The testnet of private smart contract network Enigma has been launched, the developers announced in a Medium post published on June 11. Per the announcement, the test network, dubbed Discovery, allows developers to start developing their decentralized applications (DApps). Furthermore, contracts hosted on the Discovery testnet will reportedly be immediately deployed on the Ethereum (ETH) network once Enigma has been implemented on the mainnet. The newly launched network reportedly enables privacy for general computations, which enables DApp developers to create secure applications, according to the post. The author of the post further notes that the developers have been using and …

The man who launched a blockchain and cryptocurrency assurance division for PwC in Switzerland is joining Tezos as chief financial officer, the foundation confirmed in a news release on June 11. Roman Schnider is leaving the Big Four firm after 15 years, and Tezos says he is already familiar with the organization, since it was the first major blockchain project to have its finance and business operations audited by PwC. Tezos describes itself as a platform focusing on smart contracts and decentralized applications that offers a protocol governed by stakeholders. Ryan Jesperson, the president of the Tezos Foundation, said: “As …

Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) developer cooperative dOrg has created a limited liability company (LLC) to grant its native DAO legal status, according to a report by independent law firm Gravel & Shea on June 11. As its name implies, a DAO is a firm with no centralization or hierarchy, and is instead governed by open source digital rules on a blockchain — a smart contract — and operated publicly by users via a consensus voting mechanism. According to Gravel & Shea, the native DAO of dOrg, underpinned by the DAOstack framework, is now the first legally established entity of its …

The research organization Data Foundation and IT firm Booz Allen Hamilton have published a report with five proposed questions to guide the United States federal government on where and how to implement blockchain initiatives. Their research was published in the report “Bringing Blockchain Into Government: A Path Forward for Creating Effective Federal Blockchain Initiatives” on June 10. According to the report, blockchain solutions make the most sense when applied to some sort of procedure with a predetermined level of consistency and a low level of agility, assuming that the immutable ledger provided by blockchain is valuable for the task in …

The Dubai Land Department (DLD) and telecoms firm Etisalat have signed a memorandum of understanding concerning real estate blockchain technology, United Arab Emirates-based outlet Gulf Today reported on June 10. The DLD works under the Executive Council of Dubai in real estate-related services, while Etisalat is a multinational, Emirati firm that serves 15 countries in the Middle East, Asia and Africa. Both parties have said they aim to implement smart government standards and introduce paperless management and digital contracts for property transactions. Sultan Butti Bin Mejren, DLD’s director general, said the agreement is part of an ambition to make Dubai …

Blockchain tech company Tether has announced that it is partnering with EOS parent company Block.one to release its stablecoin (USDT) on the EOS blockchain (EOSIO), according to a press release shared with Cointelegraph on May 31. According to the announcement, Tether developed the Tether EOS smart contract, which has been sent to the EOS account “tethertether” and peer-reviewed by the Canadian branch of EOS. Tether EOS is reportedly well-suited for peer-to-peer microtransactions, due to its delegated proof-of-stake design. Tether’s Chief Executive Officer, Jean-Louis van der Velde, said that expaned the coin to the EOS blockchain provides greater interoperability. As reported …

Disclaimer: The source in this article previously listed the file archive domain name. It has been changed to more accurately reflect the development. Encrypted instant messaging service Telegram has officially released a test client for its Telegram Open Network (TON), according to a recent email to investors. The archive of files available for download on test.ton.org is a distribution of a preliminary version of the TON Blockchain Network Lite Client along with the relevant portions of the TON Blockchain Library, according to the readme information file. The development is a simplified stable version of the Lite Client. On May 25, …

Major United States-based cloud software firm Salesforce, has introduced its own blockchain platform, the firm said in a live stream on May 29. The new product, Salesforce Blockchain, is based on the firm’s own application builder Salesforce Lightning and open source blockchain technology by Hyperledger. Salesforce Blockchain is a low-code blockchain platform that provides companies with the tools to build smart contracts, app and networks in order to share verified data using distributed ledger technology (DLT). The product also enables the automation of a number of processes based on artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms. Currently available to selected partners, Salesforce Blockchain …

Disclaimer: The headline of this article previously read that Tezos underwent a hard fork and was subsequently corrected. After three months, a governance vote of public smart contract-enabled blockchain tezos (XTZ) started on Feb. 28 has been concluded — as scheduled — three months later, on May 28. Cryptocurrency news outlet Coindesk reported yesterday that the voting process has approved the upgrade — dubbed Athens A — and that the implementation is imminent. Tezos is a so-dubbed “self-amending” proof-of-stake blockchain, which means that it has an integrated upgrade system managed by the votes of coin stakers. The Athens A upgrade …

Privacy-focused encrypted instant messaging service Telegram has created a new programming language for its Telegram Open Network (TON), according to a document posted on an unofficial TON Telegram channel on May 23. The document — evidently authored by Telegram co-founder Nikolai Durov and dated May 23 — introduces a new language called Fift. The language is specifically designed for developing and managing TON blockchain smart contracts, and interacting with the TON Virtual Machine (TVM). TVM, in its turn, executes smart contract code in the TON blockchain, supporting all operations required to parse incoming messages and persistent data, and to create …

Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin has proposed creating an on-chain smart contract-based ether mixer in a note on collaborative development platform HackMD on May 24. In his note, Buterin argues that the Ethereum ecosystem needs more privacy, and points out that the default behavior is to do everything through a single account, allowing for all of the user’s activities to be linked to each other. Furthermore, he notes that simply spreading the ether across multiple addresses is not a solution, since the transactions sending ETH to those wallets connect them. Buterin also linked to a Twitter thread where it has …

The South Korean Ministry of Science and ICT is going to run a follow-up study on blockchain regulations, according to a Yonhap News report on May 21. The study is called the “Blockchain Regulation Improvement Study Group” and is part of an initiative run by the government’s science and tech arm to figure out how regulations could be improved so that blockchain tech could achieve widespread institutional adoption. The Blockchain Regulation Improvement Study Group was launched in June of last year, and initially focused on improving legal regulations pertaining to blockchain tech such as personal privacy, smart contracts, electronic documents …