In a recent crackdown on fraudulent activities in the cryptocurrency space, the Texas State Securities Board has issued a cease and desist order against Arkbit Capital, a company that engaged in a crypto mining multi-level marketing (MLM) fraud scheme. The order alleges that Arkbit Capital and its affiliated entities used deceptive tactics, including image and video manipulation, to promote their investment plans and lure unsuspecting investors.

According to the Texas State Securities Board, Arkbit Capital falsely claimed to operate data centers in Arkansas for cloud mining various cryptocurrencies and promised investors daily returns of 1.6-2.8% for 120 days on digital asset deposits between $50 and $49,999. The company also used a payment processor, (link unavailable), to facilitate payments despite the processor's policy restricting users from certain jurisdictions, including the United States.

The investigation revealed that the Arkbit CoinPayments account holder was located in Hyderabad, India, not Arkansas, and that the company's CEO and founder were not present at a cryptocurrency conference in Austin, Texas, as claimed in a manipulated video. The Texas State Securities Board has urged the public to remain vigilant when dealing with social media investment opportunities and to thoroughly research any investment before sending money.

This is not the first Ponzi scheme case related to cryptocurrency in the United States. Recently, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) busted a $300 million Ponzi scheme under the guise of a crypto trading platform called CryptoFX, which targeted crypto investors from the Latino community in the U.S. Additionally, a New York jury convicted two individuals who acted as promoters for the now-collapsed fake crypto mining and trading scheme IcomTech, and a former head of legal and compliance for the multibillion-dollar OneCoin fraud scheme received a four-year jail sentence.

In a separate development, newly discovered neural features in artificial intelligence (AI) systems could be the key to solving AI hallucinations, one of the industry's biggest challenges. According to Dario Amodei, the co-founder and CEO of Anthropic, the newly discovered features could help solve the issue around AI hallucinations, which occur when AI models output new, usually incorrect, information that isn't contained in its data set. Anthropic has already been researching the effects of altering internal features on its AI assistant to change its behavior.

The development of more advanced AI systems will depend on the talent and expertise of developers, and the discovery of these neural features is a significant step forward in this journey. As the AI industry continues to evolve, breakthroughs like this will play a crucial role in shaping its future.