The new year for Bitcoin is fully upon us with a great deal of news spanning the entire community. Blockchain-related technologies continue to take the forefront with Microsoft’s Azure cloud Blockchain-as-a-Service, which has added BitPay, Manifold Technology, LibraTax and Emercoin. Enterprise blockchain platform provider Gem just netted the first venture capital of the new year with $7.1 million in Series A funding.

The Isle of Man, amid the British isles, appears to be reaching for the cryptocurrency sky by providing smarter legislation and regulation of bitcoin and other currencies while vying to bring more businesses to the island (no doubt a spit in the eye to New York and BitLicense).

Shanghai-based Bitcoin exchange BTCC (formerly BTCChina) recently found itself the target of a massive Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack preceded by a ransom e-mail demanding Bitcoins. To its credit, BTCC totally ignored the attacker and weathered the storm. Read below for the interesting story.

And finally, embattled altcurrency exchange Cryptsy has suspended all withdrawals and its trading engine in the wake of further troubles.

The Bitcoin market remains in the $400 range this week, settling in at $431, which put the market price fairly much in line with last week’s Bitcoin Weekly spot publishing price (which was $425).

This and more in this week’s Bitcoin Weekly. A happy New Year to everyone, and hope to see you next week.

More Blockchain-goodness is coming to Microsoft Azure’s Blockchain-as-a-Service platform offering.

Microsoft Azure cloud Blockchain-as-a-Service adds BitPay, Emercoin and LibraTax

The Microsoft Azure cloud has released even more blockchain-based currencies on its Blockchain-as-a-Service offering; these new additions include BitPay’s API, Manifold Technology, LibraTax and Emercoin.

Previous additions include Ethereum and later Eris Industries, CoinPrism and Factom, Inc.’s currencies.

BitPay, Inc. is best known as a Bitcoin wallet and Bitcoin financial service and provides payouts for over 65,000 businesses worldwide. The addition of BitPay to Azure’s Blockchain-as-a-Service offering puts Bitcoin directly on the service rather than via a platform that uses the Bitcoin Blockchain (or a private Blockchain).

Manifold Technology, Inc. provides an API with the patent-pending Manifold Liquidity Platform (MLP), which provides a private Blockchain designed for high transaction speed and throughput. LibraTax is a reporting and accounting service using a blockchain service designed for digitized ownership and trading of assets. Emercoin is a scalable blockchain for enterprise service.

The Isle of Man on the road to becoming a cryptocurrency nation

Floating between the island of Great Britain (containing England, Scotland and Wales) and Ireland is a small, unassuming island nation known as the Isle of Man. Not only is the Isle of Man the native home for the Manx Gaelic language, it’s also a place where cryptocurrency is being embraced by the local government and businesses as a venture into the future.

According to an article in The Independent, many people in the United Kingdom are now referring to the Isle of Man as “Bitcoin Island” due to this cryptocurrency curiosity. While, of course, British pounds sterling are accepted by businesses on the island, a growing number are beginning to also process Bitcoin, including a smart café, a chauffeur company and a popular pub.

Approximately 25 Bitcoin-related startups have begun using the Isle of Man as their international headquarters. This has led the Manx government to mull over thoughtful regulations for cryptocurrency regulations that do not get in the way of innovation.

Speaking to The Independent, Brian Donegan, the head of digital business at the Manx government’s Department of Economic Development, said, “We have an advantage here in that we can put the legislation in place and provide the rigorous oversight that is needed more rapidly than other jurisdictions. We move quickly because we can see the potential of what is out there. This technology is transformational, and we want to be in the lead.”

As of last month, legislation came into Manx law that requires all cryptocurrency businesses to register with its government and submit to financial regulation. While the Manx government would like to call this the world’s first regulatory framework for Bitcoin, it was beaten to the punch by New York’s infamous BitLicense (which launched in August 2015); however, the major difference is that New York lost numerous Bitcoin businesses due to its attempt.

BTCC exchange hit by attempted DDoS extortion; ignores all demands

BTCC (BTCC Technology, Ltd.), a Bitcoin exchange based in Shanghai, China, became the target of a DDoS attack on December 31 and announced the effect on Twitter. According to the tweet, the attack caused a disruption to the exchange’s API, and a comment on Reddit related that the exchange had received a ransom demand from the attacker.

Our website is under DDoS attack, which is hampering access to our APIs and other services. We are working quickly to resolve the situation.

— BTCC (@YourBTCC) January 1, 2016

The initial attack was small, /u/jtoomim said, and then an e-mail came in demanding 1 BTC or the attack would happen again. Of course, the company ignored the e-mail and another attack did happen.

“The attack was larger than BTCC had expected. I think he said something like 10 Gbps,” jtoomim writes. “During the attack, they got a few fretful calls from their DDoS protection provider, who said something like, ‘This thing is huge! You guys aren’t paying us enough for this!’ So BTCC paid them more.”

After the second attack, the extortionist stepped up the ransom to 10 BTC. This back and forth continued (attacker hitting, BTCC not responding) until the attacker began requesting 30 BTC in ransom.

As it is an extremely bad idea to pay ransoms, the best possible reaction BTCC could have to the extortion is to ignore it and let its anti-DDoS service handle it as best it can. Fortunately, the attacker eventually began to weary of hitting the site and finally bottomed out on a potential ransom offering to stop at 0.5 BTC.

After ignoring that final e-mail, writes jtoomim, the attacker sent one remaining query: “Do you even speak English?”

It’s unknown if this is how the whole exchange panned out, but it apparently reflects the experience of other people struck by DDoS demands. A Bitcoin exchange would look like a fairly vulnerable target — high-volume trades happening, customers who want to make money off minute-by-minute price fluctuations — as even minor disruptions could be a major inconvenience to traders. The result, the DDoS extortionist may think that an exchange like BTCC might just pay them to go away.

Mike Tyson’s ATM, screenshot of http://www.miketysonbitcoin.com/

Mike Tyson at it again lending his name to a Bitcoin wallet service

Monday saw the first apparent celebrity endorsement of a Bitcoin wallet with retired heavyweight world champion Mike Tyson lending his name to the Mike Tyson Digital Wallet.

The wallet, run by Bitcoin Direct, LLC, a subsidiary of Connexus Corp., will operate using BitPay’s Copay open source code and Bitcoin wallet API.

“Bitcoin Direct is pleased to partner with Mike Tyson because Tyson is a universally known star whose fan base extends generations. People around the world of all ages know Mike Tyson, and as such Tyson’s potential to expand the Bitcoin market is dramatic,” Bitcoin Direct Chief Executive Officer Peter Klamka said in a statement.

This isn’t the first time SiliconANGLE has reported on Mike Tyson’s name being used in the Bitcoin space. Previously, his name was attached to the Mike Tyson ATM in July 2015, which is still considered a dubious project to this date.

Cryptsy altcoin exchange market is there, but trading has been halted.

Cryptsy shuts down all trading

The altcoin exchange Cryptsy (Project Investors, Inc.) has shut down its trading engine amidst continuing woes that started late last year with withdrawal problems and numerous customer complaints. While many issues had already surfaced before October 2015, that’s the best point to start with the Cryptsy troubles — at the time, withdrawals had become difficult for many users and The Merkle claimed that the exchange had “gone full Mt. Gox.”

CoinDesk reports that after the shutdown, Cryptsy only reported roughly 235 BTC in 24 hours.

“Trade engine and withdrawals paused while we investigate cause of lag. Your patience is appreciated. Thank you,” a message on the website read at the time.

These problems with Cryptsy, starting in 2015, have led popular Altcoin pricing site CoinMarCap to remove the exchange from its listings.

Withdrawal problems for Bitcoin from Cryptsy have not been the only troubles that exchange has faced. Also in October 2015, Coin Fire reported that the exchange had come under investigation by numerous US federal government entities for misbehavior potentially connected to the GAW Miners debacle. Cryptsy is no stranger to lawsuits, as in 2014 the exchange had been sued by scorned customers.

Update 2016/01/06 9:00 p.m.: Cryptsy has removed the “trade engine and withdrawals paused” message from the front page, and trading has reportedly resumed.

Gem raises $7.1 million in Series A funding first in the new year

California-based enterprise Blockchain platform provider Gem (BitVault, Inc. dba Gem) has just announced $7.1 million in Series A funding led by Pelion Venture Partners, KEC Ventures, Blockchain Capital, Digital Currency Group, RRE Ventures and other investors.

“It was obvious to us immediately the Pelion team shared our vision for the future of Blockchains and what would be required to get there,” said Gem Founder and CEO, Micah Winkelspecht. “We’re excited to have Ben and Pelion join the team and help us do something special.”

Winkelspecht is described as a Blockchain thought leader, open-source contributor and community organizer who founded Gem as a multisignature API for developers to make use of the blockchain. The company is now working to promote the integration of blockchain technology in finance, healthcare and other data-reliant industries.

This funding round brings Gem up to a total of $10.4 million in Series A and seed funding.

Featured image credit: Bitcoin Logo, https://www.flickr.com/photos/thelastminute/12350379324