In a recent article, we discussed about the Bitfinex hack, its implications on the digital currency, and the possible future of the exchange, as it’ll implement better security measures.

Surprisingly, just one week after losing more than $60 million bitcoin in a hacking attack, Bitfinex has managed to once again become one of the largest bitcoin exchanges, judging by the current US dollar volume being traded.

Many Ethereum users from all around the world thought that the Ethereum classic drama would end once the hard fork was issued to recover the lost DAO funds, yet this hasn’t happened. In fact, the process did shine some light on one of the biggest threats of cryptocurrency- the need to have consensus, and the inability of the community to achieve it.

To put things better into perspective, whenever a fork happens on the digital currency market, it is important for the community to carefully choose between two main branches, and then proceed to move from the one which lost, to the one which won. This helps keep balance, and ensures a higher rate of success for the digital currency in question.

If you've been following recent bitcoin news, then chances are that you are aware of the Bitfinex hack, where more than $60 million worth of bitcoin were stolen.

Regardless of whether these coins are recovered or not, the digital currency has taken a massive plunge, falling over $100 in value. Not only this, but it has also shined some light on the weak security that many bitcoin exchanges from around the world employ. Its negative effects include the possibility of weakening the trust that investors have in the cryptocurrency.

During the last couple of months, Bitcoin has become more of a taboo subject over in Russia, especially due to the numerous government tries to discourage the use of the digital currency. Regardless of this, recent reports indicate that there is some room for improvement.

With this in mind, Russian authorities are reportedly considering the idea of abandoning the efforts to institute criminal penalties for those who use the cryptocurrency within the country. Surprisingly enough, it seems that representatives from the country's Central Bank, government bureaus and the Ministry of Finance agree with the idea, and have become more supportive Bitcoin.

According to recent reports, a Miami-based judge just ruled that Bitcoin is not actually money, a decision not taken lightly by digital currency fans from all around the world.

The case in question refers to a web designer known by the name of Michell Espinoza, who reportedly laundered and illegally transmitted around $1,500 worth of Bitcoin. Reports indicate that the funds were then sold to undercover detectives who told the web designer that they were to be used to purchase stolen credit card numbers from the internet.

During the last couple of months, the position of the European Commission concerning digital currencies has gradually changed. To fulfil their goal of preventing terrorism financing and money laundering, the legislative body has decided to create a database of digital currency users and record bitcoin transactions.

Not only is this against the principles of anonymity and transparency that bitcoin and other digital currencies strive for, but many believe that the decision is also morally wrong. According to recent reports, the Commission believes that a regulatory framework for digital currency platforms must be formed as soon as possible, as they aren’t monitored nor observed by the European authorities.

Russia has been a key player in the effort to ban digital currencies for a while now, but things are about to change. According to recent reports, an official of the Russia’s Ministry of Finance has stated that the financial regulator will support a law meant to ban the use of bitcoin domestically, yet allow people to use it as a foreign currency.

With this in mind, the deputy finance minister, Alexei Moiseev, declared that their change of tone is partially due to the increasing popularity of digital currencies worldwide, and is meant to limit the use of alternatives to the ruble inside the country. Together with this, the amendments made to the law will likely remove the uncertainty that those working with blockchain technology have faced in Russia so far.

While the Bitcoin community has been debating whether to issue a hard fork for a while now, to reduce the blocksize, the Ethereum network has taken the step forward and carried out the long-debated and anticipated fork on the blockchain.

A couple of hours ago, the China-based Ethereum miner known by the name of BW.com managed to mine the 192,000th block on the Ethereum blockchain. Just a few seconds afterwards, the mining pool also mined the first block on the new version of the blockchain, thus returning the funds that were lost during the collapse of The DAO project.

Through time, banks and other financial institutions have taken different approaches when it came down to dealing with the Bitcoin revolution. With this in mind, it seems like the Bank of England will take a different approach: if you can’t beat them, join them.

According to a research paper published this week by the bank, economists working for it have stated that central banks should issue their own digital currency. By using a case study carried out in the US, they concluded that doing so is likely to give national economy a boost of at least 3%, while also offering policy makers the tools needed to handle financial crashes and booms.

During the last couple of months, Bitcoin has been the subject of discussion for numerous government meetings, looking for new ways to regulate the digital currency.

According to recent reports, last week, The European Commission published a directive draft including a couple of proposals for the future of Bitcoin. With this in mind, it means to extend anti-money laundering regulation to exchanges and bitcoin wallets. The reason behind this is to help counter tax evaders, fraudsters, terrorists, money launderers, drug dealers and other criminals.