Electric car manufacturer Tesla has seen more than $55 billion wiped from its market cap since announcing the purchase of $1.5 billion in Bitcoin four days ago — but Twitter and MasterCard have headed in the other direction. Since Tesla’s announcement on Monday, the electric car giant’s stock price has dropped 7% from $869.52 ($834.6 billion market cap). It is currently trading at $811.66 ($779 billion market cap). While there may be other factors behind the share price drop, some investors, such as Baker Avenue Wealth Management chief strategist King Lip, are concerned that holding 8% of the company's cash …

Microsoft has employed blockchain technology to purchase soil carbon credits in Australia. In combination with Regen Network — built on the Cosmos blockchain — the CarbonPlus Grassland credits were initially issued to two ranches in New South Wales. The carbon credits are used as a measure of soil sequestration, which is the process of capturing atmospheric carbon dioxide and storing it in soil. This is achieved through Regen Network’s remote sensing technology and is also said to help monitor animal welfare, soil health and general ecosystem health. A total of 43,338 metric tons worth of carbon credits were issued to …

Enterprise blockchain started gaining traction in 2017 shortly after Bitcoin had reached its all-time high of nearly $20,000. Since then, enterprise blockchain has mainly been defined by private blockchain networks used by businesses for things such as supply chain management. The enterprise blockchain space has changed quite a bit since 2017. For instance, 2020 has brought in a number of enterprise blockchain use cases that leverage public networks rather than private ones. The COVID-19 pandemic has also driven many companies, both large and small, to use blockchain for guaranteeing proof-of-health or to revive tourism. Finally, some blockchain companies this year …

Enterprise Ethereum is beginning to show its impact as some of the largest companies in the world start to leverage the Ethereum network to solve complex business challenges. For example, tech giant Microsoft and Big Four firm Ernst & Young announced the expansion of Microsoft’s blockchain-based solution to extend to gaming rights and royalties management. Paul Brody, blockchain lead at EY, told Cointelegraph that Microsoft’s blockchain solution for this particular use case is being conducted on a private Quorum network based on Ethereum. Brody noted that this expansion will provide a financial system of record for royalty agreements, allowing Microsoft's …

With an eye towards the rapidly spreading coronavirus pandemic, Albany Airport has begun experimenting with the "Wellness Trace App" to track the cleanliness of surfaces and objects inside the airport. The app, developed by General Electric Co. (GE) in partnership with TE-FOOD and Eurofins, aims to provide a safe travel experience during and after the coronavirus pandemic. It is built using the Microsoft Azure enterprise blockchain. The app aims to provide travelers with information about the cleanliness of surfaces prior to travelers touching them in real-time. Travelers will be able to gather this information by scanning QR code stickers scattered …

The World Trade Organization and Trade Finance Global have published their latest taxonomy of blockchain projects in international trade, arranged into what they present as a “periodic table” for the industry. The original rendition of the periodic table was published in winter 2019. Since then, a lot has changed: despite the pandemic, several indicators used in the table show that blockchain trade innovation projects worldwide are reaching ever greater maturity. On a scale of one to five, projects’ maturity was assessed as being 2.3 on average in Dec. 2019. As of this month, the same figure stands at 3.3. To …

Cryptocurrencies are not immune to the feverish climate in 2020 — a year in which the line between mainstream politics and an online morass of conspiratorial theories is becoming ever more blurred. Former CIA counterintelligence and staff investigator Kevin Shipp, who has close to 150,000 followers on Twitter, has now dragged a recent Microsoft cryptocurrency patent into the quagmire. On Sept. 10, Shipp linked Microsoft’s recent cryptocurrency patent, which would enable users to mine crypto using their body activity data, to a short-lived Microsoft ad that had featured the Serbian performance artist Marina Abramovic. The ad, which promoted a new …

In a tweet, Microsoft Security Intelligence (MSI) warned cryptocurrency owners who are also Windows users on August 27 that their funds in crypto wallets might be in danger because of a new malware. The new malware, called Anubis, seems to use code forked from Loki. It steals crypto wallet credentials, credit card details and other valuable information from these Windows users. According to MSI, it first discovered the malware in June in the cybercriminal underground. It has the same name with another potent banking Trojan that has been targeting Android smartphones for months. Source: MSI Tweet MSI stressed that the …

Starbucks, the biggest coffee shop chain in the world, now allows its customers to trace the origins of its coffee using Microsoft's blockchain solution. Customers will be able to scan codes on the bags of coffee they purchase to discover their origins. Little information has been provided concerning the traceability solution other than the fact that it employs blockchain. Microsoft is one of the leading providers of blockchain-as-a-service platforms, though IBM's Food Trust platform is better known in the space. As consumers become more concerned about the ethical sourcing of the products they purchase, the blockchain-tracing trend could rapidly begin …

Every Friday, Law Decoded delivers analysis on the week’s critical stories in the realms of policy, regulation and law. Editor’s note The U.S.–China trade war continues its brazen spillover into tech. In response to concerns over where data from TikTok and WeChat was going, President Trump sent out twin executive orders banning both applications last night. The new action is distinct from, for example, squeezing Huawei out. Huawei’s hardware is tied up in international supply chain and military networks, forming a more obvious security risk. TikTok and WeChat are consumer apps, more occupied with viral dance videos than top secret …

Chinese content generation platform TikTok, a video-sharing app that has been called the fastest-growing social networking service in history, has been in the spotlight since early 2019 and now surpasses 800 million users. Despite the fact that the app’s data security breaches are raising controversy worldwide, more and more young people are using it as the go-to social media for the new generation, with a reported 69% of TikTok’s global audience being between the ages of 16 and 24. Despite its overwhelming success and rapidly growing user base, the truth behind the worldwide sensation is that “the new Instagram" is …

Climate change is one of the greatest problems facing society today. Therefore, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to see large corporations stepping in to mitigate their environmental impact. For example, Amazon plans to be carbon neutral by 2040; Starbuck has goals to become “resource positive” by reducing carbon emissions; and Microsoft has aims on getting to a carbon-negative status by 2030. Companies that vow to take responsibility for offsetting their own carbon emissions are part of voluntary carbon marketplaces. Unfortunately, a common set of standards doesn’t exist to ensure that voluntary carbon markets operate efficiently when companies produce environmental, …