Actor Steven Seagal was at the center of charges now settled with the Securities and Exchanges commission related to cryptocurrency investments, according to CNBC on Thursday (Feb. 27).
Seagal, according to the SEC, failed to report that he was being paid for promoting a cryptocurrency investment. The statement by SEC said he violated anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws as the “brand ambassador” for the “Bitcoiin.” He reportedly failed to disclose that he was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens for his promotional tactics.
Seagal agreed to pay $314,000 in disgorgement and penalties in a settlement, and around $157,000 of that amount, for the disgorgement, was the amount he was paid by the company.
A cyber-attack on Coinhako, a crypto-exchange backed by venture capitalist Tim Draper, led to the exchange restricting user withdrawals.
The Singapore-based exchange told users Friday that account send functions for cryptocurrencies were temporarily disabled, initially saying it was for “maintenance” but then admitting it was because of an attack.
The account restrictions were intended to prevent unauthorized transactions until the issue was corrected.
Details on the nature of the attack or what had been accessed, including if anything had been stolen, were unavailable, but fewer than 20 Coinhako users were believed to have been affected, according to Coindesk.
Coinhako’s spokesperson said the attack wasn’t a wallet hack, and private user keys were not affected either.
In Ukraine, a worker at the State Judicial Information Systems were found to have been illegally using work computers to mine cryptocurrency.
The Kyiv Prosecutor’s Office said on Facebook that it had completed a pretrial investigation into an individual who remained unnamed, in conjunction with the State Bureau of Investigation. The accused miner was an information technology specialist who illegally used network equipment and machines to mine for cryptocurrency, according to CoinTelegraph.
The defendant also allegedly provided placement to third parties on the office servers in exchange for money. This resulted in the machines hosting “three online stores and a resource for Chopper motorcycle enthusiasts by August 2018.”
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