The irresponsible libertarian rationale for all manner of bad behavior – popular in Silicon Valley – has found its greatest expression in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and its ilk. The anonymity of cryptocurrencies had made ransomware a global criminal enterprise.

Digital mirageCurrencies are traditionally a medium of exchange, a store of value, and a unit of account. Cryptocurrencies are bad at all three.Yes, they are a medium of exchange, but try to buy a house with one. Painful.As a store of value they are extremely unstable, since there is no underlying asset, such as the full faith and credit of a nation. Which directly reflects on the third use of currency – a unit of account – how do you maintain a set of books with a currency whose value is ever shifting?If you own a cryptocurrency and aren’t a criminal, you’re a speculator. To see how that ends, check out Tulip Mania.Anonymity is the problem todayGood arguments can be made for a digital global currency, although that has serious problems too, as the Euro has demonstrated. The real problem is the anonymity that enables criminals to collect multi-million dollar ransoms without fear of being tracked down and brought to justice. How is that a good thing?The bigger problem

Suppose you are a billionaire. You’ve gotten comfortable with evaluating risks, knowing that you can deploy a phalanx of Ivy league lawyers at $1,000 an hour to make your case and hold off the law. Gosh. Untraceable digital money. No more paying mules to haul cash across national borders. Pay foreign law firms to create shell companies to hide assets – private island, superyacht, arms dealing, drugs, sex trafficking – with untraceable cash. Yum!

Yeah, the local tax authorities might get lucky and figure out what you’ve done, but really, they don’t have the expertise. Unregulated digital currencies are empowering a whole new level of criminal.Plus, they’ve been hackedMuch of the technical interest in cryptocurrencies is due to the blockchain data structure, a supposedly unhackable storage technology that preserves, forever, the history of a particular coin. But as we’ve seen repeatedly, the blockchain may not be hackable, but the supporting infrastructure surely is. Beyond that, one of these days quantum computing will leave computer science labs and enable the decryption – and rewriting – of cryptographically protected blockchains. Sorry, Mr. Boris owns your Bitcoin, not you. It says so right here.The TakeI’ve been watching cryptocurrencies for years. I get the attraction. But it’s now clear — the Colonial pipe line shutdown is only the latest example — that they need policing. Anonymity, at least, must end.I suspect that with policing, much of the attraction will disappear. Oh well. It doesn’t matter how much technobabble surrounds a bad idea. It’s still a bad idea.Comments welcome. If you think cryptocurrencies are wonderful, please tell me, in as few words as you can manage, why. I’m listening.See also: More

Sabrina Ortiz/ZDNETZDNET’s key takeawaysGoogle’s new Pixel 10 lineup incorporates a handful of new AI-powered features. They include photo editing with speech, language translation that uses your voice sample, and prediction of users’ needs.The Pixel 10 Series also includes a one-year subscription to the Google AI Pro plan. Get more ZDNET: Add us as a preferred Google source More

CyberCX, the group of security companies headed by two of Australia’s most experienced technology and cyber veterans, has continued its expansion, this time into Queensland.
The company said it has unified Queensland’s best cybersecurity talent, expertise, and capability to create the state’s leading full-service cybersecurity operator.
The launch follows CyberCX recently acquiring two Queensland-based cyber companies, Alcorn Group and Yell IT.
CyberCX said it would work closely with the University of Queensland and QUT to help it grow its Queensland workforce to around 200 over the next 18 months.
“Queensland is a key market focus for CyberCX. We are the country’s largest, sovereign cybersecurity player and we are passionate about protecting the communities we serve,” CyberCX CEO John Paitaridis said. “CyberCX is well placed to deliver mission-critical cybersecurity services to Queensland businesses and government leveraging our 600 plus cybersecurity specialists nationally.”
See also: Former PM Turnbull suggests Australia boosts its cyber capability by buying local
CyberCX in late October also stood up operations in Western Australia after acquiring two local cyber firms, Asterisk Information Security and Diamond Cyber Security.

Similar to its Brisbane approach, CyberCX said it would work with ECU, UWA, and Curtin University to grow its Western Australian workforce to over 70 cybersecurity professionals over the next year. 
CyberCX, backed by private equity firm BGH Capital, was formed a year ago when it brought together 12 of Australia’s independent cybersecurity brands: Alcorn, Assurance, Asterisk, CQR, Diamond, Enosys, Klein&Co, Phriendly Phishing, Sense of Security, Shearwater, TSS, and YellIT.
It is headed by Alastair MacGibbon, former head of the Australian Cyber Security Centre and once special adviser on cybersecurity to former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, as well as Paitaridis, who was formerly Optus Business’ managing director.
Since launch, CyberCX has gone on an expansion spree, scooping up a number of local cybersecurity startups, which in addition to the Queensland and Western Australian acquisitions, includes identity management firm Decipher Works and cloud security specialists CloudTen in October; and two Melbourne-based startups, Basis Networks and Identity Solutions, in July.
CyberCX has also pushed into the New Zealand market in August, adding its first Kiwi acquisition in Insomnia Security a month later.
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