Square forms COPA: a crypto patent alliance group

Square forms COPA: a crypto patent alliance group

By Benson Toti - 3 min read

The payment company hopes that the alliance will encourage innovation and open-source research in the industry

Square, the payment company founded by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, has launched the “Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance” (COPA).

COPA is a nonprofit organisation that aims to stop companies from locking up the development of new and useful technologies behind patents. The company has claimed that this practice cripples innovation.

“Locking up foundational cryptocurrency technologies in patents stifles innovation and adoption; and offensive use of patents by bad actors threatens the growth of cryptocurrency technologies,” Square said in their statement announcing the alliance.

Aside from companies that closely guard their progress in the cryptocurrency industry, some firms go as far as to file “pre-emptive patents” for ideas that they do not yet have plans to develop. This benefits firms by preventing competitors from developing the ideas themselves.

To become a part of COPA, members pledge to make their patents freely available to the rest of the members by publishing it in a shared library. This library will function as a “shield” of sorts for the group, protecting members from “patent aggressors”.

Square, which made its first foray into the cryptocurrency industry in 2018, has already pledged to put its own crypto patents into the shared library.

The company recently made headlines for winning a patent for a fiat to crypto payments network. The payment system would allow users holding different asset types to transact with one another in real-time. The network itself would be in charge of automatically exchanging the sender’s payment into the asset requested by the receiver.

The only exception to the rule would be those that are filed to preserve existing patent applications.

The number of patents on cryptocurrency and blockchain-related innovations within the US doubled between 2016 and 2017. Notable patents filed in the past year include Microsoft’s for a crypto mining system powered by physical exertion and IBM’s patent for a token they claim is “self-aware”.

In the event that Square’s patent library would grow and gather momentum, the idea is to have more companies think of joining COPA to access these innovations. Square believes that this would help create a more equitable patent environment.

Any company working in the cryptocurrency industry, regardless of whether it has patents of its own or not, will be eligible for membership in COPA. A spokesperson has confirmed that COPA will be an entirely separate entity from Square and have its own independent board of directors.

US charges Russian national with wire fraud and ID theft

By Benson Toti - min read

The new charges claim that the operators stole identification papers to open crypto and bank accounts

The US has filed criminal charges against Artem Lifshits, a Russian national, over his management of an affiliate of the infamous Internet Research Agency. US authorities have accused the agency of interfering in the 2016 national elections with a large-scale influence operation named Project Lakhta.

The new complaint claims that Lifshits was in charge of the translator department of Project Lakhta since 2017. He used his position to illegally procure US identification documents, so as to use “the means of identification of United States persons to open bank accounts, PayPal accounts, and cryptocurrency accounts”.

He is now charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud. The US Department of Justice stated that these accounts were an avenue for Lifshits and his colleagues to fund both Project Lakhta and their own “personal enrichment”.

John C Demers, the Assistant Attorney General for National Security, explained that the charges allege Lifshits had conspired with others to steal the identity of US citizens and promote Project Lakhta’s influence operations.

“Lifshits participated in this fraud in order to further Project Lakhta’s malign influence goals and for his own personal enrichment.  This case provides a clear illustration of how these malicious actors fund their covert foreign influence activities and Russia’s status as a safe-haven for cyber criminals who enrich themselves at others expense,” Demers said.

A testimony from a Secret Service investigator alleges that the project was part of a massive operation orchestrated against the American people.

“From in and around April 2014, Project Lakhta’s Translator Department focused on influencing the United States population. The Translator Department conducted operations on social media platforms, such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter,” his testimony began.

“The Translator Department’s primary goal was to sow discord in the United States political system, incite civil unrest, and polarize Americans by promoting socially divisive issues, with particular emphasis on racial divisions and inequality in the United States.”

The complaint did not name the crypto exchanges that Lifshits and Project Lakhta managed to access. However, it did say that at least one exchange considered itself a victim of fraud, as it processed false documents that were presented as a means of passing its Know Your Customer requirements.

The charges pressed by the Secret Services have been handed out mere hours after Lifshits and some of his colleagues at Project Lakhta appeared on the Treasury’s sanctions list, along with their respective crypto wallet addresses.

Similar concerns have surfaced as the 2020 elections approach.