Shaun Bridges, 35, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco after pleading guilty in August to money laundering in the second criminal case to be brought against the former agent, prosecutors said.Bridges, who served in the Secret Service’s Baltimore field office, was sentenced in 2015 to 71 months in prison for diverting to his personal account over $800,000 worth of bitcoins during the Silk Road probe.Before serving that sentence, though, Bridges was arrested again on new charges related to his theft of bitcoins that were at the time worth $359,005 but today are valued at $11.3 million, according to the industry publication CoinDesk.

Source: Ex-agent in Silk Road probe gets more prison time for bitcoin theft | Reuters

More than $300m of cryptocurrency has been lost after a series of bugs in a popular digital wallet service led one curious developer to accidentally take control of and then lock up the funds, according to reports.Unlike most cryptocurrency hacks, however, the money wasn’t deliberately taken: it was effectively destroyed by accident.
[…]
On Tuesday Parity revealed that, while fixing a bug that let hackers steal $32m out of few multi-signature wallets, it had inadvertently left a second flaw in its systems that allowed one user to become the sole owner of every single multi-signature wallet.

The user, “devops199”, triggered the flaw apparently by accident. When they realised what they had done, they attempted to undo the damage by deleting the code which had transferred ownership of the funds. Rather than returning the money, however, that 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.

Effectively, a user accidentally stole hundreds of wallets simultaneously, and then set them on fire in a panic while trying to give them back.

Source: ‘$300m in cryptocurrency’ accidentally lost forever due to bug | Technology | The Guardian

The mobility means that if one blockchain dies out as the result of infighting among developers or slackened use, metronome owners can move their holdings elsewhere. That should help the coins retain value, and ensure their longevity, Garzik, co-founder of startup Bloq that created metronome, said in a phone interview. It will be unveiled Tuesday at the Money 20/20 conference in Las Vegas.”Institutional investors should be very excited to see something like this,” Matthew Roszak, the other co-founder of Bloq and chairman of industry advocate Chamber of Digital Commerce, said in a phone interview. “We’ve built a thousand-year cryptocurrency, something that’s built to last.”That’s a concern for many digital currencies. Infighting among developers and various supporters, and the slow pace of enhancements on the bitcoin blockchain have helped to limit use. Both bitcoin and its main rival, ethereum, have split into several versions.More splits could be coming — partly, thanks to Garzik, who is a proponent of and a developer for an upgrade to the bitcoin network called SegWit2x, which offers one way to speed up transactions. That split could happen in November.

Source: Bitcoin Pioneer Says New Coin to Work on Many Blockchains – Bloomberg

A useful feature for a coin.

Personal TechAMD sales soar, actually makes a profit, beats expectations, share price… decimatedIntel’s antitrust shield even loses when it winsBy Shaun Nichols in San Francisco 25 Oct 2017 at 00:0816 Reg comments SHARE ▼guitar player on shuttertsock photo of (sisyphus) man rolling a rock up a hill. photo by SHutterstock/PHOTOCREO Michal BednarekAMD revenues were up, an actual proper profit was banked, and its future looking brighter than ever in the past financial quarter… meanwhile investors are selling off shares fearing a downturn looming for the chip designer.Strong sales from its Ryzen and Epyc Zen-based processor lines helped the world’s second-favorite x86 PC and server chip slinger grow revenues by more than 25 per cent in its third quarter of 2017, the three months to September 30. Here’s a summary of the figures, announced on Tuesday: Revenues of $1.64bn were up 26 per cent from $1.31bn in Q3 2016, and topped analyst estimates of $1.51bn. Net income of $71m topped the admittedly low bar set by last year’s $406m quarterly loss, in large part caused by a $340m payment to Global Foundries. For a different angle, non-GAAP operating income this year was $110m compared to $27m this time last year. Earnings per share were $0.10 non-GAAP, topping analyst estimates of $0.08. Computing and graphics processors (PC CPUs and GPUs) accounted for much of the jump, as the Ryzen launch and Radeon revamp bumped revenues to $819m, compared to $472m on the year-ago quarter. CEO Lisa Su claimed AMD’s Ryzen desktop processors made up 40 to 50 per cent of CPU sales at certain online retailers. Enterprise, embedded, and semi-custom (everything from servers to games console chips) logged revenues of $824m, down slightly from $835m this time last year.
[…]
Investors, meanwhile, seemed to be less interested in 7nm than in what lies immediately ahead for AMD. For the upcoming quarter, the chip designer is expecting a sequential revenue decline of 15 per cent, with year-over-year Q4 revenues up by 26 per cent. Additionally, AMD said that it sees sales for hardware specializing in blockchain calculations – GPUs for Bitcoin and other alt-coin mining, which has fueled sales – “leveling off” as demand slows.

Those figures spooked shareholders after hours, sending AMD stock down by 10.5 per cent to around $12.75 per share at the time of writing.

Source: AMD sales soar, actually makes a profit, beats expectations, share price… decimated • The Register

Signs the market we use is outdated!

n-line Plc jumped as much as 394 percent on Friday after announcing plans to change its name to On-line Blockchain Plc, following an initial climb of 19 percent on Thursday when it first announced the news. It’s the biggest one-day gain for the small-cap company since its December 1996 listing. The trading volume that reached 2.9 million shares by early afternoon in London is equal to more than 16 times the entire year’s trading before the last two days.
[…]
This isn’t the first time that investors have gotten excited about a name. Shares in Colorado-based Bioptix Inc. nearly doubled in value in the days leading up to its name change to Riot Blockchain Inc. earlier this month. In what seems to be a case of mistaken identity, a New York-based startup called SNAP Interactive Inc. jumped more than 150 percent in the days after Snap Inc. filed for a $3 billion initial public offering in February. Little-known SNAP Interactive makes mobile dating apps, while Snap Inc. is the parent of the popular Snapchat photo-sharing app.

Source: This Company Added the Word ‘Blockchain’ to Its Name and Saw Its Shares Surge 394% – Bloomberg

Shortly before Amazon Prime Day in July, the owner of the Brushes4Less store on Amazon’s marketplace received a suspension notice for his best-selling product, a toothbrush head replacement.

The email that landed in his inbox said the product was being delisted from the site because of an intellectual property violation. In order to resolve the matter and get the product reinstated, the owner would have to contact the law firm that filed the complaint.

But there was one problem: the firm didn’t exist.
[…]
“Just five minutes of detective work would have found this website is a fraud, but Amazon doesn’t seem to want to do any of that,” the owner said. “This is like the Wild Wild West of intellectual property complaints.”
[…]
the issue with Amazon was finally resolved on Tuesday after two months of waiting.

Source: Amazon was tricked by a fake law firm into removing a hot product, costing this seller $200,000

Further on my preachings on making money from open source (see video), it turns out that there is a Fair Source license already available on Github

Not open source. Not closed source. The Fair Source License allows everyone to see the source code and makes the software free to use for a limited number of users in your organization. It offers some of the benefits of open source while preserving the ability to charge for the software.

re:Work is organized around some of the biggest ways you can make an impact in your workplace. Each subject contains guides, with tools and insights, for addressing specific challenges.

Source: re:Work

They look at Hiring, managers, people analytics and unbiasing. A treasure trove of business data.

Shaun Bridges, who is already serving a six-year sentence for nicking Bitcoins from the underground souk, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to stealing a further 1,600 Bitcoin (worth $359,005 at the time and approximately $6.6m today) during a separate investigation.

According to court documents [PDF] Bridges, 35, was probing European Bitcoin trading firm Bitstamp, which led to the US government seizing 1,606,6488 BTC in November 2014. These were transferred into a digital wallet that only Bridges had the access code for.

In March 2015, while under investigation for the Silk Road thefts, Bridges resigned from the Secret Service and in June pleaded guilty to money laundering and obstruction charges. A month later, while still free and awaiting sentencing, he took the Bitcoins seized from Bitstamp and moved them into an account run by the BTC-E exchange.

Source: Disgraced US Secret Service agent coughs to second Bitcoin heist

It turns out they won’t cover the cost of your smartphone breakages, because they are the most popular claims. And if they do cover your tablet, there are surcharges and other difficulties.

Allrisk inboedelverzekeraars hebben zich gewapend tegen kwetsbare smartphones, zo blijkt uit onderzoek van financieel communicatiebureau SevenEight onder 23 grote allrisk inboedelverzekeraars.

Source: Inboedelverzekeraar niet dol op smartphones – Emerce

Anyone can vote in the Stock Stream Twitch Channel on which stocks should be bought or sold. Trades are executed automatically using Robinhood.

How much money is available?

The account is funded with $50,000 though unfortunately, due to FINRA/SEC regulations, trading will halt if the account value falls below $25,000.

Source: Stock Stream – Worlds First Multiplayer Stock Market Game Using Real Money

Unfortunately I haven’t found any figures about how well or badly this is doing

A fired SpaceX worker has accused the company of leaning on its employees to forge test records for parts destined for NASA.

Jason Blasdell told his wrongful firing court hearing in California that although he complained to the HR department about being pressured into creating false test passes, the company ignored him – and he even tried to take matters to CEO Elon Musk in person.

Blasdell told the Los Angeles court that he spoke to SpaceX HR manager Carla Suarez in early 2014 to say he was having problems with his immediate management.

“I told her that in the avionics test lab that managers had been pressuring us, pressuring me, to falsify test documents. And that management is trying to point to me as being the problem instead of acknowledging and discussing actual falsification of documents as being the real problem,” he said, as reported by legal website Law360.

The former US Marine, who was trained in aviation electronics in the service before spending four years at SpaceX, also said that his supervisors would “chastise” him for not signing off parts as having passed required testing in SpaceX’s avionics test lab.

SpaceX managers, his lawyer said, responded to his attempts to escalate his concerns by branding him a “chronic complainer”. In spite of this Blasdell managed to get a personal audience with the president of SpaceX, Gwynne Shotwell.

The technician testified that Shotwell’s response to his concerns was “Don’t tell Elon, do not tell Elon. If he finds out about this, we will all get fired.”

In return, SpaceX’s lawyers told the court that, over time, Blasdell became disrespectful towards colleagues and managers alike and that this made some “afraid for their safety”. The firm also suggested that amphetamines Blasdell was taking for attention deficit disorder may have affected his behaviour, as well as saying he was annoyed at being passed over for promotion.

The firm also stated that Blasdell’s safety-related complaints only emerged after he was fired, stating that until that point his complaints were all about the “inefficiency” of testing

Source: ‘Do not tell Elon’: Ex-SpaceX man claims firm cut corners on NASA part tests • The Register

Code.gov is a platform designed to improve access to the federal government’s custom-developed software.

Source: Code.gov

The US Government is committing to open source in a big way. This is where to find it.

AN FRANCISCO — Wells Fargo may have opened as many as 3.5 million bogus bank accounts without its customers’ permission, attorneys for customers suing the bank have alleged in a court filing, suggesting the bank may have created far more fake accounts than previously indicated.

The plaintiffs’ new estimate of bogus bank accounts is about 1.4 million, or 67 percent, higher than the original estimate — disclosed last year as part of a settlement with regulators — that up to 2.1 million accounts were opened without customers’ permission.

In estimating the higher number of fake accounts, the plaintiffs’ attorneys examined a much longer time period than regulators and the bank had previously addressed, they said in court documents. The attorneys covered a period from 2002 to 2017, rather than the previously scrutinized five-year stretch from 2011 to some time in 2016 in which the bank acknowledged setting up unauthorized accounts. Scrutiny of bank employees’ activity during that five-year period led to the settlement last September, which required the bank to pay $185 million in fines.

Source: Wells Fargo fake accounts scandal appears far bigger than previously thought, attorneys say

What a world we live in – and the banks were too big to fail? Too corrupt to, I think.

When Congress voted in March to block FCC privacy rules and let internet service providers sell users’ personal data, it was a coup for the telecom industry. Now, the nonprofit, pro-privacy group Fight for the Future is publicizing just how much the industry paid in an attempt to sway those votes.

The group unveiled four billboards, targeting Reps. Marsha Blackburn and John Rutherford, as well as Sens. Jeff Flake and Dean Heller. All four billboards, which were paid for through donations, were placed in the lawmakers’ districts. “Congress voting to gut Internet privacy was one of the most blatant displays of corruption in recent history,” Fight for the Future co-founder Tiffiniy Cheng said in a statement on the project.

The billboards accuse the lawmakers of betraying their constituents, and encourage passersby to call their offices.

The Verge

Last fall, Shearer filed a $125 million lawsuit against Vivendi – the company that owns This Is Spinal Tap – for financial misappropriation and launched a website called Fairness Rocks explaining his lawsuit. He alleged that the company says the four creators between them have only earned $81 in merchandizing income and $98 for their contributions to the movie’s soundtrack over a 22-year period
[…]
Unfortunately, “Hollywood accounting” isn’t a practice confined to California. Within the success story that is the European film and television industry, which generated €122 billion in 2013, less than one-third of 1 percent[1]was shared with the writers and directors of the works created. A peculiar definition of “fairness,” you might say.

Under French law, filmmakers should be paid a fee for their work plus an ongoing remuneration proportionate to the exploitation of their creation. In reality, less than 3 percent of French writers and directors receive anything more than the initial payment of that minimum guarantee.[2]And 70 percent of all European film directors are asked to defer a proportion of their original fees (as we, the creators of This is Spinal Tap, originally agreed to do).

Source: Harry Shearer: Why My ‘Spinal Tap’ Lawsuit Affects All Creators

This happens to rock stars too 🙁 Good luck guys!

The Kerala government has made a saving of Rs 300 crore through introduction and adoption of Free & Open Source Software (FOSS) in the school education sector, said a state government official on Sunday.

IT became a compulsory subject in Kerala schools from 2003, but it was in 2005 only that FOSS was introduced in a phased manner and started to replace proprietary software. The decision made by the curriculum committee to implement it in the higher secondary sector has also been completed now.

K. Anwar Sadath, executive director IT@School, said they have been entrusted the job for easy classroom transaction of chapters including customisation of applications, teachers’ training, and video tutorials.

“The proprietary version of this software would have incurred a minimum cost of Rs 150,000 per machine in terms of licence fee. Hence, the minimum savings in a year (considering 20,000 machines) is Rs 300 crore. It’s not the cost saving that matters more, but the fact that the Free Software licence enables not only teachers and students but also the general public an opportunity to copy, distribute and share the contents and use it as they wish,” he said.

Source: Kerala saves Rs 300 crore as schools switch to open software

Even though cash payments have decreased to 49% of our daily payments, people in the eurozone still think cash is important and shouldn’t be banned.

DNBulletin: Contant betalen moet mogelijk blijven

Source: DNBulletin: Contant betalen moet mogelijk blijven

There has been a movement to try to shame cash payments, into creating a shady overtone to them. In fact it’s none of anyones’ business what you are spending your money on and being able to monitor your expenditure is shameless. For the banks you become the product, for the government you fall more under their control.

This site has a good list of items they link to on Amazon which are cheaper than the best item you could have gotten. It also compares the items on a few points they think are important, so you know why you are saving all the money. You don’t always need the best of the best!

Source: Outsmart Big Brands and Save Money

Religion in the United States is worth $1.2tn a year, making it equivalent to the 15th largest national economy in the world, according to a study.

The faith economy has a higher value than the combined revenues of the top 10 technology companies in the US, including Apple, Amazon and Google, says the analysis from Georgetown University in Washington DC.

The Socioeconomic Contributions of Religion to American Society: An Empirical Analysis calculated the $1.2tn figure by estimating the value of religious institutions, including healthcare facilities, schools, daycare and charities; media; businesses with faith backgrounds; the kosher and halal food markets; social and philanthropic programmes; and staff and overheads for congregations.

Co-author Brian Grim said it was a conservative estimate. More than 344,000 congregations across the US collectively employ hundreds of thousands of staff and buy billions of dollars worth of goods and services.

More than 150 million Americans, almost half the population, are members of faith congregations, according to the report. Although numbers are declining, the sums spent by religious organisations on social programmes have tripled in the past 15 years, to $9bn.

Twenty of the top 50 charities in the US are faith-based, with a combined operating revenue of $45.3bn.

Source: Religion in US ‘worth more than Google and Apple combined’ | World news | The Guardian

Threatening file-sharers with high fines or even prison sentences is not the best way to stop piracy. New research published by UK researchers shows that perceived risk has no effect on people’s file-sharing habits. Instead, the entertainment industries should focus on improving the legal options, so these can compete with file-sharing.

Source: Stop Piracy? Legal Alternatives Beat Legal Threats, Research Shows – TorrentFreak

The movie industry understood this better than the music industry. The music industry decided to try to sue everyone on the planet (including, funnily enough, themselves). The movie industry solution involved releasing movies on the same day globally, going to DVD faster after movies were out of the cinema and decreasing the price of DVDs (with them going on sale fairly quickly after). Netflix etc are also part of this flexible policy.

In 2014, San Francisco tech startup Skully raised hype and money to build a Tony Stark-style digitally augmented motorcycle helmet. Almost $2.5 million later, the company’s shutting down. Now a lawsuit from within the company gives us some hints as to why: founders allegedly blew the R&D money on lap dances and fast cars.

Source: Failed HUD Helmet Maker Skully Spent Funding On Strippers And Exotic Cars: Lawsuit