There area few different companies specializing in Bitcoin blockchain analysis. Every single one of thoseentities seeksto provide law enforcement agencies and other parties with actionable insights on the Bitcoin network. One of these companies isNeutrino, based in Italy. Now would bea good time to check up on what this company provides exactly and how itcould be both a blessing and a curse to Bitcoin users.

It sounds quite interesting if a company claims they can properly analyze the Bitcoin blockchain. Companies such as Neutrino not to be confused with the infamous exploit kit used by criminals specialize in searching for malicious behavior on the Bitcoin network. If criminals were to steal funds or move funds belonging to suspicious addresses, companies like these wouldimmediately track themdown to the best of their abilities.

Contrary to what a lot of people think, Bitcoin is not an anonymous currency. It is true that transactions do not include personal information, but it is a pseudonymous currency which allows anyone to keep tabs on network transactions in real-time. Doing so does not even require specialized software. All it takes is a browser and a mouse to start going through Bitcoin transactions and their histories.

Companies such as Neutrino take this concept one step further. The company uses a proprietary machine learning algorithm known as P-Flow to constantly monitor the Bitcoin blockchain and all activities taking place on it. The software also categorizes money flows and labels risks accordingly. Interestingly enough, P-Flow is apparently capable of analyzing alltransactions, even the obfuscated versions.

Any compliance officer looking to assess risk of Bitcoin operations could certainly benefit from a tool such as P-Flow. It enhances AML/KYC checks and sets up customizable red flag alerts based on a blacklist approach. Users can flag any transaction potentially related to Bitcoin obfuscation as a threat as well. It is even capable of ascertaining whether or not a particular BTC transfer has a link to the darknet. All of this makes for an incredibly powerful solution.

Neutrino was founded back in 2016 with a strong focus on cybersecurity in general. Bitcoin quickly became one of itsareas of expertise, as the companyaspires to develop highly specialized cybersecurity solutions for use by partners and companies. Given the increasing popularity of Bitcoin over these past few years, developing P-Flow made a lot of sense. It is also the companys first project to come to market. Blockchain analytics companies are in high demand these days.

Neutrino is the company responsible for tracking the recent WannaCry Bitcoin funds movements. Itsresearch indicated how these funds were transferred to the ShapeShift exchange and converted to Monero. That statement was later confirmed by ShapeShift themselves, although they never indicatedwhetherall of the remaining WannaCry proceeds were laundered in such a manner. This development highlights the value of Neutrino as a Bitcoin analytics company. Anyone trying to abuse Bitcoin for nefarious purposes will certainly now have a difficult time getting away with it.

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Neutrino Is an Italian Bitcoin Blockchain Analytics Service Provider - The Merkle

Bitcoin was the first, and is the most famous, of a new type of digital money. The plan was to make a form of currency not controlled by governments or businesses, that you could trade globally with no cost and without having to reveal your identity.

It's an idea that took off. There are now more than 800 cryptocurrencies in existence, worth more than 75billion in total.

And their value has soared too - in 2011 you could buy a Bitcoin for $11, they're now worth $2,755 each. That means if you'd put just 100 into the currency in 2010 (when you could buy Bitcoins for 5p or less if you timed it right) they would be worth 4.3million now.

But are they safe to put money in, can the growth continue and how do you get involved?

The idea is simple at its core use maths to create a unique, verifiable, line of code and write down who owns it on a ledger.

You can then sell it to someone else, they can check it's real and the ownership change is also recorded.

People can also create new coins by solving mathematical problems on their computers, up to a total limit of 21million with Bitcoin, and sell them on.

The ledger, known as a blockchain, is public and anyone can get involved either checking and recording transactions or looking for new coins.

Coins can be bought and traded on exchanges or even at some ATMs - and stored on an exchange, your computer or even offline (known as cold storage) if you want more security.

Once a coin is assigned to someone (this is done through a digital address, which you are given a private key to, so your name isn't recorded) it can't be used by anyone else. That means a fair few coins have been lost over the years, after people misplaced their keys to them.

Normally, the value of a currency is backed up by a country's central bank or in the case of the euro, a whole host of countries' central bank.

That means that while it's not protected, and values can change, there is at least someone responsible.

With crypto currencies there is nothing backing their value at all.

That means prices are based solely on what people think they're worth, and if something undermines that belief they can go into freefall.

Earlier this year Ethereum the second biggest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin saw its value collapse from $317 a coin to $0.1 a coin in a day. It bounced back, and is now trading at $225 a coin, but the lesson is there.

Put simply - if something were to go wrong, you'd have no support.

The second issue is that Bitcoins are what is known by traders as a fool's asset. Because unlike investing in a house that can be rented out or a company that makes profits the only way to make money from them is to find a greater fool than you who'll pay an even higher price than you will.

But they're far from alone in this, with everything from art, to wine, to stamps all falling into this category.

And so far, the general trend has been up especially if you managed to pick one of the winners - with the price of Bitcoins more than doubling this year alone.

The real profits are in the smaller coins. Pick something that's cheap now - like Bitcoin was in 2010 - and you can see massive returns. With Ethereum the price went from $8 a coin in January to almost $400 a coin this year, before dropping back down to just $225 a coin at the time of writing.

And it's far from alone the price of NEM coins, Dash coins, Litecoins and more have all soared this year.

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The news this week has been about the split in Bitcoin. Because you need to check crypto currencies and register transactions, that means whenever people transfer them to either pay for something or just cash in on their current value - there's a blocker.

The people doing the checking aren't necessarily interested in your transaction and might be keen to keep prices high if they're holding onto Bitcoins themselves.

Additionally, cryptocurrencies are generally designed to be open so have certain aspects baked into them. In the case of Bitcoin, only 1 megabyte of new information can be added to the official register every 10 minutes.

However, the people using them to buy something are keen for transactions to go through fast.

Essentially, the people mining Bitcoin were at odds with the people using them and there were fears that this could cause huge problem down the line.

That led to a split this week with the new Bitcoin Cash launched for people who want faster transactions. In just a day the new currency became the third-biggest cryptocurrency although it has now slipped to fourth - with more than 4billion worth of the new coin in circulation.

The move to the new currency has gone well so far, but it exposes a weakness in the system where the people using the currencies to buy something are reliant on an entirely different group of people to make that exchange official.

For people wanting to test the water or even dive straight in we decided to speak to the experts to get some help.

Ive been involved for two years now, and we have seen explosive growth in these currencies, along with tremendous volatility, said David Siegel, and internet pioneer and founder of blockchain innovation community 20|30 .

He thinks that the future is bright for crypto currencies, but it will be a bumpy ride along the way. Here are his 10 rules for investing in them:

Put a small amount of money, like $100, into an exchange account. Use a reputable exchange like Lykke , Coinbase , Kraken , etc.

Buy some cryptocurrencies to learn about them.

Go to YouTube and watch videos on crypto-investing, cold storage, security, talks at recent events, etc.

Read about new developments on Bitcoin Magazine , CoinDesk , Brave New Coin , etc.

Dedicate no more than 10% of your entire investment portfolio to crypto-investments.

Diversify! Plan to buy at least ten coins/tokens. Learn about index investing at http://www.tokenfactory.io .

Carve out about one third of your money. Put this third into Bitcoin, third into ether, and one third into 3-5 other coins/tokens you like.

Wait and watch. The volatility will almost certainly present buying opportunities.

Work your way into your portfolio over time. If prices go down, buy more. Plan to be fully invested within 12-24 months.

After you buy, put your coins into cold storage . Dont trade. Buy and hold for the long run.

Read the rest here:
100 of Bitcoins in 2010 would be worth 4.3million today but can it continue and how do you safely invest? - Mirror.co.uk

Coinbase, one of the worlds largest (if not the) largest cryptocurrency exchanges, has reversed its stance on Bitcoin Cash and said it will introduce support for the fork next year.

Coinbase was among numerous exchanges to opt out of trading Bitcoin Cash after it came into existence on August 1 on the grounds that it wasnt proven or safe. Beyond refusing to facilitate trading, Coinbase also said it wouldnt allow customers storing original Bitcoin on its platform to claim their Bitcoin Cash entitlement. Those who wanted it were told to remove their coins and go elsewhere to do that.

But now the company which was started by former Airbnb engineer Brian Armstrong (pictured above) and is reportedly raising funding at a $1 billion valuation has changed its stance slightly. It told customers via email that it will introduce support for Bitcoin Cash by January 1.

Once supported, customers will be able to withdraw Bitcoin Cash. Well make a determination at a later date about adding trading support, Coinbase said.

In other words, lets see what happens before we commit to trading

Thats almost certainly a response to anger from Coinbase customers, who threatened to move their coins elsewhere and, in some cases, take legal action over their Bitcoin Cash entitlement. (Tl;dr people like free stuff, especially people who are into crypto.)It is unclear exactly what impact this had on the Coinbase business, but signs arent great.One analytics firm estimated that its cold storage reserves dropped to half of their previous level following customer withdraws.

Yet, despite that, a number of Coinbase investors told Business Insider that they arent overly concerned about the pushback, while the overall future of Bitcoin Cash itself is unclear. Principally thats because the fork has the same mining difficulty as Bitcoin, but asmaller fraction of its hashrate.

Right now, Bitcoin Cash became the third largest cryptocurrency based on total coins in the market on day one, but its $7 billion market cap trails Bitcoin ($44 billion) and Ethereum ($21 billion) by some way. Its situation mayhave changed by January, too, while also Coinbase has tended to take a conservative approach to bringing new currencies on.

Right now it offers trading for Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin the latter of which was only added this past May despite gaining significant attention in 2013. Indeed, Litecoins founderhad been director of engineering at Coinbase for nearly four years before leaving this summer that gives some insight into how stringent its policy is.

Note: Article corrected to note that Litecoin founder Charlie Lee is no longer with Coinbase.

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Coinbase says it will support Bitcoin Cash after all but it isn't committed to trading yet - TechCrunch

Menant said Gatecoin would start supporting trade with "bitcoin cash". This is in contrast to Coinbase, the world's largest bitcoin exchange, which decided not to support the new cryptocurrency.

In a Tweet on Tuesday, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, said we "don't want to rush anything out," highlighting the uncertainty over "bitcoin cash's" future.

But the continuing debate over the underlying bitcoin technology continues. The fight was over how much to increase the block size of the blockchain.

To understand this, it's important to outline how transactions work. Transactions by users are gathered into "blocks" which is turned into a complex math solution. So-called miners, using high-powered computers work these solutions out to determine if the transaction is possible. Once other miners also check the puzzle is correct, the transactions are approved and the miners are rewarded in bitcoin.

Increasing the block size would boost transaction speeds. Some people wanted a solution that would dramatically increase the block size from its current 1 megabyte level. But the majority of the community have decided to increase the block size to 2 megabytes.

A full recap of what has happened can be found here. This 2MB increase is likely to come into effect in November, providing miners stick to their word and make the necessary software updates.

If this doesn't happen, then "bitcoin cash" could get a boost.

"If most miners decide that for economic reasons they prefer to mine larger blocks and commit more hashing power to Bcash, then it's likely more development work and user adoption would follow, and those conducting business with bitcoin may decide to adopt Bcash instead," Menant said.

"Yet for this to happen Bcash would need to prove that its technology can match the security features and reliability of bitcoin's software," he added, striking a note of caution.

Continue reading here:
'Bitcoin cash' potential limited, but a catalyst could be looming for it to take off - CNBC

Attention this week has so far focused on a group of bitcoin users that successfully split off the blockchain to form their own cryptocurrency.

But fascinating asthe real-time market creation of Bitcoin Cash has been,for those who have closely watched developments, August 1 marked another lesser-acknowledged milestone the passing of the deadline for a controversial scaling proposal Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP) 148.

That's when a vocal group of users had scheduleda so-called "Independence Day." The goal was to push through a long-stalled coding optimization calledSegregated Witness (SegWit), designed to increase and redefine the network's capacity. The software upgrade would find node operators (users who store transaction history) initiating the move, hoping to lead the way for miners and startups.

And while it's faded a bit into the background, you could argue that, even amidst a busy season for scaling proposals, BIP 148 was perhaps the most influential.

The scaling "agreement" Segwit2x followed soon after, proposing to add a feature that BIP 148 wouldn't have provided: a boost to the block size parameter. Bitcoin Cash was even more explicitly a response to BIP 148 hence, why both were scheduled for the same day.

Butthose two proposals had one other thing in common, and that was giving some degree of power over the software transition to theminersthat secure the blockchain.

Beforeits introduction, for example, SegWit had stalled for months due to its reliance on the idea miners would signal support toactivate the change. However, only about 25 to 50% of mining pools did so from November to June.

Then, suddenly, two weeks before the scheduled UASF, and with little time to spare, mining pools rallied around either Segwit2x or BIP 91 on its own, toactivate SegWit.

UASF supporters don't see this asa coincidence.

Blockchain startup founder Ragnar Lifthrasir, a public UASF proponent, told CoinDesk:

"UASF worked as designed and predicted, it is activating SegWit."

It's a narrative that adds evidence to the idea that some changes to the bitcoin protocol (and perhaps all public blockchains) are destined to be political.

As ethereum classic and bitcoin cash have now proved, there's capital to be created in splits. The more nuanced argument is that they also seek to aid research and understanding of the science behind open blockchains, though with economic risk to users.

In bitcoin, it could be said the scaling debate has called to mind the balance of power between its major network participants startups, miners, developers and users. And the argument continues to be that UASF was a movement of the people, one that like any social revolution, was perhaps destined to be feared by the powers that be.

While bitcoin users may be predisposed to such narratives, it's certainly one that has resonated with supporters.

"We found out that not just miners, but some VCs and bitcoin startups didn't like the power of users, that's why they came up with Segwit2x, to obscure UASF's success and precedent," Lifthrasir he said.

Heargues that it was a question of incentives. Mining pools didnt want to risk that their 12.5 bitcoin block rewards (worth approximately $33,000 today) would berejected, but they didn't want to support the UASF effort.

"This means hashing power follows nodes and users, not the reverse," Lifthrasir argued, and he isn't the only UASF supporter to feel this way (or that this is important).

"Basically, BIP 148 was an early success," remarked Bitcoin Core developer Luke Dashjr, one of the UASF'smore ardent supporters.

In the end, BIP 148 was sidestepped by another network proposal. But it's the mere threat of action, supporters argue, was enough.

Calin Culianu, a developer for Bitcoin Cash, the version of the bitcoin protocol boasting no SegWit and 8MB blocks, even agreed that Segwit2x was likely a response to BIP 148 on some level.

Although, Culianu has a different way of thinking about it, arguing that BIP 148 supporters used scare tactics to make it sound like it had more supportthan it did.

"Miners got antsy, people got scared and everyone met in New York to hash out a plan," he said, alluding to how Segwit2x was originally determined.

The question now seems whether this tactic is good for bitcoin's development.

Culianu almost seesawed on the question of whether UASF was a good thing for his project, as it could be said it spurred the "big block movement" to action.

He concluded:

"UASF was the spark that made all this happen, for better or for worse."

Image via Michael del Castillo for CoinDesk

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is an independent media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. Interested in offering your expertise or insights to our reporting? Contact us at [emailprotected].

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UASF Revisited: Will Bitcoin's User Revolt Leave a Lasting Legacy? - CoinDesk