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WazirX’s post-hack woes continue

More than one week after a hack that led to the theft of over $230 million in crypto assets from a multi-signature wallet, the Indian crypto exchange WazirX is struggling with the issue of resuming normal operations. The exchange admitted that approximately 45% (as per preliminary workings) of crypto assets were affected by the attack, and is yet to update its latest proof of reserves so that the public has a better idea of the damage. As of June 10, WazirX reported that its total holdings stood at ₹4,203.88 Crores (USDT 503.64 Million), before the attack.

In order to resume normal operations after the hack, WazirX introduced what it called a ‘socialised loss strategy,’ in which the exchange adjusts all users’ holdings in order to spread out the loss in an attempt to balance its impact. However, the move proved to be controversial as WazirX users on X called on the exchange to instead compensate users with its own profits.

Elon Musk shares Kamala Harris deepfake

Experts are looking into the impact of AI-generated videos and audio in the run-up to the U.S. presidential election in the coming months after X owner Elon Musk shared a manipulated video that showed Vice President Kamala Harris talking about President Joe Biden’s “senility” and claiming that she was a diversity hire. Some digital advocates felt that there was not enough clarification regarding the satirical nature of the clip, while others felt that enforcing such standards would amount to censorship.

Musk recently endorsed former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, and has spoken out against Democrat policies. Some users were perplexed that a clarifying ‘Community Note’ was not added to the initial post he shared with his more than 150 million followers. Musk defended himself by claiming that parodies did not violate American law.

TikTok collected U.S. users’ views

The U.S. Justice Department accused TikTok of harvesting U.S. users’ views on controversial issues such as gun control, abortion, and religion, through the use of an internal web-suite system called Lark. Federal officials claimed that TikTok used Lark in order to send information about U.S. users to the employees of the Chinese ByteDance, which is TikTok’s parent company.

TikTok is currently in the eye of a legal storm as the U.S. government signed a law forcing ByteDance to divest ownership of TikTok or see the viral video app banned in the U.S., where it has at least 170 million users. The U.S. Justice Department was concerned that the Chinese regime could use the collected data about users in order to manipulate the algorithm to shape their views on key issues.