Politics

China dev fined 3 yr’s salary for VPN use, 10M e-CNY airdrop: Asia Express

Published

2 years ago

September 28, 2023

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Our weekly roundup of news from East Asia curates the industry’s most important developments.

Chinese worker fined $145K over VPN

An unnamed individual in China was fined 1.06 million Yuan ($144,907) for using a virtual private network (VPN) to access restricted websites as part of a remote work routine for a foreign employer.

According to local mediareportsearlier this week, during his employment as a consultant between 2019 to 2022 the unnamed individual accessed GitHub to view source code, answered questions in customer support, held teleconferences via Zoom, and posted multiple threads on Twitter with the help of a VPN.

Images from the China Digital Times story.

Based on a document issued by City of Chengde Police, the individual’s income earned with the aid of a VPN was deemed as “proceeds of crime.” The police issued a penalty of $144,097, equivalent to three years of the individual’s salary.

Chinese law prohibits the use of VPNs to bypass the country’s “Great Firewall” that blocks popular sites such as Google, Wikipedia, and Facebook. The ruling has spooked many in China’s IT and Web3 circles, who often rely on VPNs for similar remote-work tasks.

City of Hangzhou airdrops 10M e-CNY

The City of Hangzhou is airdropping 10 million digital yuan central bank digital currency (e-CNY), worth a total of $1.37 million, to incentivize food and beverage spending as it hosts the 19th Asian Games.

Anyone within the municipality of Hangzhou, locals and visitors alike, can receive the e-CNY airdrop for use in food delivery platforms. Individuals can receive up to three vouchers that reimburse merchants, in e-CNY, up to 20% to 30% of the value of food items after purchase.

The airdrop will renew every five days until the balance is emptied. The vouchers, although denominated in e-CNY, are only effective for five days and can only be tendered through select food delivery platforms. Earlier this year, the City of Hangzhou airdropped 4 million e-CNY, worth $590,000, in an effort to boost the CBDC’s adoption.

15 detained over largest alleged Ponzi scheme in Hong Kong’s history

Hong Kong police have detained 15 individuals linked to the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange JPEX.

As of September 27, Hong Kong Policeclaimthey have received over 2,392 complaints claiming a total loss of 1.5 billion Hong Kong dollars ($191.6 million) in the apparent Ponzi scheme. Since the investigation began mid-September, police say that they have seized 8 million HKD ($1 million) in cash and frozen bank accounts worth 77 million HKD ($10 million) suspected of being proceeds of crime.

On September 13, the Hong Kong Securities & Futures Commission (SFC) issued a warning regarding JPEX being an unlicensed exchange within its jurisdiction. The move led to several arrests of its key executives and the abandonment of its corporate booth in Token2049 Singapore. Prior to its collapse, JPEX was one of the most heavily marketed crypto exchanges in Hong Kong, with corporate ads displayed across the city’s metro lines and taxis.

The incident is shaping up as potentially the worst Ponzi scheme in Hong Kong’s history in terms of monetary loss. Shortly after its discovery, the SFC began publishing a list of crypto exchanges awaiting registration or are unlicensed within the special administrative region of China.

CoinEx resilient despite $70M hack

Hong Kong crypto exchange CoinEx will resume services despite falling victim to a $70 million wallet hack orchestrated by North Korea’s infamous Lazarus Group.

According to a September 22 statement, CoinEx claims to have resumed deposits and withdrawals on 190 cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, USD Coin, and Tether. The firm stated:

“The wallet system is operating safely and steadily at present. We will gradually resume deposit and withdrawal services for the remaining 500+ cryptos. Since the resuming operations will be processed frequently, there will be no further or separate announcements for each crypto.”

As part of its new wallet system, CoinEx updated the deposit addresses of all crypto assets, rendering old addresses invalid. On September 12, a leak of the exchange’s hot wallet keys led to the theft of over $70 million worth of users’ cryptos. Despite the incident, CoinEx said that cold wallets were not affected and that the CoinEx User Asset Security Foundation would “bear the financial losses from this incident.”

Multiple blockchain security firms, such as Elliptic, have pointed to North Korea’s Lazarus Group as the perpetrator of the exploit. The CoinEx team has since offered a “generous bounty” for the return of stolen funds. Prior to the hack, the exchange disclosed it had around $260 million worth of major cryptocurrencies in its proof-of-reserves report.

Alibaba moves into digital wallets

Chinese tech conglomerate Alibaba wants to launch its own wallet service.

According to the September 28 announcement, Alibaba’s Cloud subsidiary has partnered with crypto custodian Cobo to create an enterprise wallet-as-a-service solution for developers and organizations, integrating crypto wallets into software through APIs and SDKs. Cobo says it is incorporating its custodial wallet and multi-party computation technology to build the Alibaba Cloud wallet.

“This collaboration marks a significant step towards setting new standards in security, performance, and accessibility of the digital wallet infrastructure for Web3,” said Dr. Changhao Jiang, co-founder and CTO of Cobo. The firm claims to hold partnerships with over 500 institutions, with billions of digital assets in custody through its wallet solutions. In June, crypto-friendly executive Joe Tsaibecame the chairmanof Alibaba Group, replacing his predecessor Daniel Zhang.

Zhiyuan Sun

Zhiyuan Sun is a journalist at Cointelegraph focusing on technology-related news. He has several years of experience writing for major financial media outlets such as The Motley Fool, Nasdaq.com and Seeking Alpha.

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Starmer gets carnival welcome in India – but UK business leaders paint challenging picture back home

Published

6 hours ago

October 8, 2025

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Starmer gets carnival welcome in India - but UK business leaders paint challenging picture back home

It is not hard to see why Sir Keir Starmer ends up doing quite so many foreign trips.

On the road to Mumbai, India, from the airport there were giant pictures of the British prime minister looming over the sealed-off roads cleared for his special VIP convoy.

There was nothing short of a carnival along the roadside to greet the cars.

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People who knew nothing about Sir Keir – and were happy to admit so to me – dressed up for the occasion in plumes of feathers and chicken costumes and danced to music. The Labour conference does not come close to that.

This trip has a big first – 125 blue chip business leaders, more than any business delegation in history – are here. The enthusiasm to take advantage of the signed, though not completed, free trade deal is clear.

“I think the importance of this trip is reflected by the huge British delegation we’ve got here today,” said Shevaun Haviland, director general of the British Chambers of Commerce.

“A hundred and twenty five businesses, biggest UK names Beattie, BP, British Airways, Diageo, Virgin, huge businesses all the way through to incredible AI and energy start-ups from around the UK.”

But business leaders have been clear to me that they haven’t simply joined the delegation to further their activities in India. They want to raise their profile with the prime minister, in order to ensure their voice is heard when it needs to be by the government.

And the picture some paint of life back in the UK is more challenging. CEO of leading architecture firm Benoy, Tom Cartledge, said how 10 to 15 years ago their business was 90% UK activity, and now it is 90% overseas. He said markets like India are important in part because the UK environment is challenging.

“We’re having to go and find new markets because what we do is design big projects, infrastructure, real estate towers, residential, retail,” he told me.

He went on: “There really is a perception of overseas markets that we are sluggish, low productivity, high tax rates. And that does nothing for the confidence. And in fact, I spoke to an Indian client this morning who said that they are relocating from the head offices to Dubai, because the perception is it’s going to get harder, it’s going to get tougher in the UK and we just do not need that.”

It is rare for business figures on a PM delegation to speak so openly.

Ms Haviland told me that business figures are using this trip to pass a message to the prime minister.

“We want to see no more tax for business,” she told me, saying that’s the message being conveyed right now in India. I asked what they say back? “They hear us,” she replied. “I think we’ll have to wait and see.”

Another important voice is Rohan Malik, managing partner of EY. He says there’s an optimistic case for the UK over the medium term but suggested short-term challenges for the government.

“No one likes taxes, but at the same time, they are a necessary way for the government to balance the books.

“If I take a five or seven-year view, I feel more optimistic about the future, because I do think some short-term pain will lead to some long-term gains.”

Does he think the business community could bear paying a bit more?

“I think it’s going to be tricky for the chancellor,” he said.

“I don’t envy her position at all to be looking at different, but she’s got other of disposal businesses, but not like more taxation. At the same time, we have to be prepared to understand how do we try and contribute more towards economic growth?”

The candour is not something I can remember from business delegations in the past. That’s a response to the nervousness about a £20bn-£30bn black hole Chancellor Rachel Reeves will have to fill in the November budget. Overall the delegates remain on side – for now.