Today in crypto, A former BJP legislator and 11 police officials have been convicted for the 2018 abduction of a Surat businessman in a plot to seize over 750 Bitcoin, El Salvador splits up 6,274 BTC holdings into 14 new addresses to lower …
Today in crypto, A former BJP legislator and 11 police officials have been convicted for the 2018 abduction of a Surat businessman in a plot to seize over 750 Bitcoin, El Salvador splits up 6,274 BTC holdings into 14 new addresses to lower risk of quantum attack. Meanwhile, the Ethereum Foundation paused its open grant applications.
Indian court sentences 14 to life in Bitcoin extortion case
An Indian anti-corruption court has sentenced 14 individuals, including 11 police officials and a former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA), to life imprisonment in a case involving the kidnapping and extortion of crypto from a Surat-based businessman in 2018.
The judgment, delivered by Special Judge B.B. Jadav in Ahmedabad on Friday, found the group guilty of criminal conspiracy, kidnapping for ransom, illegal detention, and assault, according to a report by The Times of India.
Among those convicted are former Amreli district superintendent of police Jagdish Patel and ex-MLA Nalin Kotadiya. All 11 police officers, including former IPS officer Patel, were also found guilty under the Prevention of Corruption Act for misconduct by public servants.
The case centers around businessman Shailesh Bhatt, who had reportedly recovered a portion of his lost investment from BitConnect developer Dhaval Mavani in the form of Bitcoin (BTC), after the $900 million company he invested in shut down.
El Salvador splits $678M Bitcoin across 14 wallets to reduce quantum risk
El Salvador has redistributed its Bitcoin reserve holdings into 14 new wallet addresses as a precaution against potential quantum computing threats.
“By splitting funds into smaller amounts, the impact of a potential quantum attack is minimized,” El Salvador’s Bitcoin Office said in an X post Friday, adding that each new Bitcoin address holds up to 500 BTC.
The Bitcoin Office explained that once funds are spent from a Bitcoin address, its public keys are revealed and vulnerable — making it a target for quantum computers to crack — should the technology evolve into a significant threat in the future.
More than 6 million Bitcoin — worth around $650 billion — could be at risk if quantum computers become powerful enough to crack elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) keys, quantum research company Project Eleven said in April.
However, quantum computing is still far away from being capable of hacking Bitcoin, it said, nothing that a Bitcoin private key contains 256-bits, and no quantum computer running Shor’s algorithm has managed to even crack a 3-bit key yet.
Faced with application influx, Ethereum Foundation pauses open grant submissions
After funding hundreds of projects with millions of dollars, the Ethereum Foundation is temporarily pausing the Ecosystem Support Program’s (ESP) open grant application process to refocus on a more proactive funding model that is better aligned with the ecosystem’s strategic needs.
The transition comes as the foundation faces challenges reviewing the high volume of inbound applications, which it said has left “limited capacity to pursue new strategic opportunities.”
In a Friday blog post, the Ethereum Foundation stressed that the ESP will continue funding new projects, but under a refined approach to grantmaking. More details are expected in the fourth quarter, including a curated methodology outlining specific ecosystem priorities.
In 2024, ESP awarded nearly $3 million across 105 projects and initiatives, supporting areas such as developer tooling, data and analytics, research and education. In the first quarter of 2025 alone, the Ethereum Foundation distributed $32.6 million in total grants.
