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Government vows cyber encryption crackdown after Manchester … – The Independent

Theresa May is expected to signal a new crackdown on encrypted messaging apps after the deaths of 22 people in the Manchester attack.

The Prime Minister, addressing leaders of fellow G7 countries in Sicily on Friday, is to warn that governments need to be tougher on tech companies in the face of a growing terror threat.

Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary,has already reinforced the UK governments commitment to make tech companies hand over encrypted messages in the aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing.

We need to do more, and we need to work with them to make sure they help us to do more, MsRudd said in an ITV interview Wednesday.

Conservative ministers plan to push through new legislation which would force tech giants such as WhatsApp and Telegram to decrypt communications, according to a report in The Sun.

The encrypted messaging app Telegram has become one of the primary means of communication for Isis, as Facebook and Twitter have increased their efforts to shut down pro-Isis accounts.

Amber Rudd says WhatsApp's encryption of messaging may come to an end after Westminster terror attack

One government minister told The Sun: We will do this as soon as we can after the election, as long as we get back in. The level of threat clearly proves there is no more time to waste now.

Under the new orders, known as Technical Capability Notices, MI5 and the Police would reportedly be able to order messages to be decrypted if they suspected a service was being used to conduct criminal activity.

However, its not yet clear how, and if, this would work, as end-to-end encryption techniques are designed to make decryption impossible.

Last month, a draft ofnew legislationwas leaked to digital rights campaigners, sparking alarm about theexpansion of government surveillance.

The proposals in the paper included real-time email and message monitoring, and the removal of encryption by inserting a backdoor into messaging services.

The Open Rights Group is campaigning against the expansion of government powers, and warned in a statement on Thursday that proposed new surveillance methods could actually empower criminals and terrorists.

Apetition started by the group says: Vulnerable groups will have their safety compromised if services like WhatsApp and Signal are forced to build backdoors.

Lawyers will lose client confidentiality, victims of police misconduct will be spied on, journalists unable to protect sources, and domestic abusers gifted new ways to exploit tech vulnerabilities to spy on partners.

The UK Home Office already has some of the most aggressive surveillance powers in the world. This is nothing more than a power grab.

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Caroline Lucas in ending end-to-end encryption gaffe on Andrew Marr show – iNews

Caroline Lucas has been forced to clarify the Green Partys position on mass internet surveillance after accidentally saying she wanted to ban companies from using end-to-end encryption as part of the fight against terrorism.

During a live television interview on Sunday morning, the Green Partys co-leader said services such as the popular messaging service WhatsApp should be stopped from scrambling peoples data.

Too many ends in one question! To be clear, Greens do not want to end end to end encryption

Caroline Lucas

Many technology companies currently use end-to-end encryption to protect their users against eavesdropping. However critics of the measures argue that such security makes them more attractive for terrorists looking for a safe way to communicate.

End-to-end encryption renders messages meaningless if they are intercepted by a third party. The potential issue with banning end-to-end encryption is that moves to stop such data scrambling could allow everyones messages to be read- by security services as well as other potential snoopers not just those of suspected terrorists.

Read more:Amber Rudd must realise a back door in encryption wont make us more secure itll help criminals

Asked on the BBCs Andrew Marr Show if she was in favour of putting a stop to this, Ms Lucas replied: Do I think that ending end-to-end encryption is wrong? No.

But shortly after her appearance on the programme, she reversed her position, telling her Twitter followers that she had misunderstood the question.

Too many ends in one question! To be clear, Greens do not want to end end to end encryption, she wrote.

The partys manifesto states that the internet should be free of state and corporate surveillance to protect the rights and freedoms of individual citizens.

Our policy is about opposing the mass industrial scale surveillance of emails, she said, claiming that having to sift through so much information could actually make the job of the security services more difficult.

The bigger you make the haystack in which youre looking for the needle, the harder it is to find it, she added.

Encryption explained as simply as possible

Having all of that extra surveillance doesnt work. Its targeted surveillance that really makes the difference.

She also pointed out that she and other Green Party colleagues such as Baroness Jenny Jones were on a list of UK domestic extremists due to their environmental activism, arguing that this was a waste of police resources.

The issue of end-to-end encryption has come back under the spotlight in the wake of last weeks terrorist attack on Manchester.

Following the Westminster attack in March, Home Secretary Amber Rudd said it was completely unacceptable that security services were unable to read WhatsApp messages sent by the perpetrator Khalid Masood.

However she too appeared to misunderstand the intricacies of such technology in an embarrassing appearance on the Andrew Marr show.

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Home secretary Amber Rudd denies she wanted an encryption ban and says progress is being made with tech giants – City A.M.

Home secretary Amber Rudd has denied she suggested an encryption ban, and said the government was making "good progress" with firms using end-to-end encryption.

In March, Rudd came in for criticism after saying end-to-end encryption on messaging apps like WhatsApp and iMessage was "completely unacceptable".

Read more: WhatsApp encryption is "completely unacceptable" warns home secretary

"We need to make sure that organisations like WhatsApp, and there are plenty of others like that, don't provide a secret place for terrorist to communicate with each other," she said in the wake of the attack on parliament, when it emerged the attacker Khalid Masood used WhatsApp minutes before the attack.

Speaking today on the Andrew Marr show, when asked about banning end-to-end encryption in its entirety and the damage it would do to the internet, Rudd said: "I never did suggest it."

"What I have always said is the internet provides an incredibly important place for people to do business, encryption is important for banking, for everything else as you say," she said. "But we need to do better to stop terrorists being able to use it."

"We are making good progress with the firms that have put in place end-to-end encryption. Some of them are being more constructive than others, but we will continue to build on that," Rudd said.

"The area that I am most concerned about is the internet companies who are continuing to publish the hate publications, the hate material that is contributing to radicalising people in this country."

Discussing terrorism threats and the UK's security in the wake of the Manchester attack last week which left 22 dead, Rudd said the police and security services have the tools they need and further legislation isn't required.

She said the government has started to use temporary exclusion orders (TEOs) for the first time; until recently, zero had been issued. Rudd would not disclose the number that have now been issued.

Introduced by David Cameron during his tenure as Prime Minister, the TEO are meant to disrupt and control the return to the UK of British citizens who have engaged in terrorism-related activity abroad.

They are approved by a judge before being issued by the home secretary and make it illegal for the person in question to return to the UK without informing the authorities and agreeing to be monitored.

Their travel documents are cancelled and they are also added to watchlists.

Read more: Here's what Tim Berners-Lee had to say about encryption after Rudd comments

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Terror Posts, Encryption Targeted by U.K. Following Attack … – Bloomberg

The U.K. government urged social-media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter to tackle terror posts on their sites as it reinforced its demand to allow access to encrypted messages.

We need to do more and we need to work with them to make sure they help us to do more, Home Secretary Amber Rudd said in an ITV interview Wednesday.

Following the attack by a suicide bomber who killed 22 people at a Manchester pop concert on Monday, supporters of Islamic State published a number of posts on Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Telegram boasting about the incident. Security services are investigating the possibility that the bomber, who was known to the authorities, was part of a wider network.

We mustnt underestimate that ISIS really want to commit these acts and are constantly trying to radicalize people, Rudd said.

Facebook and Twitter declined to comment. Spokespeople from Telegram could not be reached for comment.

Prime Minister Theresa Mays Conservative Party has taken a hard line against social-media platforms following the revelation that Khalid Masood, who killed five people in London in March, had used WhatsApp shortly before he began his rampage.

Rudd said at the time that Facebooks WhatsApp messaging system should open its encryption to security services and urged online companies to be more aggressive in shutting down sites exploited by terrorists.

U.K. legislation is set to force companies such as Facebook Inc. and its subsidiary WhatsApp Inc. to allow the U.K. government access to encrypted services upon request.

If approved, lawmakers are keen to apply this obligation to social-media platforms, said one government official speaking on condition of anonymity, adding that the companies have varied in their willingness to deal with government requests.

Tech giants such as Facebook, Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc. have been keen to protect their encryption capabilities. Apple and the U.S. government engaged in a high-profile battle over data privacy and encryption following the 2015 terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California.

The Manchester attack comes just two weeks before a U.K. general election. The Conservatives, predicted to win the vote, have proposed tighter rules for how companies deal with hate speech and illegal content. In May, Parliaments Home Affairs Committee said Facebook, Google and Twitter were shamefully far from effectively managing extremist and hate content.

We need an international solution and the U.K. is going to take the lead in taking that forward, Rudd told ITV.

BetweenJuly and December last year, Twitter received 681 requests from U.K. law enforcement for user data, relating to 1,017 accounts, according to a report from the company published in March.

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Terror Posts, Encryption Targeted by U.K. Following Attack ... - Bloomberg

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All Top 20 Altcoins Fall By At Least 30%, Ripple Down to $6.2 Billion – CryptoCoinsNews

Bitcoin, which experienced a 20 percent price drop from $2,500 to $1,900, actually had a relatively decent day.

All top 20 alternative cryptocurrencies (altcoins) declined by at least 30 percent on March 27, with some cryptocurrencies demonstrating a sharp decline in price by around 40 percent.

Ripple experienced a massive short-term decline in market cap, after seeing a staggering $10 billion decrease within a week. In a seven-day period, Ripples market cap plunged from $17 billion to $6.2 billion. On May 27, Ripple also experienced a nearly 50 percent drop in price, triggering concerns from investors in Japan and South Korea, where the majority of Ripples trading volume is concentrated in.

Other prominent blockchain networks and cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum, Litecoin, Ethereum Classic and NEM have also seen a sharp drop in market cap, as the entire cryptocurrency market crashed overnight.

Ryan Selkis, former BitGo executive, previously stated that bitcoin has become a conservative investment for cryptocurrency investors. An increasing number of traders and investors have begun to eye ICO tokens and other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum and NEM that often demonstrate higher returns and larger fluctuations.

I dont know when it happened, but at some point it became relatively conservative to invest in bitcoin, which is mind-blowing, noted Selkis.

However, it is also important to consider the dependence of altcoins on bitcoin and the network effect it presents over the cryptocurrency market. Often, as seen on May 27, significant drop in the price of bitcoin leads to the decline of other altcoins. In most cases, altcoins suffer deeper declines in market cap and price in contrast to bitcoin.

Today for instance, bitcoin saw a 20 percent decline in price while altcoins such as Ripple, NEM, Stellar Lumens and Golem experienced nearly a 50 percent decline in market cap. After dipping below $1,900, bitcoin price has already recovered beyond $2,050. Meanwhile, the majority of altcoins are struggling to recover and regain momentum.

Bitcoin has also regained its 50% dominance over the cryptocurrency market, which it failed to secure over the past few months, primarily due to the strong rally of Ethereum and Ripple.

Unexpectedly, the majority of investors within the cryptocurrency market believes that bitcoin will not be the dominant blockchain after the market matures. Even successful billionaire early-stage investors such as Fred Wilson have previously stated that bitcoin will not be the dominant blockchain. At the Techonomy NYC event, Wilson stated:

Bitcoin probably will not be the dominant public blockchain.

Yet, bitcoins dominance and influence over other altcoins have been evident on todays decline of the cryptocurrency market. Furthermore, bitcoin accounts for over 50 percent of most altcoins trading volumes. In other words, the BTC/altcoin pair is usually the largest trading pair for all altcoins including Ripple and Ethereum.

Casual traders and small-scale investors follow mainstream and influential figures such as Fred Wilson for investment advice and outlook on bitcoin. The truth is, most of these experts outside of the cryptocurrency market and industry have been inaccurate in predicting future events. Wilson previously stated that a fork was imminent and that Open Bazaar was going to be the killer app of bitcoin. None of the two predictions turned out to be correct.

Investors should take away two important lessons from todays altcoin or cryptocurrency market decline: altcoins investors turn back to bitcoin in times of instability and uncertainty and bitcoin often recovers from short-term decline caused by bubbles and major corrections.

Featured image from Shutterstock.

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All Top 20 Altcoins Fall By At Least 30%, Ripple Down to $6.2 Billion - CryptoCoinsNews

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Bitcoin Is Bigger Than Ever, And Here’s Why That Matters – Forbes


Forbes
Bitcoin Is Bigger Than Ever, And Here's Why That Matters
Forbes
The money you've been using all your life is backed by a government of some sort, and it exists in a tangible way. Bitcoin is neither tangible nor backed by anyone, but it's still worth a great deal to some people. This digital currency began ...
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Bubble? So What? Token Summit Marks Cryptocurrency’s Revitalization – Forbes


Forbes
Bubble? So What? Token Summit Marks Cryptocurrency's Revitalization
Forbes
It was cold. It was raining. And it was the final gathering in a week of back-to-back cryptocurrency and blockchain conferences. Attendees should have been inclined to flake or tempted to sell their tickets for a tidy sum. Instead, rumor was that, for ...

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Cryptocurrency Update: Strong Bounce After the Massacre | Hacked … – Hacked

Hacked: Hacking Finance Posted by Mate Cser on May 28th, 2017. Mate Cser

Trader and financial analyst, with 10 years of experience in the field. An expert in technical analysis and risk management, but also an avid practitioner of value investment and passive strategies, with a passion towards anything that is connected to the market.

The major coins are sporting massive gains this morning after the crash of the previous sessions with Bitcoin trading near the $2250 level after bouncing off the $1875 support. As long as the short-term downtrend is intact, bounces should be treated with a grain of salt, while keeping an eye on the crucial support/resistance level just above 2200.

NEM and ETC are up by around 50% from their minimum levels, and Ethereum also jumped by 35% today, while the other majors are trading 20-30% higher. Among the rising starts, Golem is showing the most relative strength, as it is trading very close to its recent highs after a whopping 70% daily rally.

The charts still look wounded concerning short-term trends, despite the quick recovery, so more consolidation is expected before a sustained move higher. Given tomorrows US Memorial Day holiday, Tuesdays session might be very important.

Stay safe out there!

Feedback or Requests?

Trader and financial analyst, with 10 years of experience in the field. An expert in technical analysis and risk management, but also an avid practitioner of value investment and passive strategies, with a passion towards anything that is connected to the market.

Bitcoin Bitcoin spiked down towards the first main support zone

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ViaBTC goes live with its cryptocurrency exchange service – CryptoNinjas

Popular Chinese mining pool ViaBTC has gone live with its cryptocurrency exchange before its planned launch date of June. The exchange can be reached at viabtc.cn. Initially, ViaBTC will focus on domestic Chinese users, the company has plans to then further expand out internationally.

This was made possible through an investment of $2.9 million from Bitmain Technologies back in April.

The new exchange includes a high-speed matching engine, multilateral security protection, 100% excess reserves with rapid deposits and withdrawals.

ViaBTC exchange lists, BTC/CNY, ETH/CNY, and ETH/BTC.

ViaBTC entered into Bitcoin industry in June 2016 with a professional pool service and cloud mining products and has since built up a world-wide reputation in the Bitcoin community. The pool hashrate reached a record high in September last year, rising at a time to second in the world. ViaBTC has built a user base of nearly 10,000, among which 80% are from outside China.

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Top 5 Best-Looking Cryptocurrency Software Wallets – The Merkle

When people experiment with a cryptocurrency wallet, there are different needs to cater to. Some people like advanced trading options, whereas others just want a wallet solution that looks good. Thankfully, there are quite a few good-looking cryptocurrency wallets out there. Do keep in mind this is all subject to personal preferences and need. Below are some of the wallets that we think look pretty decent.

The Mobile Bitcoin wallet is quite an interesting project. It is available to mobile users around the world, and offers an elegant yet clutter-free user interface. Users can quickly convert their Bitcoin balance to many different currencies, all of which are presented in the form of one screen. It is a great wallet for novice Bitcoin users, to say the least. Moreover, Movi users can send Bitcoin to all contacts using the wallet as well, which adds a massive convenience factor.

Although web wallets should usually be avoided when it comes to storing large amounts of coins, Waterhole is quite a pleasant sight for sore eyes. Luckily, the wallet is also available for mobile devices, which makes it more secure. This wallet was well-received by the ZCash community, as it is is a beautifully designed wallet, to say the least. It is also packed with a ton of features, including a built-in marketplace. Waterhole supports both ZCash and Bitcoin at its current stage.

Although the Coinomi wallet should need no further introduction, a lot of people may still be unfamiliar with it. It is one of the few multi-currency wallet solutions that is both pleasing on the eye and user-friendly. As of right now, the wallet supports Bitcoin, Dogecoin, Litecoin, and a handful of other currencies. What makes Coinomi stand out are the bright colors and user-friendly approach to the concept of a cryptocurrency wallet. The built-in exchange service should not be overlooked either.

It is not hard to see why the Exodus wallet is gaining a lot of attention as of late. The developers of this wallet have done a stellar job to make it look feature-rich, vibrant, and clutter-free all at the same time. It is the representation of what most people would seek from a cryptocurrency wallet, without unnecessary bells and whistles. As far as desktop clients go, Exodus should be in the top three for nearly all cryptocurrency enthusiasts.

It is impossible to deny the success of the Jaxx wallet over the past year or so. Not only are the developers slowly integrating support for additional currencies and assets, but the visual portion of the wallet is a sight to behold as well. Most people want a solution to store their digital wealth and not be burdened with features and information they couldnt care less about.

That is what the Jaxx wallet does best, and it does so on a level most other wallets will never attain. What makes this project even more attractive is how the wallet continues to support more digital currencies and coins as time progresses. In recent news, the Jaxx team announced they will enable support for additional currencies and assets throughout the rest of the year.

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