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When the FBI successfully breached a crypto wallet held by the Colonial Pipeline hackers by following the money trail on bitcoin’s blockchain, it was a wake-up call for any cyber criminals who thought transacting in cryptocurrency automatically protected them from scrutiny.

One of the core tenets of bitcoin is that its public ledger, which stores all token transactions in its history, is visible to everyone. This is why more hackers are turning to coins like dash, zcash, and monero, which have additional anonymity built into them.

Monero, in particular, is increasingly the cryptocurrency of choice for the world’s top ransomware criminals.

“The more savvy criminals are using monero,” said Rick Holland, chief information security officer at Digital Shadows, a cyberthreat intelligence company.

Created in 2014

Monero was released in 2014 by a consortium of developers, many of whom chose to remain anonymous. As spelled out in its white paper, “privacy and anonymity” are the most important aspects of this digital currency.

The privacy token operates on its own blockchain, which hides virtually all transaction details. The identity of the sender and recipient, as well as the transaction amount itself, are disguised.

Because of these anonymity features, monero allows cyber criminals greater freedom from some of the tracking tools and mechanisms that the bitcoin blockchain offers.

“On the bitcoin blockchain, you can see what wallet address transacted, how many bitcoin, where it came from, where it’s going,” explained Fred Thiel, former chairman of Ultimaco, one of the largest cryptography companies in Europe, which has worked with Microsoft, Google and others on post-quantum encryption.

“With monero, [the blockchain] obfuscates the wallet address, the amount of the transactions, who the counter-party was, which is pretty much exactly what the bad actors want,” he said.

With monero, they’re obfuscating the wallet address, the amount of the transactions, who the counter-party was, which is pretty much exactly what the bad actors want.
Fred Thiel
CEO, Marathon Digital Holdings

While bitcoin still dominates ransomware demands, more threat actors are starting to ask for monero, according to Marc Grens, president of DigitalMint, a company that helps corporate victims pay ransoms. 

“We’ve seen REvil…give discounts or request payments in monero, just in the past couple months,” continued Holland.

Monero was also a popular choice on AlphaBay, a massive underground marketplace popular up until it was shut down in 2017.

“It’s almost like we’re seeing, at least from a cyber criminal perspective, a resurgence…in monero, because it has inherently more privacy than some of the other coins out there,” Holland said of monero’s recent rise in popularity among actors in the ransomware space.

Monero’s limitations

There are, however, a few major barriers when it comes to the mainstreaming of monero.

For one, it’s not as liquid as other cryptocurrencies — many regulated exchanges have chosen not to list it due to regulatory concerns, explained Mati Greenspan, portfolio manager and Quantum Economics founder. “It certainly isn’t enjoying as much from the recent wave of institutional investments,” he said.

In practice, that means that it’s harder for cyber criminals to get paid directly in the currency.

“If you’re a corporation and you want to acquire a bunch of monero to pay somebody, it’s very hard to do,” Thiel told CNBC. 

The digital currency could also be more vulnerable to regulation at its on-and-off-ramps, which is the bridge between fiat cash and crypto tokens. 

“I would wager to say the U.S. and other regulators are going to shut them [monero] down pretty hard,” said Thiel.

One way they could go about that: telling an exchange that if they list monero, they risk losing their license.  

But while the U.S. government can indeed keep monero at bay by marginalizing liquidity points, Castle Island Ventures founding partner Nic Carter believes that markets which allow peer-to-peer transfers of monero to fiat will always be hard to regulate. 

There’s also nothing to keep hackers within U.S. jurisdiction. Criminals could easily choose to carry out all of their transactions overseas, in places that aren’t subject to the kind of controls American regulators might put in place.

Bitcoin still rules ransomware

Cyber insurance is another reason why bitcoin is still the currency of choice for most ransomware attacks.

“Insurance is so important in this space, and insurers often refuse to reimburse a ransom payment if it’s been in monero,” said former CIA case officer Peter Marta, who now advises companies about cyber risk management as a partner with law firm Hogan Lovells. 

“One of the things that insurers will always ask for is what type of due diligence the victim company conducted, before making the payment…to try to minimize the chance that the payment goes to an entity on the sanctions list,” explained Marta. 

Traceability is more easily accomplished with bitcoin, given that its blockchain lays bare transaction amounts and the addresses of both the sender and recipients taking part in the exchange. There is also an established infrastructure already in place for officials to monitor these transactions.

Authorities keep lists of bitcoin wallets, which are tied to different sanctions regimes.

While monero does offer a greater degree of privacy over bitcoin, Holland points out that threat actors have mastered certain techniques to anonymize transactions in bitcoin, in order to obscure the chain of custody. 

He says that cyber criminals often turn to a mixing or tumbling service, where they can combine the illicit funds with clean crypto to essentially make a new type of bitcoin, at which point, they turn to currency swaps. 

“Just like you would do dollars to pounds…they may go bitcoin, to monero, then back to bitcoin, and then get a bitcoin ATM card, where they can just cash out dollars with it,” explained Holland.

So even though bitcoin’s blockchain is public, there are still ways to make it difficult for investigators to trace transactions to their ultimate destination. 

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How a war-torn Myanmar plays a critical role in China’s rare earth dominance

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How a war-torn Myanmar plays a critical role in China's rare earth dominance

Illustration of the national flag of the People’s Republic of China and a mining site.

Craig Hastings | Moment | Getty Images

Beijing has been stepping up controls on rare earth exports, triggering global shortages and exposing industries’ dependence on Chinese supply chains. 

However, over recent years, China itself has become reliant on rare earth supplies from an unexpected source: the relatively small and war-torn economy of Myanmar. 

While China is the world’s top producer of rare earths, it still imports raw materials containing the coveted metals from abroad.

Myanmar accounted for about 57% of China’s total rare earth imports last year, Gracelin Baskaran, director of the Critical Minerals Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told CNBC.

According to Chinese Customs data, Myanmar’s rare earth exports to China significantly picked up in 2018 and reached a peak of nearly 42,000 metric tons by 2023.

Baskaran added that the imports from Myanmar are also particularly high in heavy rare earth element contents, which are generally less abundant in the earth’s crust, elevating their value and scarcity. 

“Myanmar’s production has significantly strengthened China’s dominant position, effectively giving Beijing a de facto monopoly over the global heavy rare earths supply chain — and much of the leverage it wields today.” 

The country has become a key source of two highly sought-after heavy rare earths, dysprosium and terbium, that play crucial roles in high-tech manufacturing, including in defense and military, aerospace and renewables sector.

“This dynamic has given rise to a supply chain in which extraction is concentrated in Myanmar, while downstream processing and value addition are predominantly carried out in China,” said Baskaran.

Why Myanmar? 

Myanmar is home to deposits that tend to have higher heavy rare earth content, David Merriman, research director at Project Blue, told CNBC. 

These “ionic adsorption clay” or IAC deposits are exploited through leaching methods that apply chemical reagents to the clay — and that comes with high environmental costs. 

According to Merriman, the vast majority of the world’s IAC operations were in Southern China in the early to mid-2010s. But, as Beijing began implementing new environmental controls and standards in the rare earths industry, a lot of these projects began to close down.

“Myanmar, particularly the North of the country, was seen as a key region which had similar geology to many of the IAC deposit areas within China,” Merriman said. 

“You started to see quite a rapid build out of new IAC type mines within Myanmar, essentially replacing the domestic Chinese production. There was a lot of Chinese business involvement in the development of these new IAC projects.”

The rare earths extracted by these IAC miners in Myanmar are then shipped to China mostly in the form of “rare earth oxides” for further processing and refining, Yue Wang, a senior consultant of rare earths at Wood Mackenzie, told CNBC.

In 2024, a report from Global Witness, a nonprofit focused on environmental and human rights abuses, said that China had effectively outsourced much of its rare earth extraction to Myanmar “at a terrible cost to the environment and local communities.”

China’s rare earth risks

China’s reliance on Myanmar for rare earths has also opened it up to supply chain risks, experts said. 

According to Global Witness’s research, most of the heavy rare earths from Myanmar originate from the Northern Kachin State, which borders China. However, following Myanmar’s violent military coup in 2021, the military junta has struggled to maintain control of the territory amid opposition from the public and armed groups.

“Myanmar is a risky jurisdiction to rely on, given the ongoing Civil War. In 2024, the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), a group of armed rebels, seized sites responsible for half the world’s heavy rare earths production,” said CSIS’ Baskaran. 

Since the seizure, there have been reports of supply disruptions causing spikes in the prices of some heavy rare earths. According a Reuters report, the KIA was seeking to use the resources as leverage against Beijing. 

Chinese customs data shows, imports of rare earth oxides from Myanmar fell by over a third in the first five months of the year compared to the same period last year.

“If Myanmar were to cease all exports of rare earth feed stocks to China, China would struggle to meet its demand for heavy rare earths in the short term,” said Project Blue’s Merriman. 

Not surprisingly, Beijing has been looking to diversify its sources of heavy rare earths.  

According to Merriman, there are IAC deposits in nearby countries, including Malaysia and Laos, where some projects have been set up with Chinese involvement.

Still, he notes that environmental standards are expected to be higher in those countries, which will present challenges for rare earth miners. 

China’s decision to cut back on its own extraction of heavy rare earth elements may serve as a warning to other countries about the costs of developing such projects. A report by Chinese media group Caixin in 2022 documented how former IAC operation sites in Southern China had left behind toxic water and contaminated soil, hurting local farmers’ livelihoods.

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Tesla robotaxi incidents caught on camera in Austin draw regulators’ attention

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Tesla robotaxi incidents caught on camera in Austin draw regulators' attention

A Tesla robotaxi drives on the street along South Congress Avenue in Austin, Texas, on June 22, 2025

Joel Angel Juarez | Reuters

Tesla was contacted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration on Monday after videos posted on social media showed the company’s robotaxis driving in a chaotic manner on public roads in Austin, Texas.

Elon Musk’s electric vehicle maker debuted autonomous trips in Austin on Sunday, opening the service to a limited number of riders by invitation only.

In the videos shared widely online, one Tesla robotaxi was spotted traveling the wrong way down a road, and another was shown braking hard in the middle of traffic, responding to “stationary police vehicles outside its driving path,” among several other examples.

A spokesperson for NHTSA said in an e-mail that the agency “is aware of the referenced incidents and is in contact with the manufacturer to gather additional information.”

Tesla Vice President of Vehicle Engineering Lars Moravy, and regulatory counsel Casey Blaine didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The federal safety regulator says it doesn’t “pre-approve new technologies or vehicle systems.” Instead, automakers certify that each vehicle model they make meets federal motor vehicle safety standards. The agency says it will investigate “incidents involving potential safety defects,” and take “necessary actions to protect road safety,” after assessing a wide array of reports and information.

NHTSA previously initiated an investigation into possible safety defects with Tesla’s FSD-Supervised technology, or FSD Beta systems, following injurious and fatal accidents. That probe is ongoing.

The Tesla robotaxis in Austin are Model Y SUVs equipped with the company’s latest FSD Unsupervised software and hardware. The pilot robotaxi service, involving fewer than two-dozen vehicles, operates during daylight hours and only in good weather, with a human safety supervisor in the front passenger seat.

The service is now limited to invited users, who agree to the terms of Tesla’s “early access program.” Those who have received invites are mostly promoters of Tesla’s products, stock and CEO.

While the rollout sent Tesla shares up 8% on Monday, the launch fell shy of fulfilling Musk’s many driverless promises over the past decade.

In 2015, Musk told shareholders Tesla cars would achieve “full autonomy” within three years. In 2016, he said a Tesla EV would be able to make a cross-country drive without needing any human intervention before the end of 2017. And in 2019, on a call with institutional investors that helped him raise more than $2 billion, Musk said Tesla would have 1 million robotaxi-ready vehicles on the road in 2020, able to complete 100 hours of driving work per week each, making money for their owners.

None of that has happened.

Meanwhile, Alphabet-owned Waymo says it has surpassed 10 million paid trips last month. Competitors in China, including Baidu’s Apollo Go, WeRide and Pony.ai, are also operating commercial robotaxi fleets.

WATCH: Tesla launches robotaxis in Austin as robotaxi race heats up

Tesla launches robotaxis in Austin as robotaxi race heats up

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Meta approached AI startup Runway about a takeover bid before Scale deal

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Meta approached AI startup Runway about a takeover bid before Scale deal

Mustafa Hatipoglu | Anadolu | Getty Images

Meta spoke with artificial intelligence startup Runway about a potential takeover ahead of its multibillion-dollar investment in Scale AI, CNBC confirmed Monday.

Runway is best known for its AI video-generation tools and earned a spot on CNBC’s Disruptor 50 list earlier this month.

The deal talks between Meta and Runway did not progress far and dissolved, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be named due to the confidential nature of the discussions.

Bloomberg earlier reported the talks. Meta declined to comment.

Read more CNBC tech news

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been aggressively pushing to bolster his company’s AI efforts in recent months. The social media giant invested $14.3 billion into Scale AI in June, and it has also approached the startups Safe Superintelligence and Perplexity AI about potential acquisitions this year.

Meta agreed to a 49% stake in Scale AI and hired away founder Alexandr Wang along with a few other employees from the company.

While Meta was unsuccessful in its efforts to buy Superintelligence outright, Daniel Gross, the company’s CEO, and former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman are joining Meta’s AI efforts, where they will work on products under Wang.

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Meta approached Perplexity before massive Scale AI deal

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