and traditional payment rails and comes with additional KYC and AML verification. Spend supports spending with over 40 cryptocurrencies at over 100 million merchants in the Mastercard network, converting funds to fiat automatically.
  • "At Mastercard, we are working closely with partners to innovate and enhance the self-custody wallet experience," said Christian Rau, senior vice president of Mastercard’s crypto and fintech division. According to a recent blog post, Mastercard works facilitate self-custody experiences because many users want to avoid centralized exchanges in the first place.
• Older YubiKeys vulnerable to sophisticated cloning attacks. YubiKeys with firmware versions before 5.7 (released in May) are vulnerable to sophisticated cloning attacks, researchers revealed. Firmware updates are not possible, leaving affected YubiKeys permanently at risk. The attack requires $11,000 in equipment and advanced electrical and cryptographic knowledge, likely limiting it to nation-states or similar entities in targeted scenarios. The risk of widespread attacks is extremely low.
• North Korean hackers to target Bitcoin ETFs. The FBI warns that North Korean cyber actors are increasingly targeting decentralized finance and cryptocurrency company workers to steal funds through "complex and elaborate" social engineering campaigns. Over the past several months, hackers have researched targets related to cryptocurrency ETFs, indicating possible future attacks.
• B-ONLY 2024 Conference is a three-day Bitcoin event taking place 'at the heart of the Alps.' It will be held on November 9-11, 2024. Get your tickets here.
• bitcoin++ news. The eCash edition is set to take place in Berlin on October 11-13 at w3 hub. The event date has been moved back one day. The Hack + Beach edition will take place in Florianopolis, Feb 19-22, 2025 (no venue yet). The Mempools edition is set to happen in Austin, Texas May 7 - 9, 2025 at the Palmer Event Center. Secure your tickets here.

Updates and releases

• Core Lightning (CLN) v24.08 has been officially announced. BOLT12 offers now support self-payments and blinded paths. The pay plugin has enhanced capacity checks, error handling, and logging. Renepay plugin updates include a probability cost function and exclude option for better routing control. The update also brings improvements in I/O optimization, documentation, gossipd, and reckless.
• Strike integrated support for BOLT 12 payments. "Our initial integration only supports a basic Offer payment flow. However, it paves the way for exciting and more advanced BOLT 12 features over time," said the company.
• Mutiny announced a timeline for shutting down its wallet services. Users are urged to host the app themselves, move funds out and close open lightning channels.

• Blixt Wallet v7.0.0 has been released. It updates LND to v0.18.2, fixes syncing issues in Neutrino SPV, adds new syncing nodes in different regions around the world, makes Lightning Box payable via <pubkey>@blixtwallet.com, adds a dropdown menu to Lightning channels screen and ability to hide amounts in the Overview screen. It also introduces support for fee bumping on channel openings, and Speedloader is now enabled by default for all new wallets.
• Cashu Dev Kit (CDK) v0.3.0 adds LNbits, Strike API, and LND as supported Lightning backends for the mints. The Strike API supports both bitcoin denomination as well as fiat currency.
• DLC Dev Kit in an application tool kit that makes it easier to build DLC apps with rust-dlc and BDK. Application developers just need to plug in their own components for communication, contract storage, and oracle clients, and DLC Dev Kit handles the rest, writes the developer.
• LDK v0.0.124 is up on crates.io. It features a new crate structure, numerous requested features, many BOLT 12 improvements, faster route-finding, and several bug fixes. Releases in other languages are expected to follow soon, according to the developers.
• Breez SDK Liquid v0.3.0 is here. This new release includes LNURL-Pay support, Go & C# bindings, background receive via mobile notifications, new API features, optimizations, and fixes.
• LNDK v0.2.0 now allows paying BOLT 12 offers with blinded paths. Users need to run the LNDK binary alongside LND to make payments. Instructions for the sending part can be found here.
• Zaprite added virtual Point-of-Sale (POS) terminal integration for enhanced in-person payments experience that complements the platform's suite of online merchant tools.

• Fedi App v1.19.0 adds Tagalog language support, improves eCash UX when joined to multiple communities, and includes several bug fixes.
• Phoenix Android v2.3.7 introduces support for custom 6-digits PIN code specific to Phoenix. It can replace or coexist with the user's ScreenLock.
  • Phoenix iOS v2.3.3 brings compatibility improvements for BOLT12 payments.
• Mempool v3.0.0 is now available on startOS.
• Alby Hub v1.7.2 update introduces a new Friends & Family app in the app store, designed for onboarding friends and family. Other updates include a receive-only PoS app, the ability to pay to Lightning addresses, a new savings balance withdrawal UI, and displaying pending balances from closed channels. Mac users also benefit from several desktop app fixes and a new server build.
• Alby Go - a simple mobile Lightning wallet interface and a companion app for Alby Hub users is now available for testing.
• Lipa Wallet iOS v0.6.29 is here. Lipa is a user-friendly, self-custodial Lightning wallet designed for simplicity and ease of use. The latest release adds support for telephone numbers (allowing you to send Bitcoin to your contacts via phone numbers), the ability to connect to a local address book, improved customer feedback, as well as bug fixes and other improvements.
  • The Lipa Wallet is currently available in Europe, with a global rollout planned. An Android app release is also in the making.
• Nunchuk mobile apps Android (v1.9.50) and iOS (v1.9.53) ship with new and improved Coin Collection settings, a refactored sign-in flow, and other bug fixes and improvements.
• A beta version of Foundation Passport firmware v2.3.2 is now available for testing. It adds support for ephemeral seeds, the ability to sign messages via QR code, and a connection flow for Fully Noded.
• BlueWallet v7.0.3 adds a camera flip image feature, the ability to hide balance and delete wallets from the Manage Screen, and several fixes.

• Fountain v1.1.2 is now live on iOS and Android. It comes with a many bug fixes and improvements around the project's recent Nostr integration.
• RGB v0.11 beta 8 marks the start of the pre-release code freeze for the project. The new beta comes with a several bug fixes and completion of previous epics related to the data persistence and better eltoo support. You can read all about it here.
• BitAxe Viewer Extension v1.2 adds new stats and makes it easier to navigate to the device's UI.
• Braiins OS v24.08 comes with support for Antminer S19 XP Hydro and Antminer T21 models. It also extends underclocking on Antminer S19 XP models and includes various bug fixes and UI improvements. Users with BHB68603 and BHB68603P hashboards can now find compatibility with Braiins OS.
• New and improved Krux Installer v0.0.2-alpha is here. It comes with macOS support, ten languages, support for seven devices, a settings page, and more.
• Live Wallet v0.6.0, an app for estimating the effect of bitcoin transaction fees on invididual UTOXs and transactions containing multiple UTXOs, comes with improved fee estimation and bug fixes.
• Tankred Hase introduced StashPay, a personal Bitcoin wallet for freelancers and digital nomads built on Lightning and Liquid with Liquid SDK by Breez. It integrates with Zaprite, and is available for testing on iOS TestFlight.
• Jippi, a new interactive Bitcoin education app for beginners to earn and learn about Bitcoin with others, is now available for download on both Android and iOS.
• Gifbuddy.lol, a GIF companion app for Nostr clients, now lets you upload your own GIFs, loads more search results, and works faster.

• 0xchat v1.3.1, a secure chat app built on the Nostr protocol, incorporates all changes from the previous beta versions. New features include better handling of microphone access, support for voice calls in the background, multi-account switching, and more.
  • 0xchat v1.3.2 fixes several issues and adds a "remove photo" feature for profile settings.
• Amethyst v0.90.5 comes with an Orbot fix and a number of other fixes introduced in v0.90.4. Amethyst v0.90.6 implements a zap amount fix on profile zaps, along with a few other improvements.
• Getwired.app is an anon agora built on the Nostr protocol to facilitate 'unstoppable free speech on the internet.' It also uses Proof-of-Work (PoW) mechanism to prevent spam.
• Zapin.me v0.1.0 has been released. It is an open-source platform where users can pin messages on a global map, with visibility determined by the amount of sats paid via the Lightning Network.
• Orqestra is a regulated tool for bitcoin business operators that allows them to convert a portion of their sales revenue to bitcoin.
• strfry v0.9.7 and v1.0.0-beta2 have been released. The former brings bug fixes and other changes that accumulated in master branch, including a "strfry export --fried" feature that can be used to create DB exports that can be rapidly imported in the v1.0.0 series releases. The latter is a release candidate for  strfry v1.0.0. Help is needed with testing, said the developer.
• Yeghro.site provides a simple tool for unfollowing inactive npubs on Nostr.
• SimpleX Chat v6.0.4 aims to reduce traffic and battery usage on unstable networks.
• Ginger Wallet v2.0.11, a fork of Wasabi Wallet that screens CoinJoin input transactions via a chain surveillance company, added 2FA functionality with an option to apply local encryption to wallet files when 2FA is enabled.
• noStrudel v0.40.0 is here. It brings NIP-49 encrypted nsec support, blindspot feeds that show what others are seeing in their timeline, NIP-42 relay authentication, WASM relay and event verification, threaded tabs, support for Wiki articles, Blossom uploads, task manager, and finishes the platform's launchpad.

• Nuts.Cash is an experimental ecash web wallet that saves your proofs in the Nostr protocol, meaning that if you have a Nostr account, you can use it to login to Nuts.Cash and access your nuts.
• lnwCash is a free and open-source Cashu wallet (and progressive web app) over Nostr, utilizing NIP-60 and nutzaps (NIP-61). Support the project's development here.
• Coinos.io, a custodial yet free and open-source Bitcoin, Lightning and Liquid web wallet with Nostr integration, added eCash support via the Cashu protocol.
• Bitkey App now lets you view the current Bitcoin price and historical performance in the app. Firmware updates now include a link to view the release notes.
• Citrine v0.4.3, a local Nostr relay for Android, now allows changing NIP-11 information in the settings.
• Angor is a crowdfunding platform built on Bitcoin and Nostr. You can test it here.
• Bee Evolved announced M.O.E.M. (Mining Operation Environmental Monitor), a device that provides comprehensive monitoring for mining operations' environments.

• shinigami is a Bitcoin Script library for generic Script VM execution in Cairo, enabling the generation of STARK proofs for Bitcoin Script computation and Bitcoin transaction execution.
• Tor Browser v13.5.3 brings important security updates to Firefox.
• Arti v1.2.7, a next-generation Tor client in Rust, adds support for restricted discovery mode in Arti's hidden service implementation, and contains a number of bug fixes, cleanups, improvements, behind the scenes work on the RPC subsystem, DoS resistance, and relay infrastructure.
• Stacker.news issued a small release for detecting and displaying video links in a player, along with a few other fixes.
• Boltz Client v2.1.5, a tool for fully unattended channel rebalancing via Boltz API, is another patch release with some minor fixes and improvements.
• Amber v1.3.7, a nostr event signer for Android, fixes connection to the push notification server and adds more event descriptions.
• CalyxOS, a privacy-friendly mobile OS for Android devices, released a September security update.
• GrapheneOS v2024090400 is a September security patch update for the privacy and security-focused mobile operating system.

Guides and research

• Peter Todd compiled a comprehensive overview of soft-fork and covenant-dependent layer 2 proposals, including Ark, LN-Symmetry, Validity Rollups, BitVM, CTV, SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT, LNHANCE, OP_TXHASH, OP_CAT, Consensus Cleanup, and others.

• Rearden wrote a reasonable breakdown of threat models in relation to the Dark Skippy vulnerability.
• Bitcoin Optech #319 covers a proposal for allowing Stratum v2 pool miners to receive compensation for the transaction fees contained in the block templates they turn into shares, a research fund investigating OP_CAT, and a discussion about mitigating Merkle tree vulnerabilities with or without a soft fork.
• Greg Walker wrote a basic introduction to Schnorr Signatures in Bitcoin.

• The Lightning Dev Kit team published a case study on how Alby Hub uses LDK to provide a self-custodial Lightning experience.
• Jameson Lopp his thoughts on why duress wallets are an unreliable defense against attackers.
• Bitvocation published a Bitcoin Job Market update for August 2024. Get the latest insights here.
• M. K. Fain published a blog post on how to join Nostr in Brazil. Cobrafuma is a freshly launched Brazilian community on Nostr.
• Matthew Mezinskis put together the 25th monetary base update for Q2 2024. Get all the latest insights here.
• A report by Blockware Intelligence dives into the dynamic relationship between price and hashrate throughout the market cycle.

Mining stats

• Bitcoin's hashrate has been hitting new highs lately, reaching up to ~746 EH/s at certain times. The average (7-day SMA) network hashrate is currently ~650 EH/s.

Lightning stats

• Lightning Network capacity has been on the rise lately, although the number of active nodes and channels remains relatively unchanged.

Nostr stats

• Nostr daily active user numbers have finally surpassed 20,000 in the last couple of weeks. The number of weekly active users has exceeded 50,000 lately, per nostr.band stats.
• According to primal.net user count, close to 50,000 new users joined the protocol last week.

• What did we miss? DM us on Nostr.
• Do you want more? Subscribe and get No Bullshit GM report straight to your mailbox.