Hackers Abuse BNB Chain to Spread Malware
Attackers are turning BNB Smart Chain into malware infrastructure, hiding the commands their malware fetches inside smart contracts, where they are far harder to take down than a normal server.
It is a reminder that a public blockchain's censorship-resistance cuts both ways: the same permanence that protects legitimate apps also gives attackers durable, tamper-proof hosting.
Attackers are turning BNB Smart Chain into malware infrastructure, hiding the commands their malware fetches inside smart contracts, where they are far harder to take down than a normal server.
Microsoft's threat researchers describe the chain: a victim hits a fake CAPTCHA page that instructs them to paste and run a command in Windows, which installs the malware. From there it reads its next instructions and payloads straight from a BNB Smart Chain smart contract, a technique sometimes called EtherHiding. Because the data lives onchain, defenders cannot simply delete a file or block a server to shut it down.
It is a reminder that a public blockchain's censorship-resistance cuts both ways: the same permanence that protects legitimate apps also gives attackers durable, tamper-proof hosting.
Coinbase Opens a Tokenization Hub in Abu Dhabi
The hub will bring tokenized RWAs on-chain, much of it on Coinbase's Base network, as the exchange pushes institutional tokenization into the Middle East. ADGM has become a magnet for on-chain finance under the FSRA's virtual-asset framework.
The hub will bring tokenized RWAs on-chain, much of it on Coinbase's Base network, as the exchange pushes institutional tokenization into the Middle East. ADGM has become a magnet for on-chain finance under the FSRA's virtual-asset framework.
It follows Coinbase taking exposure to a tokenized Mubadala Capital fund that has already drawn about $75M on-chain.
Tokenized Card Boom: Who Controls Gacha Market
Tokenized trading cards did $327M in volume over the last 30 days, up 8.3%, with the market splitting between five protocols. On the surface it looks like Courtyard's game: 44.5% of all volume, $145M in flow. But volume only tells half the story.
The other half is who actually makes money. Courtyard runs a thin 2.14% take-rate, so all that flow turns into just $3.1M in fees. Collector Crypt moves less ($123M) but charges 9.21%, pulling $11.2M, more than three times Courtyard's revenue.
Tokenized trading cards did $327M in volume over the last 30 days, up 8.3%, with the market splitting between five protocols. On the surface it looks like Courtyard's game: 44.5% of all volume, $145M in flow. But volume only tells half the story.
The other half is who actually makes money. Courtyard runs a thin 2.14% take-rate, so all that flow turns into just $3.1M in fees. Collector Crypt moves less ($123M) but charges 9.21%, pulling $11.2M, more than three times Courtyard's revenue.
Banks spent years fighting stablecoins. Now they're issuing them, but not the way you'd think
Europe builds real euro coins (Revolut, Qivalis, SocGen) as MiCA pushes USDT out. The US giants dodge stablecoins entirely and build tokenized deposits, same money on-chain, locked inside the bank.
From enemy to issuer, and a quiet fight over who owns settlement.
Europe builds real euro coins (Revolut, Qivalis, SocGen) as MiCA pushes USDT out. The US giants dodge stablecoins entirely and build tokenized deposits, same money on-chain, locked inside the bank.
From enemy to issuer, and a quiet fight over who owns settlement.
DefiLlama and Forgd have launched Universal Token Ratings, a standardized system that scores 128 tokens from 0 to 100 and assigns letter grades from AAA down to CCC.
For a market long criticized for opaque tokenomics and cherry-picked metrics, a continuously updated, disclosure-based rating gives allocators and researchers a common yardstick to compare tokens on more than price.
The grades combine each project's public disclosures with live on-chain and market data, and update continuously, so a token's rating shifts as its fundamentals change rather than sitting in a static report. Forgd, a Web3 investment bank, and DefiLlama pitch it as the first standard in digital assets that continuously verifies whether a token's real market performance matches what the project has disclosed.
Projects that are not yet covered can formally apply to disclose their information and get rated, and the full methodology behind the requirements is published openly on the platform.
For a market long criticized for opaque tokenomics and cherry-picked metrics, a continuously updated, disclosure-based rating gives allocators and researchers a common yardstick to compare tokens on more than price.
a16z Raises $1.1B Machine Age Hardware Fund
Andreessen Horowitz has raised a $1.1B fund called Machine Age to invest in the hardware backbone of AI, from chips, memory, networking and storage to robotics.
The raise underscores how the AI arms race has shifted from software toward silicon and physical infrastructure, with top venture firms racing to fund the picks-and-shovels layer rather than just the applications on top.
Andreessen Horowitz has raised a $1.1B fund called Machine Age to invest in the hardware backbone of AI, from chips, memory, networking and storage to robotics.
The fund is a bet that the hard constraint on AI is no longer just models and data but the physical supply chain underneath them, the compute, memory and networking that have become the industry's tightest bottleneck. It slots alongside a16z's other infrastructure and Oxygen compute initiatives aimed at securing hardware access for its portfolio companies.
For crypto, the thesis rhymes with DePIN and on-chain AI: whoever controls compute, chips and networking capacity controls the pace of the AI buildout, and increasingly that hardware layer is where the biggest capital is now flowing.
The raise underscores how the AI arms race has shifted from software toward silicon and physical infrastructure, with top venture firms racing to fund the picks-and-shovels layer rather than just the applications on top.