The brother of late drug kingpin Pablo Escobar is launching a new cryptocurrency in a bid to boot US President Donald Trump from office.
Less than a day after having a $50 million crowdfunding campaign for its Impeach Trump Fund pulled by GoFundMe, Escobar Inc. is running an initial coin offering (ICO) for a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar, aptly named ESCOBAR.
The move is primarily to ensure that no centralized platforms are able to further censor the fundraising efforts of the Escobar estate, which is pledged to be focused almost entirely on dethroning Trump.
The estate also aims to compete with the world’s most popular stablecoin , Tether (USDT), which Escobar Inc. says is untrustworthy.
Escobar Inc. says Trump shut down their GoFundMe
According to Escobar Inc., $10 million had been raised in just 10 hours in the leadup to the GoFundMe page going dark.
“Originally the goal was to raise $50 million just using the GoFundMe platform,” Olof Gustafsson, Escobar Inc. CEO told Hard Fork. “After raising $10 million in just 10 hours we were shut down by GoFundMe and within 24 hours launched the ESCOBAR stablecoin cryptocurrency to avoid anyone censoring us again. We believe the Trump Administration [sic] or President Trump shut us down.”
A screenshot shared with Hard Fork indeed shows the $10 million mark being reached, as well as a message highlighting that the ByeByeTrump campaign was being reviewed by GoFundMe admins.
Hard Fork has reached out to GoFundMe to corroborate Escobar’s claims, but at pixel time no response had been provided.
ESCOBAR stablecoin to rival Tether?
The whitepaper details exactly how the cryptocurrency will work. It’s an ERC-20 token, so it means the one billion ESCOBAR tokens will be issued via the Ethereum blockchain .
The value of ESCOBARs is to be fixed permanently to the US dollar. Starting in June, the whitepaper states each one will be redeemable for one US dollar, thanks to an agreement with a firm in Belize.
The estate describes a major drawcard of ESCOBAR to be that most stablecoins have been launched by “unknown companies,” as opposed to Escobar Inc.
“ Yes, we had plans to release this cryptocurrency in 2019 as a stablecoin alternative to the USD Tether. We do not trust the USDT,” Daniel Reitberg, COO of Escobar Inc. told Hard Fork. “We think that people should use our coin, as we have a much larger business sense than most other companies out there and Roberto Escobar has made hundreds of billions of dollars throughout his career.”
Any funds raised via the ICO are said to now be split between funding the Impeach Trump Fund and “developing the ESCOBAR cryptocurrency.”
This isn’t the first cryptocurrency project from Roberto Escobar and Escobar Inc. Early last year, they launched a fork of Bitcoin, called Diet Bitcoin , which was supposed to be much cheaper and faster than the real thing.
A book was published in support, penned by Roberto. In it, he made claims that the CIA will one day sell all of their coins (because Satoshi Nakamoto is really the CIA), which will inevitably destroy the value of Bitcoin.
As always, it’s best to do your own research before buying any cryptocurrency.
UK telecom regulator gets nearly $1M to put phone numbers on the blockchain
The United Kingdom’s telecommunications and broadcasting regulator, Ofcom, has received $915,000 (£700,000) to explore blockchain as a potential solution to the nation’s telephone number management woes.
The money from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy will fund research and development into telecom technologies used in the management and delivery of landline telephone numbers, Ofcom announced yesterday .
“Between now and April 2020, we’ll be inviting industry participants to trial the porting and management of millions of telephone numbers using blockchain and ledger technology,” the announcement reads. “We’ll be co-ordinating this work across industry, universities and other third-party providers.”
There are over 1 billion phone numbers in use (or reserved for use) in the UK. Managing how these are moved between operators is a complicated job, that is quickly becoming outdated as phone lines move from analogue to digital systems.
Ofcom believes that blockchain and distributed ledger technology will be able to address the impending obsolescence of current systems, while also addressing the failures of previous attempts to develop a single database of UK telephone numbers.
The telecom regulator thinks that blockchain will bring a cost-effective, collaborative, and future-proof solution. But other than parroting around buzzwords and highly contentious claims, Ofcom has yet to precisely how blockchain will provide such a solution.
The fact remains, this is the first step on a long road of development.
The good news is that the system will be tested before being deployed. In true open source spirit, any useful knowledge or code developed along the way will be shared with the industry. The bad news is we’ll have to wait a few years first.
Have you heard of Hard Fork Decentralized? Our three-day event centers around the future of blockchain and cryptocurrency. We’re currently offering an 85-percent discount on tickets. You might be eligible – check it out !
Former pro ice hockey player detained for $700,000 Bitcoin fraud
It’s a slippery slope dealing with Bitcoin and cryptocurrency.
Igor Musatov, former professional ice hockey player from Russia, has been detained in Moscow for swindling 45 million Rubles ($700,000) from the CEO of an IT company, Crime Russia reports .
The alleged crime was first reported last year by the IT professional, but after months of trying to rectify things directly with Musatov, he turned to the police.
According to Sport Express Russia , the businessman met with Musatov in January 2018, and told him that he was “engaged in the cryptocurrency business.”
A month later, Musatov offered the IT professional the opportunity to buy 103 Bitcoin for 45 million Rubles ($700,000), to which he obliged.
At the time, 45 million Rubles for 103 Bitcoin represented a substantial discount over average market prices, so it’s not surprising the businessman went for the deal.
According to the report, the businessman went to Musatov’s offices to complete the transaction. However, rather than meeting the former hockey player he was met by one of his assistants.
The businessman handed over the money to the assistant, who then took off and was never to be seen again, allegedly fleeing the building through a secret entrance.
The victim managed to contact Musatov who said he would come and sort it out, but he never appeared. Nor it seems did the Bitcoin.
Musatov’s lawyers told Russian news outlet RT that he would not plead guilty to the accusations. This is a developing case.
This isn’t the first time cryptocurrency criminals have used the ol’ bait and switch to dupe their victim out of cash or Bitcoin.
Last year, a South Korean Bitcoin millionaire handed over $2.3 million worth of Bitcoin expecting to receive the same amount in cash. However, the banknotes he received were poorly printed fakes.
Come say hi to the Hard Fork team at our blockchain event . On October 15-17 in Amsterdam, hear from top experts as they discuss the industry’s future.
