$300 Million In Crypto Currency Lost FOREVER Thanks To A Bug In A Digital Wallet

$300 million worth of the cryptocurrency Ethereum has been almost definitely lost forever.  The losing of the currency was accidental and due to a bug in a digital wallet.

The Ethereum cryptocurrency has been lost after a series of bugs in a popular digital wallet service led one curious developer accidentally taking control of and then locking up the funds, according to reports.

The user, “devops199”, triggered the flaw completely accidentally. When they realized that they had taken control of the ether of other, they attempted to undo the damage by deleting the code which had transferred ownership of the funds. Rather than returning the money, however, the program simply locked all the funds in those multisignature wallets permanently, with no way to access them. “This means that currently no funds can be moved out of the multi-sig wallets,” Parity says in a security advisory.

Unlike most cryptocurrency hacks, however, the money wasn’t deliberately taken: it was effectively destroyed by accident. According to the Daily Mail, the lost money was in the form of Ether, the tradable currency that fuels the Ethereum distributed app platform, and was kept in digital multi-signature wallets built by a developer called Parity. These wallets require more than one user to enter their key before funds can be transferred.

On Tuesday, Parity revealed that, while fixing a bug that let hackers steal $32m out of few multi-signature wallets, it had inadvertently left the second flaw in its systems that allowed one user to become the sole owner of every single multi-signature wallet.

“We are analyzing the situation and will release an update with further details shortly,” Parity told users. Parity says that it is unable to confirm the exact amount lost and that the $300 million figure is “purely speculative”. The company also disputes that the currency is “lost.” They are arguing that the term “frozen” is more accurate. But if it is frozen, it appears that no-one has the ability to unfreeze the funds and there seems to be no resolution in sight.

“The Parity vulnerability was the result of an incorrectly coded smart contract used by the Parity wallet to store tokens on the Ethereum network,” said Dominic Williams, founder of blockchain firm DFINITY. “The vulnerability made it possible for anyone to ‘freeze’ the tokens held by that smart contract, making them immovable. At this time, the only method we are aware of to ‘unfreeze’ tokens held by the vulnerable smart contract would be to create a new ‘hard fork’ Ethereum client that deploys a fix. This would require every full node on the Ethereum network to upgrade by the date of the hard fork to stay in sync, including all miners, wallets, exchanges, etc.”

America is No Longer Top Dog: Chinese Military “Reaching Near-Parity” With the West

The United States military is without a doubt the most technologically advanced force on the planet, and has been since at least World War II. Most Western nations are likewise, heavily dependent on advanced technology. When the West wins wars, it’s not because of moxy or numbers or cunning. It’s because we can detonate our enemies from miles away on a whim.

In response, our rivals have spent decades trying to compensate with those aforementioned traits. They’re the ones who rely on fighting spirit, cannon fodder, and clever underhanded tactics. They, which includes Russia, China, and lord knows how many insurgents and terrorists, have mastered the domain of unconventional warfare. And they’ve done so by necessity. We’re a wealthy nation with an unbelievably massive military budget. They could never conduct enough scientific research or build enough advanced war machines to compete with us in a conventional war.

Or could they?

It appears that China might be able to. Or at least that’s what the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) thinks. They’re a British think tank that’s been around since 1958, and they have countless members who formerly worked for the British and American governments. The IISS specializes in researching geopolitical issues, and every year they publish the Military Balance report, which examines the military capabilities of the world’s nations. Their latest issue should give the American defense establishment pause.

“Western military technological superiority, once taken for granted, is increasingly challenged,” Dr. John Chipman, Director-General and Chief Executive of IISS, said in a statement. “We now judge that in some capability areas, particularly in the air domain, China appears to be reaching near-parity with the West.”

Instead of its usual practice of working on systems that imitate Soviet and Russian technology, China has shifted its efforts (and budget) to domestic research and development. Its Navy is currently working on three new advanced cruisers, 13 destroyers, and outfitting other ships with better radar.

Most shocking were the claims that China is making fast gains in the air war domain. This is an arena that Western nations have dominated since World War II. It could be argued that the United States hasn’t won any war since the 1940’s without that advantage. Now they’re catching up, partly with their own domestic military research, and partly with research that they’ve stolen from us.

So the question is, what happens if a nation that has already mastered unconventional warfare also reaches parity with the United States when it comes to conventional warfare? Let’s just say that the results won’t be pretty for us should we come to blows with China. Perhaps the Trump and his administration should tread lightly in East Asia, if they want to avoid a rather embarrassing conflict in that region.

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Author: Daniel Lang
Views: Read by 155 people
Date: February 18th, 2017
Website: http://www.SHTFplan.com

Copyright Information: This content has been contributed to SHTFplan by a third-party or has been republished with permission from the author. Please contact the author directly for republishing information.

Euro Crashes To 1.03 Handle For First Time Since 2003

Well for me I have lots of eagles, privated minted rounds, and 10 oz bars and the case for dimes is they are widely accepted by the average joe to be silver.  So come collapse it will make exchanges easy.  People may want me to have a 3rd party verify my eagles/bars but everyone knows a dime when they see one.

Also food will need to be bought with them and I don"t need to buy 3 months of food at a time with an eagle.  I"ll be spending my eagles on cars.