Evening News | U.S. Treasury Department blacklists Tornado Cash; National Cyberspace Administration focuses on rectifying chaos related to virtual currency speculation

Organizer: Cookies, Chain Catcher

"What Important Events Happened in the Last 24 Hours"

1. U.S. Treasury Department Blacklists Tornado Cash, Prohibiting U.S. Citizens from Using It

According to CoinDesk, the U.S. Treasury Department has added Tornado Cash to its sanctions list, prohibiting all U.S. individuals and entities from interacting with Tornado Cash or any Ethereum wallet addresses associated with the protocol.

Subsequently, the GitHub account of Tornado Cash's founder was suspended, and Circle froze 75,000 USDC in Tornado Cash wallet addresses. The blockchain research firm Elliptic has marked all related addresses on the chain where Tornado Cash operates.

According to previous analysis by Slow Mist, 74.6% of the money laundering funds in security incidents in the first half of 2022 flowed to Tornado. (CoinDesk)

2. National Cyberspace Administration: Centralized Rectification of Virtual Currency Speculation Chaos, 12,000 Violating User Accounts and 105 Websites Closed

According to the "Cyberspace China" WeChat public account, in accordance with the spirit of the "Notice on Further Preventing and Handling Risks of Virtual Currency Trading Speculation," the National Cyberspace Administration urged major website platforms to effectively implement their main responsibilities, maintain a high-pressure crackdown on virtual currency trading speculation, and increase self-inspection and correction efforts regarding information content and accounts that induce virtual currency investment. Websites like Weibo and Baidu closed 12,000 violating user accounts, including @ICE暴雪创始人 and @币圈爆爷, and cleaned up over 51,000 pieces of violating information such as "Investing in Bitcoin is Easy Money."

The National Cyberspace Administration strengthened supervision and inspection, closing 989 Weibo, Tieba accounts, and WeChat public accounts that induced netizens to invest in "virtual currency," "virtual assets," and "digital assets" under the guise of "financial innovation" and "blockchain," such as @飞哥的故事江湖 and @绝对盘感比特币.

In addition, local cyberspace departments were guided to interview over 500 business entities involved in virtual currency promotion and speculation, requiring a comprehensive cleanup of information content promoting virtual currency trading. For 105 websites and platforms like "币头条," which specifically promote virtual currency marketing, release tutorials on cross-border trading, and "mining," the National Cyberspace Administration, in conjunction with relevant departments, will close them in accordance with the law. (Cyberspace China)

3. FTX.US President: Coinbase and BlackRock's Cooperation Indicates Traditional Big Players in the Crypto Market Are Not Slowing Down

FTX.US President Brett Harrison stated in an interview with Bloomberg TV that Coinbase's announcement of a partnership with BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, indicates that institutions need suitable avenues to participate in the crypto market, and these traditional big players are not slowing down. The market is continuously releasing favorable signals, and many are just lying low and building.

Regarding Coinbase's layoffs, Brett Harrison believes that looking at the growth tech industry, including Coinbase, Robinhood, Google, Microsoft, and Tesla, these growth companies typically operate under a model of increasing employee numbers, but sometimes the growth in employee numbers can hinder the company's growth, "This is a real lesson." (Bloomberg)

4. Solana: Slope Users and Those Who Imported Mnemonic Phrases into Slope May Still Face Theft Risks

Solana released an update on the Slope wallet incident on August 2, stating that affected addresses appear to have been created, imported, or used in the Slope wallet on iOS and Android. The private key information of these Slope users was inadvertently transmitted to application monitoring services by Slope, but the means by which hackers obtained or intercepted this information is still under investigation.

This attack did not involve any core code related to Solana Labs, the Solana Foundation, or any protocol-level vulnerabilities. Users affected on other software wallets (such as Phantom and Solflare) may be the result of reusing mnemonics generated or stored in Slope.

Currently, officials believe this is not directly related to any specific wallet implementation outside of Slope. Since both Ethereum and Solana use BIP39 mnemonics, any impact on Ethereum wallet users may also be due to the reuse of mnemonics. Wallets that were never imported (or used by the Slope wallet) and generated from mnemonics are not affected; however, users who import their mnemonics into the Slope application are at risk of being attacked.

Additionally, Solana officials emphasized that Slope wallet users or those who previously imported mnemonics into Slope may face theft even if no assets were transferred, and users should not reuse mnemonics derived from wallets previously used in the Slope mobile application. (Source Link)

5. Binance Will No Longer Support Off-Chain Asset Transfers Between WazirX and Binance Starting August 11

Binance announced that starting from August 11 at 11:00 AM (UTC+8), it will no longer support users transferring assets off-chain between the WazirX trading platform and Binance using the "Log in with Binance" option. Users can still deposit and withdraw between Binance and WazirX through standard deposit and withdrawal processes.

Binance stated that some users mistakenly believe that assets deposited into the WazirX exchange are managed by Binance, but this is not the case.

According to previous reports, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao and WazirX founder Shetty engaged in a social media dispute over the ownership issues of WazirX and Zanmai Labs, but later Shetty stated that Binance had restarted the off-chain trading function for WazirX. (Source Link)

6. Vitalik Proposes ERC721s "Invisible Address" Scheme to Enhance NFT Privacy

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin proposed the ERC721s "invisible address" scheme, which can hide the NFT recipient's address, aiming to increase privacy in the NFT ecosystem.

Previously, Ethereum researcher Anton Wahrstätter proposed an idea for an ERC721 extension that generates a one-time address for each transaction and uses zero-knowledge proofs to obscure public blockchain transactions, allowing users to transfer NFTs, with only the new owner able to see who owns the NFT.

Vitalik believes, "You don't need Merkle trees or ZK-SNARK level privacy because each ERC721 is unique, so it's impossible to create an 'anonymous set' for ERC721. Instead, you just want to hide links to the highly visible public identities of the sender and recipient." (Source Link)

7. Celsius Creditor Committee to Investigate CEO Alex Mashinsky and Other Insiders' Conduct

The Celsius creditor committee stated it will thoroughly investigate the conduct of Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky and other insiders, including problematic asset deployment decisions, pre-distribution fund transfers, and other issues.

Additionally, the creditor committee has hired the law firm White & Case as its legal advisor, along with restructuring advisor M3 Partners and blockchain consulting firm Elementus, and appointed investment bank Perella Weinberg Partners, which specializes in restructuring, to provide advice on "potential transactions" that may help recover lender funds. (The Block)

"What Interesting Articles Are Worth Reading in the Last 24 Hours"

1. "Does an Efficient and Non-'Troublesome' Stablecoin Solution Really Exist?"

Who wouldn't want to "print money" themselves? Issuing stablecoins means that from now on, the cost of funds disappears (although some rules must be followed). As a new and closed system, crypto must have energy injected for liquidity to increase. Energy can be injected from the outside but can also be generated internally. This article reflects on the "new normal" of stablecoins by comparing the prospects of GHO and DAI.

2. "From Ethereum to Aptos, Who Can Find the Ultimate Answer to the 'Trilemma'?"

Considering the trilemma, no chain can achieve a universal design that fits all application scenarios; at this point, balancing trade-offs is key. This article compares multiple public chains, including Solana, Aptos, Ethereum, StarkWare, zkSync, Serum, and Meteplex, to illustrate Aptos's future possibilities.

3. "Interview with Pantera Partner Paul Veradittakit: Investment Opportunities in a Bear Market"

Pantera is one of the largest and oldest VCs in the blockchain industry, with a fund size of $5 billion, and it is also a significant investor in Terra. In this interview, we discuss macroeconomic conditions, investment opportunities in a bear market, the new Meta public chain, and the reasons behind the collapses of 3AC, Babel, and Terra with Pantera partner Paul Veradittakit and SynFutures founder Rachel, highlighting some particularly insightful discussions.

4. "Dynamic Tracking of Ethereum Fork Events"

As the Ethereum merge approaches (expected on September 10), Ethereum is set to transition from Proof of Work (PoW) to Proof of Stake (PoS). Currently, some exchanges, project parties, and industry influencers have begun to publicly "choose sides" regarding the Ethereum fork, and the "fork war" of Ethereum seems imminent. Chain Catcher will update the latest developments regarding the Ethereum PoW fork in reverse chronological order, so please stay tuned.