1.Beam Plans to Develop a Mimblewimble Compatible Lightning Network
2.Mastercard and Barclays Invest in Ripple-Backed xRapid Project
3.Coinbase Wallet Users Can Back Up Encrypted Keys on Google Drive and iCloud
1.Beam (BEAM) Plans to Develop a Mimblewimble Compatible Lightning Network
Recently launched privacy coin Beam revealed on Tuesday that it is planning to develop and launch the very first Mimblewimble-compatible Lightning Network, a second-layer scaling solution for fast and cheap transfers of value off-chain.
According to a recently published document, Beam wants to add a Lightning Network despite its 1-minute block time to enhance the altcoin’s viability in commercial settings that require quick payment confirmations.
“While in Bitcoin it is generally advised to wait for 6 confirmations (6 blocks mined on top of the transaction) for a serious transaction to be considered fully settled, users of Beam may rather want to wait for a period in the realm of up to 60 confirmations to get the same level of confidence in the received payment, especially while the network is still young and hashpower is comparably low,” reads the document.
Mimblewimble’s advantage over Bitcoin
Its privacy properties are one of the major reasons why Mimblewimble chains are so appealing to many people. This feature also shines when comparing Lightning Network implementations on Bitcoin with its still theoretical counterpart on Mimblewimble chains.
A funding transaction that is opening a channel on the Bitcoin blockchain followed by a closing transaction that is resolving the same channel together leave a pattern of transactions that can be fairly easy to spot.
At the very least, the two participants of the channel, the initial state, and the end state are exposed and could be combined with other data from monitoring the Lightning Network itself to further invade user privacy. Mimblewimble, on the other hand, uses confidential transactions which hide participants and amounts on-chain, making these kinds of attacks impossible.
BEAM is currently trading for $1.29, giving the privacy coin a market cap of $7.15 million.
2.Mastercard and Barclays Invest in Ripple-Backed xRapid Project
Mastercard and Barclays, two of the world’s largest financial service companies and banking institutions are investing into a project backed by Ripple and the company’s XRP-based xRapid service.
SendFriend, a remittance company using Ripple’s xRapid service for cross-border payments, has received investments from MasterCard, Barclays and Ripple itself in the most recent round of funding reported in a press release on Feb. 11. SendFriend also received investments from MIT Media Lab, Techstars, Mahindra Finance, 2020 Ventures and 8 Decimal Capital in a round that saw the firm raise $1.7 million in capital.
According to the press release, with the use of xRapid and XRP for liquidity SendFriend will be able to offer customers remittance services with fees “65% lower than the industry average.”
3.Coinbase Wallet Users Can Back Up Encrypted Keys on Google Drive and iCloud
Users of Coinbase Wallet can now back up their private keys on Google Drive or iCloud, according to an official announcement on Feb. 12.
Coinbase states that allowing users to upload their keys to a cloud provides a safeguard against lost keys, will will help them avoid losing funds should the keys be misplaced.
Announcement states “The private keys generated and stored on your mobile device are the only way to access your funds on the blockchain. Owners of ‘user-controlled wallets’ like Coinbase Wallet sometimes lose their devices or fail to backup their 12 word recovery phrase in a safe place, thus losing their funds forever.”
Coinbase notes that, in addition to Google Drive and iCloud, they will expand support to other clouds in the future. The feature is an opt-in service that does not replace or supersede the original recovery option.
