Evening News ｜ Central Bank Leads Removal of 13 Apps Related to Virtual Currency Trading; XEN Triggers Surge in Ethereum Gas Fees
Axie will launch a new bidding feature in Q1 next year to address the sniper bot issue; BUSD's market cap has surpassed 20 billion dollars.Organizer: flowie, Chain Catcher
"What Important Events Happened in the Last 24 Hours"
1. Central Bank Leads Multi-Department Joint Law Enforcement, 13 Virtual Currency Trading Apps Taken Down
In March this year, the Chaoyang Court provided relevant clues discovered during case hearings to the People's Bank of China and the Beijing Local Financial Supervision and Administration, and sent judicial recommendations for cleaning up virtual currency trading platforms. After receiving the judicial recommendations from the Chaoyang Court, the People's Bank of China communicated with the court multiple times and actively coordinated with relevant central and local functional departments to carry out disposal work.
On September 13, the People's Bank of China replied to the Chaoyang Court, stating that it had transferred the relevant clues to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, coordinating relevant departments to block and dispose of websites and apps, totaling 10 virtual currency exchange app download addresses, 1 virtual currency trading app, and 32 related domain names.
On September 21, the Beijing Local Financial Supervision and Administration replied, stating that it had interviewed the operating party of the involved website, ordering it to take down the illegal content immediately. Under the guidance of the People's Bank of China, it launched investigations and disposals of 227 suspected illegal enterprises in the virtual currency field across the city, working with the Municipal Communications Administration and the Municipal Cyberspace Administration to shut down 23 mainstream media websites related to virtual currency, 440 self-media accounts involved in virtual currency promotion and trading, took down 13 virtual currency trading apps, and controlled 25 keywords suspected of virtual currency speculation. The Beijing Banking and Insurance Regulatory Bureau guided 6 banks in the jurisdiction to investigate the personal accounts of 2 suspected virtual currency over-the-counter traders and take control measures such as restricting non-counter transactions and account closures. (Source link)
2. Messari Report: Polkadot Q3 Revenue Down 47%, Active Addresses Down 40%
Crypto analysis platform Messari recently released the Polkadot Q3 report, pointing out that the network has seen some declines in key ecosystem indicators, but its fundamental indicators, such as the number of validators, nominators, and staking ratio, remained stable over the past 90 days.
Specifically, Polkadot's revenue continued to decline in Q3, with total revenue of $115,326, a 47% decrease quarter-over-quarter; active addresses also saw a significant drop, with only 139,419 active accounts on Polkadot in Q3, a 40% decrease quarter-over-quarter. Additionally, the Messari report noted that since the beginning of this year, the total staking amount of DOT on the network has remained unchanged, with the ratio consistently between 54% and 59% over the first three quarters. (Source link)
3. Axie Infinity: New Bidding Feature to Address Sniping Bots Launching in Q1 2023
Axie Infinity officially announced that App.axie will launch a new feature called offers in Q1 2023 to address the issue of "sniping bots that automatically purchase axies priced incorrectly on the market." This feature allows users to make offers on any Axie, regardless of whether it is for sale. If the owner attempts to set the price below the offer, they will receive a warning and be reminded that there is already a higher offer. This will significantly reduce the number of Axies with pricing errors, thereby decreasing the opportunities for sniping bots. (Source link)
4. Cosmos Co-Founder: Hacker Faked Merkle Proof in BNB Chain Attack Incident Using RangeProof
Cosmos co-founder Ethan Buchman commented on the BNB Chain cross-chain bridge BSC Token Hub attack incident, stating that the key issue in this event was that the hacker was able to fake the Merkle proof. This should not have happened, as Merkle proofs are supposed to provide high integrity. Blockchain light clients (and IBC) are built on top of Merkle proofs, and many blockchains store data in Merkle trees, allowing for the generation of proofs that certain data is included in the tree.
The Cosmos chain uses a type of Merkle tree called IAVL, and the IAVL repository publicly exposed an API using a range proof called "RangeProof," but it turned out that there were serious flaws in the internal workings of RangeProof. The code issue with IAVL RangeProof is that it allows filling the Left and Right fields in the InnerNode, and the attacker essentially exploited the advantage of pasting unverified information into the Right field, which never affected the hash calculation, leading validators to believe that certain leaf nodes were part of the tree. As a result, they successfully faked the Merkle proof.
Buchman stated that while using RangeProof is not a good idea, there is a way to address this issue: preemptively rejecting proofs when any internal node has both left and right fields filled. For Merkle proofs in IBC, IBC does not use the built-in RangeProof system of the IAVL tree but instead uses the ICS23 standard to generate and verify Merkle proofs from the IAVL tree. The ICS23 code does not have this vulnerability and can explicitly "reject" RangeProof. (Source link)
5. X2Y2 Launches Peer-to-Peer NFT Lending Feature
NFT trading market X2Y2 has launched a peer-to-peer NFT lending feature. Users holding whitelisted project NFTs can borrow ETH by collateralizing their NFTs, thereby releasing liquidity for NFT assets. Lending can be priced differentially based on rarity.
As of now, the whitelisted projects include BAYC, Azuki, Doodles, Otherdeed for Otherside, etc., and the platform has completed 10 lending transactions. (Source link)
6. Data: BUSD Market Cap Surpasses $20 Billion, Ranking Third Among Stablecoins
Currently, BUSD's market cap has surpassed $20 billion, ranking third among stablecoins. BUSD is issued by Paxos at a 1:1 ratio and has been approved by the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), making it a safe and compliant stablecoin. (Source link)
7. NFT Pricing Protocol Waterfall Completes $4 Million Seed Round Financing, Led by Electric Capital and Pantera Capital
NFT pricing protocol Waterfall announced the completion of a $4 million seed round financing, led by Electric Capital and Pantera Capital. The funds will primarily be used to expand the team and build NFT trading and pricing protocols.
It is reported that Waterfall aims to provide price discovery for all NFTs through methods that determine fair prices; by allowing people to trade NFTs without having to acquire the entire NFT, it releases more liquidity for NFT trading. (Source link)
"What Exciting Articles Are Worth Reading in the Last 24 Hours"
1. "A Conversation with Ankr Founder: How Far Are We from 'Web3 Version of AWS'?"
Without nodes, there is no blockchain, and building node infrastructure is crucial for the development of Web3.
Since Ethereum announced its transition to a PoS mechanism, the rapid growth of various public chain ecological applications has led to an increasing demand from users for the ability to run a node conveniently and at low cost. Ankr co-founder & CEO Chandler Song revealed in an interview, "Since Ankr focused on PoS infrastructure, the total API request volume has increased nearly 25 times in a year."
Recently, Chandler Song was interviewed by Chain Catcher, discussing the development history of the node ecosystem, his understanding of the industry's centralization issues, and the next wave of development trends in the industry.
2. "The 'Living Conditions' of the Crypto World: Monks, Believers, and Scammers"
To the outside world, cryptocurrency is just a corner of the internet, filled with scams and schemes. But Bankless has a different view of cryptocurrency: a land full of opportunities, a new frontier, a digital world built on free and open-source software that enables us to break the monopolies of Wall Street and Silicon Valley.
This article introduces the "concentric circles model of the crypto industry," explaining why so many people outside of crypto perceive this industry as a scam.
On the morning of October 9, Ethereum gas prices suddenly surged, with Ethereum browsers showing 200 gwei. Tracing its source, it turned out that various social media and communities were continuously minting, spreading, and discussing the project XEN Crypto.
Why did XEN Crypto explode overnight in the Chinese community? This article will outline the philosophy, design mechanism, reward acquisition methods, and future development projections of XEN.
