IEEE to issue blockchain skill certificates on Avalanche in India

December 6, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Indian government set to introduce rules against deepfake menace

November 24, 2023 Coin Telegraph

In talks with stakeholders, Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw aims to finalize the Indian government’s AI deepfake regulations in the coming weeks.

India is formulating regulations to oversee deepfakes, the country’s Minister for Railways, Communications, Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Nov. 23, expanding on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement the day before about his concerns about the technology.

According to a Reuters report, during discussions with academics, industry associations and social media firms, Vaishnaw said the Indian government aims to finish drafting the regulations in the coming weeks.

Deepfakes are realistic and often convincing artificial intelligence (AI)-generated videos or audio recordings that manipulate or replace the likeness and voice of a person in an existing video or audio clip. In the initial comments during a G20 virtual summit, Modi urged international leaders to collaborate in regulating AI and expressed worries about the adverse effects of deepfakes on society.

In the report, Vaishnaw said the regulatory drafting process will consider penalties for the individual uploading the content and the social media platform where it is posted. This development occurs as nations globally scramble to establish regulations for governing AI.

In October, United States President Joe Biden signed an executive order requiring developers of AI systems that pose risks to U.S. national security, the economy, public health or safety to share the results of safety tests with the U.S. government before they are released to the public.

The United Nations has also formed a 39-member advisory body to tackle governance challenges in AI, and European legislators have crafted draft rules for potential approval next month. In November, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service — Canada’s primary national intelligence agency — raised concerns about the disinformation campaigns conducted across the internet using AI deepfakes.

In August, the Chinese police announced closer scrutiny of the Web3 sector, with Jinfeng Sun, political commissar of the Network Security Bureau, disclosing that there had been 79 cases of fraud involving deepfake AI, such as impersonation via digital face-swaps, leading to the arrest of 515 individuals.

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Indian Supreme court rejects crypto petition, highlights legislative nature

November 11, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Listening to the plea, the bench headed by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) remarked that the petitioner’s demands are more legislative in nature.

The Indian Supreme Court declined to consider a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) that aimed to establish regulations and a framework of guidelines for cryptocurrency trading in India.

According to a report, the bench headed by the Chief Justice of India (CJI), after listening to the plea, remarked that the petitioner’s demands are more legislative in nature. Given the petition’s character, the bench, including Justice JD Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, dismissed the plea. The Supreme Court noted that despite the petitioner filing a PIL requesting regulations and guidelines for cryptocurrency and its trading, the underlying objective is to secure bail.

Significantly, Manu Prashant Wig, the petitioner, is presently held in custody by the Delhi Police in connection to a cryptocurrency case. The Economic Offence Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police filed a case in 2020, accusing Wig of enticing individuals to invest in crypto with promises of higher returns.

According to the report, Wig served as one of the directors at Blue Fox Motion Picture Limited, enticing individuals to invest. Subsequently, victims reported the fraud to the Economic Offence Wing (EOW) in Delhi. A total of 133 investors or victims who had invested their funds, filed a case stating Wig deceived them.

Seeking relief from judicial custody, the petitioner, Manu Prashant, filed a PIL demanding regulations and a framework for crypto trading in India. Despite the Supreme Court rejecting the PIL, the bench permitted the petitioner, currently in jail, to pursue legal remedies and approach other relevant authorities.

During the court hearing, the bench led by CJI Chandrachud advised the petitioner to approach a different court for bail. Expressing reservations about the plea for crypto trading regulations, the court noted that such demands fall within the legislative domain. The court highlighted its inability to issue directives under Article 32 of the Indian Constitution.

The status of crypto trading in India remains debatable due to the absence of standardized rules, guidelines, or specific frameworks for handling cryptocurrencies. India is reportedly developing a cryptocurrency regulatory framework, drawing from joint recommendations by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Financial Stability Board (FSB). The outcome could manifest as legal legislation within the next five to six months, as per Cointelegraph’s recent coverage.

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India trained 3,000 police officials on crypto investigations in 2022–2023

November 9, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

The Narcotics Control Bureau and the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre trained 141 officials and over 2,800 officers in the financial year 2022–2023.

The annual report from India’s Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) revealed that officials from various cybercrime and police departments were trained in cryptocurrency forensics and investigation during the financial year 2022–2023.

The MHA highlighted that, under the Narcotics Control Bureau — India’s central law enforcement and intelligence agency — 141 officers were trained on the investigations of darknet and cryptocurrencies and other workshops related to digital footprints and gathering intelligence and evidence from open source and social media, to name a few.

Additionally, the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre trained more than 2,800 cyber police officials in crypto forensics and investigations and other emerging technologies like anonymization networks and investigating misuse of mobile applications in cyberspace.

While India prepares to tackle possible crypto-related crimes amid greater adoption, the nation continues to explore mainstream use cases in blockchain. India’s state-run oil and gas company, Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), recently launched a blockchain system to enable automated verification of purchase orders (POs).

HPCL partnered with the blockchain software firm Zupple Labs to integrate its blockchain-based digital credentialing technology into the purchase order system.

“The implementation helps to automate the verification of HPCL POs to external parties,” a spokesperson for HPCL told Cointelegraph. “This works by integrating the blockchain system with HPCL’s internal e-PO and generates tamper-evident verifiable POs,” the representative noted.

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BRICS Currency ‘Almost Ready’, Will Be Much More Attractive Than US Dollar, Pound and Euro, Says Ex-Russian Minister

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India state refiner HPCL to use blockchain to verify purchase orders

October 19, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Hindustan Petroleum, one of India’s largest oil and gas companies, is launching a blockchain system to enable automated verification of purchase orders.

India’s state-run refiner, Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), one of India’s largest oil and gas companies, is launching a blockchain system to enable automated verification of purchase orders (POs).

HPCL has partnered with the blockchain software firm Zupple Labs to integrate its blockchain-based digital credentialing technology into the purchase order system, the firms said in a joint announcement.

Called LegitDoc, Zupple Labs’ verification tech enables HPCL to issue digital POs to its vendors without having to manually verify the PO requests. From a third-party verifier’s perspective, the project provides a facility to directly verify the validity of POs in an automated way on the HPCL website.

“These POs will be dispatched to vendors which in turn can be shared with third parties. Any third-party verifier can directly verify these POs on the HPCL vendor portal verification application.”

According to the HPCL spokesperson, the company has been collaborating with Zupple Labs on the blockchain project over the past six months. “HPCL has completed building the blockchain PO system successfully and the same facility will be made official to the vendors within this month,” the representative stated.

The spokesperson said that HPCL has implemented the blockchain-based PO system on both private blockchain and public blockchain.

According to Zupple Labs co-founder and business lead Neil Martis, the PO verification system has involved the implementation of “two parallel blockchains” used as settlement layers, including the public Near blockchain and the private Hyperledger Fabric blockchain. Martis noted that the latter was used as part of HPCL’s Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery strategy. According to Zupple Labs, HPCL issued 3,000 POs via the facility as of mid-October 2023.

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G20 adopts IMF-FSB Synthesis paper on crypto regulation

October 13, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

The Group of Twenty accepted the regulatory roadmap proposed in a joint Synthesis paper of the International Monetary Fund and the Financial Stability Board in September.

On Oct. 13, the Group of Twenty (G20), an international forum for the governments and central banks of countries with developed and developing economies, unanimously adopted the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Communique during its meeting in Marrakesh, Morocco.

Regarding crypto, the G20 accepted the regulatory roadmap proposed in a joint Synthesis paper of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Financial Stability Board (FSB) in September. As the G20 statement goes:

“We call for swift and coordinated implementation of the G20 Roadmap, including implementation of policy frameworks; outreach beyond G20 jurisdictions; global coordination, cooperation and information sharing; and addressing data gaps.”

The IMF-FSB Synthesis Paper advocates for comprehensive supervisory oversight of crypto instead of a blanket ban. Its high-level recommendations include cross-border cooperation and information sharing between regulators, a demand for comprehensive governance and risk management frameworks for crypto companies, and a guarantee of access to relevant data provided by companies to the authorities.

According to the Paper, the first review of the proposed measures' implementation status should happen by the end of 2025.

In October, the IMF published another working paper titled “Assessing Macrofinancial Risks from Crypto Assets.” Within it, the IMF researchers propose a crypto-risk assessment matrix (C-RAM) for countries to spot indicators and triggers of potential risks in the sector.

Regulators worldwide have been calling for a global framework on crypto recently. Mário Centeno, the governor of Banco de Portugal, urged for international cooperation to set up a “robust framework” and avoid the possibility of “regulatory arbitrage.” Roughly the same sentiment was expressed by the executive director of strategy, policy and control at the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, who prompted about the inconsistencies existing on a global scale.

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CoinDCX exchange expands self-custody wallet to support 155 countries

October 5, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

With Transak’s integration, CoinDCX’s Okto wallet has increased the number of supported jurisdictions from 60 to more than 150.

Major Indian cryptocurrency exchange CoinDCX is expanding its self-custody wallet, Okto, by integrating major on-ramp platform Transak.

Okto, a multichain cryptocurrency wallet launched by CoinDCX in August 2022, has integrated the Transak platform to scale the wallet’s global support, the firm announced to Cointelegraph on Oct. 5. The integration is immediately available on Okto, the company said.

With the new integration, the Okto wallet has increased the number of previously supported 60 countries to 155 jurisdictions, CoinDCX and Okto co-founder Neeraj Khandelwal said.

By integrating Transak, Okto now specifically allows users to buy cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) directly on Okto, using a large number of fiat currencies, including the U.S. dollar, the euro, the Hong Kong dollar and others.

Transak is the first and currently the only on-ramp solution introduced on Okto, Khandelwal noted. Prior to this integration, the only way of sending crypto to Okto was by sending the digital currency from an external wallet like MetaMask, Khandelwal added, stating:

“The integration of Transak now allows users to seamlessly convert fiat to crypto right within the app. Prior to this integration, users had to transfer funds from another decentralized wallet, such as MetaMask.”

While Transak supports around 160 tokens, Okto allows users to store more than 1,000 tokens across multiple chains, including Polygon, Fantom, Avalanche and others, according to the app’s description on the App Store. However, according to Okto’s spokesperson, the wallet allows users to have up to 3,000 tokens in the wallet.

While Okto announced the news about Transak support on Oct. 5, the process of rolling out the on-ramp solution started a few months ago. Some online users in India reported having issues with Transak as early as August 2023 as Okto was testing the on-ramp solution. “The process of integrating began in April 2023,” a spokesperson for the firm told Cointelegraph, adding that the official rollout to all customers occurred in mid-September.

*Okto reporting working with Transak in August 2023. Source: X*

Transak is a global Web3 payment and onboarding infrastructure provider aiming to connect traditional finance and digital assets. It is a popular on-ramp solution in the cryptocurrency industry, with platforms like MetaMask, Coinbase and PancakeSwap utilizing its services.

Earlier this week, Transak announced an integration with The Open Network’s (TON) wallet known as Tonkeeper. The event marked Transak’s entry into the TON ecosystem, enabling the wallet to buy Toncoin (TON) directly with fiat from more than 150 countries.

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