Alleged theft attempt, BTC giveaway, Amsterdam hackathon, upcoming Bitcoin Fun Fair, and other events in Cointelegraph’s news roundup for Wednesday, January 28

‘Goxed’ in China

Chinese Bitcoin exchange 796 mistakenly lost 1000 BTC in a mishandled customer service request. Nelson Yu, President of Americas Division at 796, told Cointelegraph:

"In the last 24 hours, our security team worked around the clock to trace back the codes and processes. At this moment, we have a pretty good idea of exactly how they did it. This was not a generalized attack. The hacker’s strategy was precisely calculated and well targeted to compromise a certain weakness on our server.

Precisely speaking, the wallet system is not affected at all in this event. The theft happened during the transaction of the fund. That’s where the hacker attacked.

Due to this nature, major shareholders have carried out their obligation to our customers in covering this loss of fund. The remedy came from the major shareholders’ unpaid dividend."

Amsterdam Hackathon

"Risk free" wallet NoRiskWallet won the Amsterdam Bitcoin Hackathon with innovative software that eliminates the need of confirmations when transacting bitcoins. The system is based on Bitcoin multi-signature addresses (2 of 2) used between a customer and NoRiskWallet, and a merchant and NoRiskWallet. Funds from NoRiskWallet and a customer are locked in multisignature addresses until the funds are spent or, in the worst case, until the deadline set by the user is reached which will then be returned to the original owners.

Alleged scam

Several Redditors reported that users of MultiBit, a popular lightweight Bitcoin wallet, have been the latest targets of a phishing scam attempt. The alleged phishing scam consists in an email that mentions the release of a critical update of the wallet software, with "major bug fixes." While it is still too early for speculations, users are asked to avoid the update at all costs until things get clearer, reported NewsBTC.

Venture capital

Japan-based Bitcoin services firm bitFlyer announced it had closed its third round of funding amounting of 130m JPY, or US$1.1m. The funding will be allocated to settling overseas offices, improving security, recruiting new talents, accelerating service development and carrying out marketing campaigns. Investors in the round include Barry Silbert's Bitcoin Opportunity Corp, Recruit Holdings Ltd. subsidiary RSP Fund No. 5, and GMO Venture Partners, reported CoinDesk.

Bitcoin giveaway

Following the success of the MIT Bitcoin giveaway last year, Montreal's Bitcoin Embassy announced it will be giving away bitcoins to 600 students attending McGill University. While the amount is significantly lower than the MIT project, the goal remains the same: familiarize young people to the technology.

Fun Fair in Stockholm

Bitcoin Fun Fair will be held February 14 -15, in Stockholm, Sweden. The event is expected to be the world's largest Bitcoin marketplace, exhibition, music and arts event, deli, a theater as well as a tech show, and unlike conventional Bitcoin event, Bitcoin Fun Fair will focus on personal use of the technology.

Reddit plans

Reddit's cryptocurrency engineer, Ryan X. Charles, revealed how he aims to enable P2P payments on the popular social networking service. While Charles still qualified the service as a "proof of concept" which might be subject to changes, the news attracted hundreds of comments and reactions, mostly positive, reported CoinDesk.

Back in December 2014, Reddit already proved its sympathy towards cryptocurrencies when the service announced it was working on a new decentralized digital asset project based on blockchain technology called reddit notes

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