David Sønstebø will no longer be a part of the Iota Foundation, a non-profit which he helped co-found and most recently co-chaired. According to an announcement from the Iota Foundation, the organization has “parted ways” with Sønstebø. It said it was a "unanimous decision, made by the Supervisory Board in the best interest of Iota and its ecosystem." The announcement stated the project’s interests have “diverged significantly” with the co-founder’s. His photo and bio have already been removed from the Iota website and his email address bounces back. “The decision to part ways, while difficult, had to be made,” said …

The Iota Foundation, the nonprofit organization behind Iota, Iota Tangle and Miota, announced it will be joining Austria’s newest Christian Doppler Laboratory, or CDL, as an industrial partner. The first of its kind, the laboratory is housed at the Vienna University of Technology and named the CDL Blockchain Technologies for the Internet of Things, or CDL-BOT. The laboratory was officially opened in a digital ceremony on Nov. 26 by Austrian Federal Minister for Digital and Economic Affairs Margarethe Schramböck. It will focus on research and development in public and private partnerships between institutions and businesses seeking to expand the implementation …

Bitcoin (BTC) has topped $19,000 in a fresh bullish surge, but traders are all about altcoins on Nov. 24. In what many are heralding as the beginning of “alt season,” large-cap cryptocurrencies are seeing their biggest gains in three years. XRP, XLM lead new “alt season” Cointelegraph takes a look at five of the biggest movers, all of which have returned to at least a $1 billion market cap. XRP Ripple’s XRP token is gaining traction on social media after a curious lull, thanks to its weekly gains that have topped 110%. At press time, XRP/USD traded at $0.62, having …

The IOTA Foundation, a non-profit organization behind the IOTA blockchain, is collaborating with Japan’s government on a project targeting industrial infrastructure. The foundation has partnered on a project initiated by major Japanese maintenance companies, Best Materia and IMC, IOTA representatives announced on Oct. 27. The project is funded by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization, a national research and development agency operating under Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. According to an announcement, the initiative intends to implement artificial intelligence and distributed ledger technology to risk-based maintenance systems in power, industrial, petrochemicals and oil refining plants. Dominik …

Major players in the global cryptocurrency community have addressed the European Commission’s new legislative proposals on digital assets. The International Association for Trusted Blockchain Applications, or INATBA, has released an initial response to the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulations proposed by the EC. The association features major crypto companies like Ripple, ConsenSys, and Iota. In its official response to the EC, the INATBA members expressed the industry’s concerns over the proposed MiCA regulations, calling the authority to bring their forces together in further development of the regulatory framework. While the INATBA generally sees the MiCA as a positive step that …

MasterCard's Singapore-based subsidiary filed a patent with the U.S. Patent Office detailing a payment system for using hardware devices that specifically mentions Iota's (MIOTA) Tangle technology. The patent claim, published on Aug. 20, proposes a pay-as-you-go system that uses a "transparent data storage system and aggregation." Users must provide their credentials to gain access to a particular hardware device — the patent cites copiers and 3D printers as examples — and billed strictly for what they used. The proposed data storage systems could be based on a Tangle or a generic blockchain. The patent makes no mentions of the Iota …

The IOTA project has successfully completed its Chrysalis upgrade, enabling the network to handle up to 1000 transactions per second. This is around 50x faster than previously when the network topped out around 20 TPS. According to an Aug. 19 blog post from the IOTA Foundation, IOTA 1.5, AKA Chrysalis, is now live. The upgrade is designed to be an intermediate stage before the removal of the Coordinator from the IOTA network. The Coordinator is a centralized server managed by IOTA developers that creates checkpoints in its transaction history. Under Chrysalis, the confirmation time of transactions for token transfers on …

The IOTA network is preparing to launch the first phase of Chrysalis, also known as IOTA 1.5, on its mainnet sometime next week. According to a tweet published by the IOTA Foundation, the upgrade will allow the network to process 1,000 transactions per second, and will institute 10-second confirmation times. In June, the foundation also released the latest version of its node software, Hornet. This paved the way for IOTA 1.5 following a community-driven stress test, which resulted in a stable network with more than 150 nodes. Testing showed that the upgraded network consumed 10 times less memory than IOTA’s …

Iota, a major blockchain project designed for the Internet of Things, or IOT, has entered the first phase in its roadmap for upgrading the network to IOTA 2.0. According to a June 30 blog post, users can now download the new Pollen release in the first fully decentralized IOTA test network. The release is the first phase in Iota’s IOTA 2.0 transition roadmap, released on June 29. In the roadmap, Iota Foundation laid out three phases to reach the so-called “Coordicide”, an event that will envision the permanent removal of Iota’s Coordinator. Coordinator has been a basic part of IOTA’s …

Personal data breaches on social media platforms are nothing new. Global giants like Facebook are known for their privacy issues. While global Internet users continue to rely on classic social media like Facebook and YouTube, industry players keep building privacy-focused alternatives based on blockchains like IOTA. Society2 is a new decentralized social media, or DeSM, project that aims to let users regain control of their data and enable IOTA node owners to run their own social media sites or apps. Officially announcing the initiative on May 5, Society2 outlined that there has been no mainstream adoption of decentralized social media …

On April 16, Ajit Pai, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, issued a draft order approving the usage of L-Band radio frequencies for 5G and IoT. Controversy Previously, three leaders of Congressional defense committees signed a letter urging president Trump to prevent the commission from issuing the approval. The controversy arises from the fact that the adjacent bands are used for the Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) which provide essential functionality for the modern military. Chairman Pai assured in his draft order that the approval will not jeopardise proper functioning of the GPS, while making: “...more efficient use …

The question of whether certain cryptocurrencies constitute securities is becoming increasingly relevant within the blockchain industry. As such, some core players in the space are upping their efforts to bring more understanding to the issue. The Crypto Rating Council, or CRC, is a group of major United States’ crypto firms that advocates and promotes regulatory clarity in crypto. Recently, the CRC evaluated a number of new cryptocurrencies to determine whether they should show signs of being securities. Three new tokens are analyzed In an April 2 blog post, the CRC published an introduction to ratings for three new cryptocurrencies including …