San Francisco protesters gathered outside Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen’s home on Aug. 21, challenging his financial support for police surveillance systems, including automated license plate readers supplied by Flock Safety.

Sunrise Movement Bay Area organized the demonstration as part of a national campaign calling on cities to cancel Flock contracts and remove the company’s cameras. Protesters distributed flyers and displayed a mock camera carrying the message, “Does this make you feel safer, Chris?”

Larsen co-founded Ripple and serves as its executive chairman. Brad Garlinghouse, not Larsen, is the company’s chief executive.

Protesters challenge Chris Larsen’s surveillance funding

Sunrise organizer Luc Bouchard argued that cities should direct public-safety funding toward housing, employment and social services. He also questioned whether Flock cameras materially reduce crime.

“There’s not much evidence that Flock cameras significantly impact crime rates,” Bouchard claimed.

The demonstration focused on Larsen because he has financed several San Francisco public-safety programs. The protesters did not accuse Ripple, XRP or Larsen of violating any law. No arrests or property damage were reported during the event.

The dispute instead centers on whether a wealthy private donor should play such a large role in funding public surveillance infrastructure. It adds a local civil-liberties issue to broader scrutiny of political and civic spending by crypto executives. In related coverage, crypto.news examined how Ripple became a major corporate political donor.

Larsen’s funding helped relocate the police technology hub

The San Francisco Police Community Foundation, founded by Larsen, committed $7.25 million toward relocating and upgrading the police department’s Real-Time Investigations Center. Ripple also provided office space at 315 Montgomery Street rent-free through December 2026.

The lease represented approximately $2.15 million of the overall $9.4 million package, according to the foundation’s account. The Police Commission, Board of Supervisors and Mayor Daniel Lurie approved the arrangement in 2025.

The center integrates information from emergency calls, police cameras, drones and automated license plate readers. A city statement said the technology helped officers coordinate more than 500 arrests. City officials also associated the program with falling auto theft, although the figures do not establish that surveillance technology alone caused the decline.

The Police Commission approved another $3 million contribution connected to Larsen’s foundation in July 2026. The proposed funding covers technology, infrastructure and equipment for the center, including drone-related systems. The approval process involved further consideration by the Board of Supervisors.

Improper searches strengthened the privacy dispute

San Francisco operates roughly 400 Flock automated license plate readers. The cameras photograph visible plates and record information including the vehicle, location, date and time.

Privacy concerns intensified after a compliance audit found nearly 300 improper searches of San Francisco plate data conducted for federal and out-of-state agencies. California law restricts sharing automated license plate information with those agencies.

SFPD subsequently removed the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center’s access to its Flock data. Police said they would strengthen oversight and review data-sharing practices. The improper searches represented a small portion of total queries, but opponents argue that the incident demonstrated how access can extend beyond the original local purpose.

Flock maintains that its customers own their data and control sharing permissions. It also says every search is recorded and connected to an identified user.

Flock is introducing additional privacy safeguards

Flock announced new safeguards on Aug. 13. The company reduced its recommended default retention period from 30 days to seven days for new deployments, according to its update.

Existing customers can retain previously approved periods. Flock is also introducing Evidence Mode, which allows investigators to preserve selected records connected to active cases.

Other changes include mandatory misuse detection, required case codes, multifactor authentication and controls allowing agencies to restrict data sharing by offense type. Flock said the measures would improve accountability, but their effectiveness will depend on adoption and enforcement by participating agencies.

Organizers are expected to continue pressing Bay Area cities to end their Flock contracts. San Francisco officials have not announced plans to remove the cameras, while Larsen has not issued a public response to the protest.

Bitcoin extended its rally on Tuesday, hitting the $80,000 psychological level for the first time since May 4.

The rally comes as improving liquidity expectations continued to lift the broader cryptocurrency market.

Bitcoin has gained nearly 30% in the last week, while Ethereum has risen more than 25% and XRP has advanced almost 30%.

The rally gained momentum after the U.S. Treasury announced plans to double the size of certain debt buyback operations.

The decision eased liquidity concerns and strengthened demand for risk-sensitive assets.

With Bitcoin still flying, investors are now watching whether it can extend its rally and reach the $85,000 level.

Bitcoin rally persists as Treasury buyback expansion strengthens crypto rally

The primary catalyst behind Bitcoin’s rally over the past seven days is the U.S. Treasury’s decision to expand its debt buyback program.

Larger buybacks can support liquidity in the market for longer-dated Treasury securities, easing financial pressures and encouraging investors to increase their exposure to riskier assets.

Major cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP responded strongly to the announcement, recording double-digit weekly gains.

Short liquidations also accelerated the rally as bearish traders were forced to close their positions, adding further buying pressure.

Bitcoin has now hit the $80,000 level on Friday after decisively breaking above its major exponential moving averages.

The 200-day EMA stands at $71,545, while the 100-day and 50-day EMAs are located at $66,727 and $65,286, respectively.

BTC’s position above all three indicators supports a bullish near-term outlook and suggests the market’s broader technical structure has improved considerably.

Market data shows that the current breakout is accompanied by strong trading volume, adding credibility to the latest upward move.

If Bitcoin continues to trade above the 200-day EMA, it would reinforce the case for further gains and could establish the level as new support.

BTC bulls target the $82,689 resistance

Bitcoin’s next major resistance lies near the psychological and horizontal barrier at $82,689.

Buyers have pushed Bitcoin’s price past the $80,000 level, ensuring that fresh selling pressure doesn’t dampen the ongoing rally.

A decisive break and daily close above the $82,689 barrier would strengthen the bullish outlook and potentially open the way to higher levels.

Failure to clear $82,689 could lead to a period of consolidation as traders digest the recent gains.

Bitcoin’s momentum indicators remain bullish but increasingly stretched. The relative strength index is hovering near 85, placing BTC firmly in overbought territory.

Such a high reading does not guarantee an immediate reversal, but it indicates that the rally may be vulnerable to a corrective pause.

The moving average convergence divergence remains strongly positive, showing that upward momentum is still intact.

Together, the indicators suggest bulls remain in control, although the risk of short-term profit-taking has increased.

If the bears regain control,  initial support sits at the 200-day EMA near $74,700. Holding above this indicator would preserve the immediate bullish structure and could provide a foundation for another attempt at $83,000.

A deeper correction could bring the 100-day EMA at $71,545 and the nearby horizontal level at $66,727 into focus.

Below that region, the 50-day EMA at $65,286 offers another layer of support, followed by the structural floor at $62,300.

A sustained decline below $62,300 would weaken the broader bullish outlook, while continued trading above the 200-day EMA would keep the $80,000 target within reach.

Cosmos Labs urged affected Cosmos EVM chains to request validator halts on Aug. 25 as its security and engineering teams responded to an incident that had already reached multiple networks.

The company did not identify the underlying vulnerability, affected chains or total losses in its initial statement. It said users of the Cosmos EVM module had been affected and promised an incident report after the situation was resolved.

Separate disclosures from MANTRA, TAC and KiiChain connect recent attacks to the Cosmos EVM software stack. However, Cosmos Labs has not publicly confirmed that these incidents share one exact vulnerability or named every chain asked to stop.

Cosmos EVM chains receive emergency halt advice

Cosmos EVM is a shared software stack that lets Cosmos SDK chains execute Ethereum-compatible smart contracts. A vulnerability in a common module can therefore expose independent networks running affected versions or configurations.

Cosmos Labs said its teams were “proactively responding” and had contacted chains using the module. It asked those teams to coordinate with validators, which must collectively stop block production on decentralized proof-of-stake networks.

A halt prevents new transactions from settling while developers investigate and distribute a fix. It also temporarily blocks regular transfers, applications and withdrawals that depend on the affected chain.

Cosmos Labs directed other Cosmos EVM teams with questions to its security email. It did not publish a software version, mitigation instructions or a restart schedule, likely to avoid revealing exploitable details before chains are protected.

KiiChain and TAC disclose token drains

KiiChain said an attacker drained 148,326,583.15 KII from wallets on Aug. 22. Its incident report said the attacker repeated the technique 18 times before validators stopped the network at block 9,355,723.

The team linked the attack to a Cosmos EVM vulnerability involving vesting accounts, staking operations and balance handling. KiiChain said the attacker bridged part of the assets to BNB Smart Chain through Hyperlane. The team did not identify Hyperlane itself as the vulnerable component.

TAC separately said an attacker exploited a weakness in the Cosmos EVM precompile layer on Aug. 22 and drained one account. Validators halted TAC at block 24,671, according to its official update.

The projects’ disclosures establish that both networks suffered unauthorized asset movements. Cosmos Labs has not yet published an aggregate loss calculation or confirmed whether the same attacker controlled every address involved.

MANTRA restarted after a 30-hour halt

MANTRA stopped its network on Aug. 20 after detecting activity involving two project-managed wallets. The team isolated the incident to its Cosmos EVM module and deployed an updated release before coordinating a validator restart.

As previously reported, MANTRA resumed block production after a roughly 30-hour halt. It restarted from a snapshot at block 17,449,398 without rolling back the chain’s recorded state.

MANTRA said “no user funds were affected,” but its complete post-mortem and detailed asset accounting remain unpublished.

The team said balances were unchanged and the two affected addresses belonged to its internal wallet infrastructure. That statement does not establish whether project-controlled assets moved or quantify any attempted withdrawals.

The incidents follow an earlier Cosmos EVM flaw involving the ICS20 precompile. A March security advisory said incorrect state handling during nested execution allowed the same token balance to be used repeatedly within one transaction.

That earlier issue caused an estimated $7 million loss on SagaEVM in January. In related coverage, SagaEVM was paused after bridged assets were compromised. It remains unconfirmed whether the August attacks used that exact flaw, a related execution path or a separate vulnerability.

Cosmos Labs post-mortem will determine the scope

The immediate priorities are identifying every vulnerable deployment, distributing a tested patch and confirming that affected chains can restart safely. Validators will need coordinated upgrade instructions before resuming block production.

Cosmos Labs’ promised report should identify the faulty component, affected versions, exploitation timeline and total losses. It should also explain whether MANTRA, TAC and KiiChain were compromised through the same code path.

Until that report appears, other teams using Cosmos EVM may keep networks halted or disable affected functionality. Users should rely on official chain status pages and avoid transactions through unverified interfaces or purported recovery tools.

Bitcoin crossed $80,000 on Aug. 25 for the first time in almost 15 weeks, extending one of its strongest short-term advances since 2021.

The cryptocurrency traded near $80,500 at press time, according to the crypto.news market data. It reached an intraday high above $81,000 after gaining roughly 28% over eight days.

The advance has added approximately $350 billion to Bitcoin’s market capitalization, based on the price change and circulating supply. Bitcoin has also recovered about 38% from its July 1 low near $57,700.

That rebound effectively erased the losses accumulated since May. However, the crypto has now entered a resistance area that previously attracted heavy selling.

Bitcoin price tests resistance between $80,000 and $82,000

The daily BTC/USDT chart shows Bitcoin testing resistance between $80,000 and $82,000. That area marks the upper boundary of its May trading range and represents the immediate test for buyers.

A sustained close above $82,000 would confirm that demand remains strong after the rapid recovery. Failure to hold the breakout could lead to consolidation toward $76,000 or $78,000, which now form the nearest support zone.

Momentum indicators support the short-term bullish structure. The Know Sure Thing indicator stood near 112.50, well above its signal line around 40.20. The reading shows that upward momentum has accelerated.

The Money Flow Index reached 77.22. That indicates strong capital inflows but also places the indicator near its conventional overbought level of 80. Elevated readings do not guarantee a reversal, though they show that the rally may be stretched.

Rekt Capital described the weekly close above BTC’s 50-week exponential moving average as technically bullish. However, the analyst warned in an X post that the margin above the average remained narrow.

“A failed retest could turn the move into a fake breakout similar to Bitcoin’s earlier relief rally,” the analyst warned.

ETF inflows provided identifiable Bitcoin demand

U.S.-listed spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds recorded approximately $1.9 billion in net inflows during the week ending Aug. 21. The funds attracted capital for five consecutive sessions, marking their strongest weekly intake since October 2025.

The inflows offered evidence of spot demand alongside futures-market activity. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust accounted for a large portion of the buying during the week.

As crypto.news reported in its coverage of Bitcoin’s approach toward $80,000, forced short liquidations also accelerated the initial move. Traders who had bet on lower prices were required to buy Bitcoin as the market rose.

That buying can produce rapid advances but may not provide lasting support. Continued ETF and direct spot-market demand will therefore remain important if BTC is to hold above $80,000.

Treasury buybacks improved the liquidity narrative

The rally began shortly after the U.S. Treasury expanded its planned buybacks of longer-dated government securities.

On Aug. 19, the Treasury said it would increase the maximum size of certain liquidity-support operations from $2 billion to at least $4 billion. The larger operations will run from Sept. 9 through Nov. 4, according to the department’s official statement.

Buybacks allow the Treasury to purchase older, less liquid securities while issuing other debt. The change does not constitute Federal Reserve quantitative easing, and no government agency has established that it directly caused BTC’s rally.

However, the announcement initially pushed longer-term yields lower and improved investor expectations about market liquidity. BTC’s first breakout during the move took it above $71,000, as previously reported.

Reports have also discussed using part of the Treasury General Account to finance larger buybacks. The account is expected to hold roughly $950 billion at the end of September. Treasury has not announced a program committing that full amount to bond purchases.

Inflation data will test whether the rally can continue

The next major U.S. macroeconomic event arrives on Aug. 26. The Bureau of Economic Analysis will publish July personal income, spending and PCE inflation figures at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time, according to its official schedule.

The PCE price index is the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure. A stronger-than-expected reading could lift Treasury yields and reduce demand for risk assets. Softer data could support expectations for easier financial conditions.

The crypto must also hold its 50-week exponential moving average during any pullback. A successful retest would strengthen the breakout case. A weekly close below that level would raise the probability that the move represented another temporary relief rally.

The confirmed evidence currently shows a rapid price recovery, renewed ETF inflows and stronger momentum. Whether those conditions can sustain BTC above $80,000 remains unconfirmed.

BNB Chain activated the Pasteur hard fork on BNB Smart Chain mainnet at 02:30 UTC on Aug. 25, introducing three changes focused on bridge security, validator authorization and block capacity.

The network confirmed that Pasteur was live following its scheduled activation. BSC continued producing blocks at its existing 450-millisecond interval, with no major disruption publicly reported immediately after the upgrade.

Pasteur combines BEP-682, BEP-695 and BEP-675 under the broader BEP-673 upgrade plan. The changes had operated on BSC’s Chapel testnet since July 21 before reaching mainnet.

BNB Chain Pasteur strengthens bridge verification

BEP-682 changes how BSC verifies light blocks submitted through cross-chain infrastructure. Before Pasteur, the verification process did not explicitly reject duplicate entries in a submitted validator list.

BNB Smart Chain has activated the Pasteur hard fork on its mainnet, completing a set of protocol changes designed to close weaknesses in bridge verification and validator authorization—while also aiming to pack more transactions into each block.

BNB Chain said in a Tuesday announcement that Pasteur is now live, combining three BNB Evolution Proposals (BEPs) without altering BSC’s already established 450-millisecond block time. The upgrade focuses on tighter validator handling for cross-chain operations, safer staking and governance mechanics, and a new approach to block construction during periods of network congestion.

Key takeaways

• Pasteur is live on BNB Smart Chain mainnet, tightening bridge verification and validator authorization to reduce approval and voting ambiguities.
• BEP-682 blocks duplicate validator entries during cross-chain light-block verification, improving bridge approval correctness.
• BEP-695 strengthens protections around validator key rotation, slashing, and governance voting controls.
• BEP-675 introduces a new block-building route that lets builders submit blocks after executing transactions, while validators verify and sign before final execution checks.
• BNB Chain reports an ~88% throughput increase in QANet tests, while average gas per block rose—though the team stresses these are controlled test results, not mainnet measurements.

What Pasteur changes on BSC mainnet

Pasteur brings together three protocol upgrades—BEP-682, BEP-695, and BEP-675—addressing both security and performance bottlenecks.

According to BNB Chain, BEP-682 is designed to prevent validators from being counted more than once during cross-chain light-block verification, a change intended to make bridge approval logic more robust. BEP-695 then targets the security surface around validator lifecycle operations: it updates controls tied to validator key rotation, slashing, and governance voting so that older validator authority cannot be improperly reused.

BNB Chain also said BEP-695 blocks restricted addresses from participating in voting, a targeted governance hardening that can reduce the chance of unauthorized influence during decision-making processes.

The third component, BEP-675, changes how block proposers and validators coordinate around transaction execution. Instead of forcing validators to perform repeated work inside the tight block-production window, the new route is meant to ensure execution can be handled more efficiently without sacrificing consensus verification.

Why the new block-building route matters

Under BSC’s prior block-building approach, the builder carried out transaction execution first and then submitted a proposed block to validators. Validators, before signing, would execute transactions again to confirm the block’s contents—work BNB Chain says can take time away from execution capacity inside BSC’s 450-millisecond block window.

BNB Chain argued that when blocks are hard to assemble within that short interval, blocks can end up underfilled during busy periods. Pasteur’s change is intended to reduce that waste.

BEP-675 allows builders to submit blocks they have already executed. In this flow, validators check the proposed block against consensus rules and then sign and broadcast it. BNB Chain says validators then complete full execution verification afterward—separating consensus validation from the final execution checks to better fit the timing constraints of BSC block production.

Importantly, BNB Chain said the network does not force a single method: builders can still use the older route where validators execute transactions before signing, preserving compatibility for existing operational practices while enabling the new path when it is beneficial.

Throughput gains in QANet tests, with higher block gas

BNB Chain supported the performance motivation for BEP-675 with internal testing on QANet, described by the team as a controlled environment intended to mirror BSC’s geographically distributed validator setup.

In those tests, BNB Chain reported throughput increasing by about 88%, from 1,237 to 2,324 transactions per second when using the updated block-building route. At the same time, average gas used per block rose from 46.35 million to 84.15 million. BNB Chain said the block interval and the 100-million gas limit remained unchanged.

The network team cautioned that these results were generated under controlled test conditions and were not direct mainnet measurements. Still, the pattern is directionally useful for operators and developers: the upgrade is not only about shifting workloads between builders and validators—it’s also about enabling blocks to carry more real transaction load during peak demand.

Pasteur arrives after BSC’s earlier block-time reductions

Pasteur also fits into a broader sequence of BSC upgrades aimed at reducing block times and improving operational efficiency. Earlier changes included the Maxwell hard fork, which BNB Chain says reduced average block time from 1.5 seconds to roughly 0.8 seconds in June 2025. The follow-up Fermi upgrade then brought the network down further to the current 450-millisecond cadence.

With block intervals already compressed substantially, the logic behind Pasteur’s design becomes clearer: when blocks must be produced rapidly, redundant validator-side work can become a limiting factor. Pasteur’s new builder-to-validator execution handoff is aimed at keeping consensus verification within the schedule while still performing full execution checks.

For investors and users, the practical implication is that the chain’s scaling effort is increasingly about operational fit—making the most of a fixed block time—rather than changing core time parameters again.

What to watch next after the fork

With Pasteur now live, the key items for participants are how BSC’s validator set and block-building actors adopt the new route under real network conditions, and whether the observed test gains translate into measurable improvements on mainnet during high-traffic periods. Equally important will be monitoring whether bridge verification and governance participation behave as intended with the new validator authorization and voting restrictions in place.