Značka: Telegram

Telegram founder wants to build new decentralized tools to combat power abuse

Telegram is set to build a set of decentralized tools, including noncustodial wallets and decentralized exchanges, said founder Pavel Durov via his Telegram channel on Nov. 30.The initiative is a response to the recent FTX collapse, said Durov, as the industry wound up concentrated in the “hands of a few to abuse their power. As a result, a lot of people lost their money when FTX, one of the largest exchanges, went bankrupt.” The announcement comes weeks after the launch of Fragment, a decentralized auction platform for unique usernames based on The Open Network, or TON, layer-1 blockchain. According to Durov, Fragment has seen $50 million in usernames sold in less than a month.Besides founding Telegram and Fragment, Durov was also behind the first official version of the TON blockchain. Regarding the new decentralized tools being developed, he said:”The solution is clear: blockchain-based projects should go back to their roots – decentralization. Cryptocurrency users should switch to trustless transactions and self-hosted wallets that don’t rely on any single third party.”Durov also remarked on the inefficiencies of legacy platforms, specifically mentioning Ethereum, “which unfortunately remains outdated and expensive even after its recent tweaks.” He went on to say:”The time when the inefficiencies of legacy platforms justified centralization should be long gone. With technologies like TON reaching their potential, the blockchain industry should be finally able to deliver on its core mission – giving the power back to the people.”Related: Telegram username auction marketplace ‘almost’ ready to launchThe most recent tool released by Telegram’s team, Fragment, was built in five weeks with five people working on the solution, according to Durov. The idea was first floated in late August, with the team aiming to use “NFT-like smart contracts” to auction highly sought-after usernames. Fragment launched shortly after the TON Foundation launched the TON DNS, allowing users to assign human-readable names to crypto wallets, smart contracts and websites.

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TON Telegram integration highlights synergy of blockchain community

As a result of a recent upgrade to the wallet bot, users of the Telegram app are now able to purchase and sell cryptocurrencies without leaving the application. The wallet bot was developed by The Open Network (TON, formerly Telegram Open Network) in April. The bot initially enabled users to buy, sell and trade Toncoin (TON) within the Telegram app, but a new update has added a fully functioning cryptocurrency wallet to the application.An independent team of TON developers created the wallet bot to simplify crypto transactions for Telegram users. A representative from the TON Foundation told Cointelegraph, “The creation of the wallet bot is handled by an independent development team, and we are certainly happy that more and more projects are choosing TON as the basis for creating new products,” continuing to say:“TON is intended for millions of users, and one of our goals is to make the use of blockchain no more complicated than using applications that users are used to.”The wallet bot also serves as a fiat on-ramp, allowing users to buy TON using their credit cards within the Telegram app. The currently supported fiat currencies for buying and selling Toncoin are United States dollars, euros, Ukrainian hryvnia, Belarusian rubles and Kazakhstani tenge.Regarding transactions within Telegram, the exchange service that facilitates them also functions as a guarantee and resolves any required conflicts that may arise between the two parties involved in the transaction. The other party may carry out the transactions in complete anonymity; nevertheless, users must provide the bot with their cell phone numbers before participating in any cryptocurrency-related activities made accessible by the application. Recent: Bitcoin miners look to software to help balance the Texas gridThe wallet bot doesn’t charge any fees for buying crypto through Telegram, but sellers will be charged a commission fee equivalent to 0.9% of the selling price for each complete transaction. Currently, the app can only be used to purchase Toncoin (TON) and Bitcoin (BTC). However, the TON Foundation plans to expand the number of cryptocurrencies available for purchase. In addition, in order to transfer crypto through the peer-to-peer functionality on Telegram, users need to register with The Open Network.When transferring crypto to another person, users send the coins to the recipient’s Telegram handle instead of their address. The TON Foundation representative highlighted this feature, saying, “The @wallet bot team is making great strides in this direction, as you can now buy, exchange, and send Toncoin to your contacts without leaving Telegram. There is no need for long addresses or special applications. We think that the future lies in projects like this.”History of Telegram and The Open NetworkTelegram Messenger grew massively in popularity within the crypto community due to its encrypted messaging and ability to create group chats. The bot functionality also makes automating tasks within the groups and chats easier. For example, bots can ban users, respond to questions and link users to useful resources for a project. In 2017, Telegram began monetization plans for the application since it did not use ads. As part of this plan, Telegram Open Network, or The Open Network, was founded by Telegram founders Pavel and Nikolai Durov, and the white paper was released in January 2018. The Open Network was developed as a platform for decentralized apps and an alternative payment processing network to major networks like Visa. To raise funds for the development of TON, Telegram held a private sale for the GRAM, which investors could exchange for the TON token when launched. However, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission would later class the token sale as an unregistered securities offering. As a result, Telegram decided to end its active involvement with TON in 2020. On June 11, 2020, Telegram and the SEC reached a deal in which Telegram agreed to reimburse $1.22 billion as a termination fee in GRAM purchase agreements and pay an $18.5 million penalty to the SEC. Telegram also agreed to provide the SEC prior notice if the company planned to sell any digital assets during the next three years.On May 7, 2020, Free TON was launched as an independent venture to continue the development of the Telegram Open Network, using the freely available source code. The community later grew to over 30,000 members by January 2021, and the Telegram team later transferred the ton.org domain and GitHub repository to the TON Foundation by August 4, 2021.The TON foundation has assumed responsibility for the Telegram token’s underlying cryptocurrency (TON). Before this, users of the apps collaborated on a fundraising effort for the cause. As a result, they contributed more than $1 billion to the growth of the TON ecosystem, which was made possible by their donations.What the future holds for TON and TelegramIt is possible that the TON Foundation’s new Telegram bot update may pave the way for a global cryptocurrency payments service. Furthermore, since the app has over 500 million active users globally, it can act as a catalyst for further crypto adoption if the wallet bot proves to be popular.When asked about the future of Telegram and The Open Network, a TON Foundation representative told Cointelegraph, “Telegram is a user-friendly platform for everyone in the Web3 world — both for communication and developing products using their disruptive technologies. Furthermore, the open platform allows developers to create working products with real-world use cases that can be deployed in the app.” “The wallet bot, based on TON, is a great example of this. There are also many services on Telegram that already use TON, such as donate, mobile and others,” they stated, adding, “A significant development is the launch of the Telegram username auction, which is a great demonstration of how the simplicity of tokenization on TON can open up many real-world examples of the use of blockchain technology.”As well as the wallet bot, The Open Network has developed additional Telegram bots that serve different purposes. The donate bot allows creators to post messages that accept donations via special action buttons that will facilitate a payment process within the Telegram application. The process works by a user contacting the donate bot and following the instructions. Recent: FTX’s collapse could change crypto industry governance standards for goodThe user will also have to add the bot as an administrator on the channel and submit payout information so they can receive the donations. The mobile bot allows users to access the internet when Wi-Fi is unavailable. The Telegram username auction allows users to purchase and auction off their Telegram handles for TON tokens.The recent update to Telegram’s wallet bot can open up a wider range of the public to using cryptocurrency. It can also further solidify Telegram’s reputation as one of the go-to apps for blockchain-based projects seeking to build a community, especially if additional tokens are added to the platform. Telegram already has a lot of the crypto community using the application, and the ability to buy and transfer crypto could bring non-crypto users into the market.

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FTX website comes back online with message advising against deposits

Financially-troubled crypto exchange FTX has brought its website back online following a period of intermittent downtime — with the trading platform now sporting a banner confirming withdrawals are halted and advising users against depositing.The FTX website returned online at approximately 9:00 pm UTC  on Nov. 9, after encountering five separate periods of network downtime spanning over two hours, according to the “IS IT DOWN OR JUST ME” website.The crypto community on Twitter has also noticed a new bright red banner that can be seen throughout the website that reads: “FTX is currently unable to process withdrawals. We strongly advise against depositing.”FTX’s notification on deposits and withdrawals on the trading platform. Source: FTX.comA pinned message on the official FTX Telegram Group on Nov. 8 also confirmed the halting of withdrawals, without any estimates about when they would return. “We are waiting for confirmation from our team to ramp it up. Right now we dont have an ETA but surely will communicate it as soon as we have it,” a member of FTX support staff wrote in the message. Attempting to sign up for a new account on the website also comes with an alert that “signups are paused” at this current time, Cointelegraph has discovered.This suggests that deposits, while “strongly advised against,” are only accessible to those who have existing accounts on the trading platform.[embedded content]Meanwhile, two websites linked to the crypto exchange including Alameda Research and FTX Ventures remain down at the time of writing.Related: Binance’s victory over FTX means more users moving away from central exchangesIt comes amid an ongoing liquidity crisis being faced by the crypto exchange. A Nov. 9 report from the Wall Street Journal claims that the exchange is facing a shortfall of $8 billion, and is unable to meet withdrawal demands without emergency funding.Binance initially signed a non-binding letter of intent to buy out the embattled exchange but pulled out less than 48 hours later, citing the mishandling of customer funds and alleged U.S. agency investigations as the reasons for its change in decision.Google search results for “FTX website” also saw a large spike over the last few hours following the reports that the FTX website was intermittently going down, according to Google Trends:Google searches for “FTX website'” over the last seven days. Source: Google Trends

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Russia's Central Bank report examines crypto's place in the financial system

The Central Bank of Russia (CBR) is looking at ways to integrate crypto assets and blockchain technology into its local financial system amid a pile-on of global financial sanctions.In a Telegram post by the CBR on Nov. 7, the central bank shared a public consultation report titled “Digital Assets in Russian Federation.” It considers how the sanction-hit state may possibly open up its domestic market to foreign issuers of digital assets — particularly those from “friendly countries.”Other areas of focus in the report are digital asset regulation, retail investor protections, digital property rights related to smart contracts and tokenization, as well as reformed accounting and taxation proposals.The CBR stated that it strongly supports the “further development of digital technologies” provided they don’t create “uncontrollable” financial or cybersecurity risks for consumers. Despite the nascency of blockchain technology, CBR said the same regulatory rules concerning the issuance and circulation of traditional financial instruments should also extend to digital assets. The CBR said regulation over the short term should focus on protecting investor rights, strengthen rules for admitting a digital asset into circulation, ensuring the issuer is accredited and ensuring the issuer discloses all relevant information to investors.The Central Bank’s message on Telegram, originally written in Russian, said while the legal framework for digital assets has been created, improved regulation is required for its continued development. “Russia has created the necessary legal framework for the issuance and circulation of digital assets […] But so far the market is at the initial stage of its development […] and is many times inferior to the market of traditional financial instruments. Its further development requires improved regulation.”As for smart contract regulation, the central bank acknowledged that a legislative framework was already in effect — however, it proposes that Russian-created smart contracts be independently audited before being deployed.CBR was also positive about the potential for tokenized off-chain assets. However, the bank noted that legislation would need to be put in place to ensure a “legal connection” exists between the token holder and the token itself.Related: Russian officials approve use of crypto for cross-border payments: ReportThe report comes as the Russian Ministry of Finance recently approved the use of cryptocurrencies as a cross-border payment method by Russian residents on Sept. 22.However, the CBR’s 33-page report made no reference to the increase in sanctions that have been imposed on Russia and the crippling effect it has had on its economy — nor did it discuss the Russia-Ukraine War that is currently taking place in Ukraine. It however mentions a separate report it is working on, which focuses on Russia’s new central bank digital currency (CBDC) — the digital ruble —which is expected to be piloted in early 2023.In Aug. 2022, The CBR stated that they plan on rolling out the digital ruble to all Russian-based banks in 2024.

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