Donald Trump is expected to sign the GENIUS Act into law Friday, securing his first big win as a self-described "pro-crypto president." The act is the first major piece of cryptocurrency legislation passed in the US.
The House of Representatives voted to pass the GENIUS Act on Thursday, approving the same bill that the Senate passed last month. The law provides a federal framework for stablecoins, a form of cryptocurrency that's considered less volatile than other cryptocurrencies, as each token is backed by the US dollar or other supposedly low-risk assets.
The GENIUS Act is expected to spur more widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies, since stablecoins are often used to move funds between different tokens. It could become a gateway for many Americans who are otherwise shy about investing in cryptocurrencies, which is what the industry wants. Ahead of Thursday's vote, critics had warned that Republicans were rushing the pro-industry bill without ensuring adequate consumer protections, though, seemingly setting Americans up to embrace stablecoins as legitimate so-called "cash of the blockchain" without actually insuring their investments.
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A former cop in the United Kingdom was sentenced to five and a half years in prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to covering up his theft of 50 bitcoins seized during an investigation into the now-defunct illicit dark web marketplace Silk Road.
In 2014, the former UK National Crime Agency (NCA) officer, Paul Chowles, assisted in the arrest of Thomas White, a man "who had launched Silk Road 2.0 less than a month after the FBI had shut down the original site in 2013," the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said in a press release.
Chowles was tapped to analyze and extract "relevant data and cryptocurrency" from White's seized devices, specifically due to Chowles' reputation for being "technically minded and very aware of the dark web and cryptocurrencies," CPS said.
© Paul Chowles via CPS.gov.UK
It's "Crypto Week" in Congress, and experts continue to warn that legislation Donald Trump wants passed quickly could give the president ample opportunities to grift while leaving Americans more vulnerable to scams and financial ruin.
Perhaps most controversial of the bills is the one that's closest to reaching Trump's desk, the GENIUS Act, which creates a framework for banks and private companies to issue stablecoins. After passing in the Senate last month, the House of Representatives is hoping to hold a vote as soon as Thursday, insiders told Politico.
Stablecoins are often hyped as a more reliable form of cryptocurrency, considered the "cash of the blockchain" because their value can be pegged to the US dollar, Delicia Hand, Consumer Reports' senior director monitoring digital marketplaces, told Ars.
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The Israel-linked hacker group known as Predatory Sparrow has carried out some of the most disruptive and destructive cyberattacks in history, twice disabling thousands of gas station payment systems across Iran and once even setting a steel mill in the country on fire. Now, in the midst of a new war unfolding between the two countries, they appear to be bent on burning Iran's financial system.
Predatory Sparrow, which often goes by its Farsi name, Gonjeshke Darande, in an effort to appear as a homegrown hacktivist organization, announced in a post on on its X account Wednesday that it had targeted the Iranian crypto exchange Nobitex, accusing the exchange of enabling sanctions violations and terrorist financing on behalf of the Iranian regime. According to cryptocurrency tracing firm Elliptic, the hackers destroyed more than $90 million in Nobitex holdings, a rare instance of hackers burning crypto assets rather than stealing them.
“These cyberattacks are the result of Nobitex being a key regime tool for financing terrorism and violating sanctions,” the hackers posted to X. “Associating with regime terror financing and sanction violation infrastructure puts your assets at risk.”
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Critics have long warned that Donald Trump's pro-cryptocurrency push as president, coupled with his links to his family's growing crypto empire, creates substantial conflicts of interest that must be probed.
But so far, nothing has stopped Trump's family from seemingly benefiting from the presidency while expanding their empire. And now, Trump is rushing regulation through Congress that many Democrats fear could create his biggest conflict of interest yet.
On Tuesday, the Senate passed the GENIUS Act, a bill that will regulate stablecoins in the US, establishing guardrails and consumer protections that may spur wider crypto adoption nationwide. Unlike more volatile forms of cryptocurrency—like Trump's controversial memecoin—stablecoins' value can be pegged to the US dollar. The crypto industry is hoping the House of Representatives will quickly send the bill to Trump's desk, which Trump has demanded happen by August.
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Police have arrested a third suspect linked to one of the most extreme bitcoin-related kidnapping and torture cases in the United States, The New York Times reported.
The arrest came after an Italian man, Michael Valentino Teofrasto Carturan, escaped a luxury Manhattan townhouse after three weeks of alleged imprisonment.
Running to a traffic agent for help, he later told police that he was tortured by colleagues for his bitcoin password, "bound with electrical cords and whipped with a gun," his feet submerged in water while a Taser gun sent jolts through his body, the NYT reported. At times he feared for his life—allegedly once held suspended from the ledge of the fifth-story building—but he seemingly never gave up his password, a resistance that only prompted more extreme violence.
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