The co-founder of Web3 metaverse game engine “Webaverse” has revealed they were victims of a $4 million crypto h after meeting with scammers posing as investors in a hotel lobby in Rome. The bizarre aspect of the story, according to co-founder Ahad Shams, is that the crypto was stolen from a newly set up Trust Wallet and that the hack took place during the meeting at some point. He claims the thieves could not have possibly seen the private key, nor was he connected to a public WiFi network at the time. The thieves were somehow able to gain access …

The future of decentralized social media Traditional Web2 social media platforms are plagued by fundamental problems such as censorship, lack of users’ privacy and demonetization. Decentralization is a potential solution. Many of Web2’s major social media are already looking for a way out by making steps forward to Web3 and decentralization. For instance, Reddit touted community points, which are ERC-20 tokens that users can earn by posting quality content and contributing to online communities. To do so, Reddit is working with Arbitrum, a layer 2 protocol designed to scale Ether (ETH) transactions. Twitter rolled out support for NFTs, allowing users …

Coffeezilla, a YouTuber and crypto investigator, revealed that American mixed martial artist Dillon Danis promoted a fake NFT project without disclosing that he received $1,000 for the advertisement. We just tricked Dillon Danis into promoting a fake NFT project. We paid him $1,000 to post, he didn't disclose it was an #AD, and posted copy that literally spells out S.C.A.M. pic.twitter.com/SVo2SCoN9q — Coffeezilla (@coffeebreak_YT) February 3, 2023 In the promotion, Danis tweeted out a digital image along with a website URL, which according to Coffeezilla, “literally spells out S.C.A.M.” A further investigation from Cointelegraph shows that the website URL was …

Atto, the pseudonymous founder behind Little Shapes NFT has revealed that the project was actually a “social experiment” designed to shed light on large-scale NFT bot network scams on Twitter. Since late December, Little Shapes had been attracting a fair amount of attention from the media and crypto community. This is due to several semi-viral tweets detailing incidents in the founder's life that seemed too good to be true. Examples of such included him waking up from a five-month coma, finding out he had assets locked on FTX, telling his wife and then finding out she was cheating on him …

Bitcoin Ordinals causes fees to spike The Bitcoin (BTC)-native Ordinals protocol is taking up record-breaking space on the blockchain and in the process is hiking the transaction fees on the network. The divisive newly launched protocol allows for nonfungible token (NFT)-esque assets on the Bitcoin mainnet by inscribing satoshis with content. So far, inscriptions have included content such as images, documents including a PDF file of the Bitcoin whitepaper and even a fully playable clone of the video game DOOM. On Feb. 2, independent developer, Udi Wertheimer, tweeted he had conducted the “largest transaction in Bitcoin’s history” after using the …

In this week’s newsletter, read about how Moonbirds founder Kevin Rose lost nonfungible tokens (NFTs) worth more than $1.1 million. Find out why an NFT collector is suing NFT marketplace OpenSea over locking his account for three months and how the Porsche NFT collection gained almost $5 million in sales volume, despite a failed launch. In other news, find out how NFT trademarks could potentially be a reliable signal for NFT traders. Lastly, professionals within the Web3 space shared various ways to combat NFT theft. Moonbirds creator Kevin Rose loses $1.1M+ in NFTs after one wrong move Moonbirds co-founder Kevin …

Fumio Kishida, the Prime Minister of Japan, has come out in support of blockchain as a potential solution for technological issues facing the country. In response to questioning from Liberal Democratic Party member Masaaki Taira before the Budget Committee of Japan’s House of Representatives on Feb. 1, Kishida said there were “various possibilities for using Web3” in Japan. He added that the Japanese government could use aspects including nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) in efforts to revitalize regions and promote ‘Cool Japan’ — a national strategy aimed at showing off the country’s innovations and culture to the …

Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols experienced a boom in total value locked across different staking pools in January 2023. The market hit $74.6 billion worth of staked assets, increasing by 26% from December. In its latest monthly report, DappRadar outlined the growth of the DeFi sector alongside rejuvenated nonfungible token (NFT) markets that have also had upticks in trading volume and sales. Optimism emerges as the top DeFi performer, seeing a 57.44$ increase in total value locked (TVL) at $808 million. Blockchain Analyst Sara Gherghelas told Cointelegraph that Optimism’s transaction volumes were likely driven by a "learn-to-earn" incentives program that ended …

Blockchain courses and certifications can play an important role in helping individuals gain a comprehensive understanding of blockchain technology and its applications. By completing these courses, individuals can develop technical skills, stay current with industry developments, enhance their career opportunities and increase their earning potential. Here are seven blockchain courses and certifications for beginners. INE’s Blockchain Security INE’s Blockchain Security course is an online course offered by Internetwork Expert (INE) that provides a comprehensive overview of the security aspects of blockchain technology. The course covers various topics such as consensus algorithms, cryptography, network security, smart contract security, and blockchain attacks …

A big concern for users in decentralized finance (DeFi) involves the industry’s susceptibility to exploits. A report from Privacy Affairs revealed hackers stole $4.3 billion worth of cryptocurrency in the time period from January to November 2022 — a 37% increase from the previous year. Such exploits harm the integrity of companies and fuel skeptics from outside of the space in their case against cryptocurrencies. However, in a Feb. 2 announcement from Web3 Builders Inc., the company revealed a suite of tools to combat this issue. The initial browser extension TrustCheck was created to flag Web3-related scams before users continue …

The rise of Web3 functionality has been a boon for decentralized domain name services over the past two years, with millions of blockchain-based domains registered to date. Challenging market conditions may have hampered exponential growth, but industry leaders believe that utility-driven adoption will continue in the future. Web3 is fundamentally changing how businesses, brands and retailers serve customers, who are taking full control of their data, wallets and online identity courtesy of blockchain ecosystems like Ethereum. Decentralized domain names are proving to be valuable tools for users and businesses to integrate with Web3 functionality. From providing human-readable names that replace …

Only days after the launch of the Bitcoin (BTC)-based Ordinals protocol, its creators have had to deal with its first shock pornographic image which has been inscribed into the blockchain. On Feb. 2 at around 12:15 AM UTC, an unsavory image known as “goatse” was inscribed onto the Bitcoin blockchain via the Ordinals protocol. It featured on inscription 668 and was live on the Ordinals' front page for roughly half an hour before the image was removed. It still exists on the blockchain but is not able to be viewed using the Ordinals website. Ordinals creator, Casey Rodarmor, told Cointelegraph …