PayPal’s embrace of cryptocurrencies appears to be growing after the payments provider revealed that it will allow users to withdraw their digital assets to third-party wallets. The news, which was reported by Reuters Wednesday afternoon, comes just seven months after PayPal first enabled crypto purchases on its platform. At the time, the decision was heralded as a major milestone in mainstream recognition of digital assets. The Wednesday announcement means PayPal users will be able to send their cryptocurrencies to other wallets instead of just holding it on PayPal or selling it into fiat currency for withdrawal. However, neither Reuters nor …

Digital currency exchange Coinbase has announced a new browser extension for its native wallet, enabling users to more easily connect to decentralized applications and decentralized finance directly on their desktop. The Coinbase Wallet browser extension is now available on Google Chrome, the company announced Monday. Coinbase Wallet lead Sid Coelho-Prabhu said that more than 1 million Coinbase Wallet customers regularly connect to applications like Uniswap and Compound. The new Chrome extension will streamline this process, removing the need to scan a QR code on their mobile devices each time they want to connect. Coelho-Prabhu explained: “Starting today, we’re making it …

As Bitcoin looks to recover on Friday from a stomach-churning dip on the back of a strong bid, on-chain data indicates that high-net-worth "whale" wallets may not be part of the effort. Bitcoin (BTC) — along with most crypto markets — suffered a staggering series of losses this week following a string of negative tweets from the world’s second-richest man, Elon Musk. Tesla & Bitcoin pic.twitter.com/YSswJmVZhP — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 12, 2021 While prices have begun to rebound, “whale” wallets — a playful term for Bitcoin addresses with 1,000 or more BTC — have nonetheless been dwindling in the …

A tranche of long-dormant Bitcoin seized in the 2016 hack of the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange are on the move today, an over $620 million sum that has some market participants spooked and may be contributing to a downward slide for Bitcoin. Blockchain analytics bot Whale Alerts was the first to raise the alarm, calling attention to a series of over five dozen transactions from wallets that have largely been inactive since the 2016 hack: ⚠ ⚠ ⚠ ⚠ ⚠ ⚠ ⚠ 1,241.37 #BTC (78,246,494 USD) of stolen funds transferred from Bitfinex Hack 2016 to unknown wallethttps://t.co/yLsJDXUBvE — Whale Alert (@whale_alert) …

After another jump in the price of major cryptocurrencies at the end of 2020, crypto enthusiasts began to mine, sell and buy currencies with renewed vigor — which means that nowadays, the topic of custodying cryptocurrencies is more relevant than ever. But unlike the past bullish waves, this time many users are also concerned with how to protect their assets. The blockchain industry is developing, and traders have become noticeably smarter, but scammers and thieves have also become much more agile. This is also indicated by the period appearance of news related to exploits and rug pulls, not only regarding …

January was a record month for Bitcoin’s price and network activity, with more than 22.3 million unique addresses actively sending or receiving BTC over 31 days. The milestone was spotted by crypto market data aggregator Glassnode, who tweeted that January had seen the highest monthly number of unique active addresses in Bitcoin’s history: #Bitcoin network activity at ATH. In January, more than 22.3 million unique addresses were active in the network sending or receiving $BTC – the highest monthly number in Bitcoin's history to date Chart: https://t.co/yPPOix0KFx pic.twitter.com/yjWwYbRC98 — glassnode (@glassnode) February 1, 2021 January’s spike in activity beats out …

David Schwartz, current chief technology officer at Ripple, is responding to reports his predecessor had lost access to hundreds of millions of dollars in Bitcoin. In a Quora post on Thursday, Schwartz said recent reports about former Ripple CTO Stefan Thomas forgetting the password to an encrypted hard drive containing thousands of Bitcoin (BTC) were true, but added Thomas had also lost access to hundreds of coins when the crypto asset was young. The Ripple CTO said his predecessor used to test the development of a Javascript library for Bitcoin by using real coins when the price was well under …

Bitcoin’s supply is capped at 21 million, but a significant proportion of that total sum is likely lost forever. This situation is due to a variety of reasons such as lost private keys and discarded storage devices containing substantial amounts of Bitcoin (BTC). When Bitcoin owners are not being careless with their wallet passwords, they can sometimes be targeted by hackers looking to steal their precious crypto. Those who utilize third-party custodial solutions place their Bitcoin fortune at the mercy of the security protocols adopted by such services. Indeed, several attack vectors are constantly being utilized to try and gain …

James Howells, the owner of a discarded hard drive with 7,500 Bitcoin (BTC), has made a fresh plea to excavate a landfill site and possibly recover the device. Back in 2013, Howells accidentally threw away a hard drive containing 7,500 BTC while cleaning his house. The Bitcoin stash came from Howell’s mining activity back when it was still possible to use CPUs to mine Bitcoin. By November 2013, the Bitcoin in the hard drive was already worth $6.5 million and Howell has been trying to recover it ever since. Now, according to Newport daily tabloid, the South Wales Argus, Holler …

A Redditor has issued a warning to “overconfident” HODLers after losing the password to their crypto wallet by not acting cautiously enough. A Bitcoiner with the username Onnar posted they had lost access to 2.6 Bitcoin (BTC) — roughly $96,400 at the time of publication — while attempting to transfer a wallet to a new computer purchased over the holidays. The user claimed to have formatted the drive of their old system without double checking whether the password manager still contained the password needed to access the private keys. “I go to my password manager to grab it and... it’s …

Major venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, also known as a16z, is the latest crypto-related form to oppose a recently proposed regulation in the United States. According to a blog post by a16z general partner Kathryn Haun, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network has issued "a rushed, non-vetted rule under the cloak of the holidays that violates the government’s own established rulemaking procedures." FinCEN, which operates under the purview of Steven Mnuchin's Department of the Treasury, introduced a proposed regulation late last month that would restrict money services business, as well as U.S.-registered cryptocurrency exchanges, from transacting with so-called "self-hosted" wallets. Effectively, …

With the two-week commentary period winding down, Jerry Brito, executive director of non-profit crypto policy advocate group Coin Center, says comments could make a difference in the ultimate outcome of the self-custodied wallet ruling recently proposed by the U.S. Treasury. “Coin Center is working with folks in Congress to get some letters sent to Secretary Mnuchin requesting an extension to the rushed comment period,” Brito said in a Dec. 28 tweet, adding: “Everyone in the cryptocurrency ecosystem should file a comment with FinCEN explaining how this rule would affect them and pointing out the unintended consequences. Filing a comment really …