The post ‘Crypto’ ATMs grow in Kenya; regulators warn of unlicensed ops appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com. Homepage > News > Business > ‘Crypto’ ATMs grow in Kenya; regulators warn of unlicensed ops Digital asset ATMs have sprung up across Nairobi, allowing Kenyans to quickly convert their cash to digital currency, a month after the country’s VASP bill was signed into law. Elsewhere, the Atlantic Council has lauded the rapid implementation of digital IDs across Africa, but it warns that poor oversight and fragile legal safeguards expose citizens to privacy breaches and government surveillance. Kenya warns against unlicensed ‘crypto’ ATM operators After two years of public consultations and parliamentary debates, Kenya finally enacted the VASP Bill, with President William Ruto signing it into law in late October. Just weeks later, Kenyan VASPs are rolling out new products and services targeting the growing base of digital asset users, estimated at 6 million. According to local outlets, digital asset ATMs have sprung up in many of the largest malls in the capital, Nairobi. The most popular is ‘Bankless Bitcoin,’ whose orange-branded machines are conveniently placed alongside bank ATMs. Digital asset ATMs enable users to convert their cash into digital assets, primarily targeting novice users who are new to digital asset purchases. While they offer an easy and convenient onramp, they have also been vastly targeted by criminals in phishing, ransomware, and extortion scams. According to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, these ATMs have been used to process at least $160 million worth of illicit digital assets in the past six years. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission claimed that in 2023, Americans lost $110 million to digital asset ATM scams. In Kenya, where investors lost $44 million to digital asset scams last year, according to one report, these ATMs risk fueling even more illicit activities. This risk is heightened by the new enacted regulations; while the VASP Bill was signed… The post ‘Crypto’ ATMs grow in Kenya; regulators warn of unlicensed ops appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com. Homepage > News > Business > ‘Crypto’ ATMs grow in Kenya; regulators warn of unlicensed ops Digital asset ATMs have sprung up across Nairobi, allowing Kenyans to quickly convert their cash to digital currency, a month after the country’s VASP bill was signed into law. Elsewhere, the Atlantic Council has lauded the rapid implementation of digital IDs across Africa, but it warns that poor oversight and fragile legal safeguards expose citizens to privacy breaches and government surveillance. Kenya warns against unlicensed ‘crypto’ ATM operators After two years of public consultations and parliamentary debates, Kenya finally enacted the VASP Bill, with President William Ruto signing it into law in late October. Just weeks later, Kenyan VASPs are rolling out new products and services targeting the growing base of digital asset users, estimated at 6 million. According to local outlets, digital asset ATMs have sprung up in many of the largest malls in the capital, Nairobi. The most popular is ‘Bankless Bitcoin,’ whose orange-branded machines are conveniently placed alongside bank ATMs. Digital asset ATMs enable users to convert their cash into digital assets, primarily targeting novice users who are new to digital asset purchases. While they offer an easy and convenient onramp, they have also been vastly targeted by criminals in phishing, ransomware, and extortion scams. According to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, these ATMs have been used to process at least $160 million worth of illicit digital assets in the past six years. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission claimed that in 2023, Americans lost $110 million to digital asset ATM scams. In Kenya, where investors lost $44 million to digital asset scams last year, according to one report, these ATMs risk fueling even more illicit activities. This risk is heightened by the new enacted regulations; while the VASP Bill was signed…

‘Crypto’ ATMs grow in Kenya; regulators warn of unlicensed ops

2025/12/09 18:11

Digital asset ATMs have sprung up across Nairobi, allowing Kenyans to quickly convert their cash to digital currency, a month after the country’s VASP bill was signed into law.

Elsewhere, the Atlantic Council has lauded the rapid implementation of digital IDs across Africa, but it warns that poor oversight and fragile legal safeguards expose citizens to privacy breaches and government surveillance.

Kenya warns against unlicensed ‘crypto’ ATM operators

After two years of public consultations and parliamentary debates, Kenya finally enacted the VASP Bill, with President William Ruto signing it into law in late October.

Just weeks later, Kenyan VASPs are rolling out new products and services targeting the growing base of digital asset users, estimated at 6 million.

According to local outlets, digital asset ATMs have sprung up in many of the largest malls in the capital, Nairobi. The most popular is ‘Bankless Bitcoin,’ whose orange-branded machines are conveniently placed alongside bank ATMs.

Digital asset ATMs enable users to convert their cash into digital assets, primarily targeting novice users who are new to digital asset purchases. While they offer an easy and convenient onramp, they have also been vastly targeted by criminals in phishing, ransomware, and extortion scams.

According to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, these ATMs have been used to process at least $160 million worth of illicit digital assets in the past six years. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission claimed that in 2023, Americans lost $110 million to digital asset ATM scams.

In Kenya, where investors lost $44 million to digital asset scams last year, according to one report, these ATMs risk fueling even more illicit activities.

This risk is heightened by the new enacted regulations; while the VASP Bill was signed into law, the Central Bank of Kenya recently warned that it has yet to license any VASP under the new framework.

The top bank is the designated digital asset watchdog, alongside the Capital Markets Authority (CMA). However, in a recent public announcement, it warned that neither regulator had licensed any VASPs under the new Act “to operate in or from Kenya.”

The central bank says the Cabinet Secretary for the National Treasury is drafting regulations that offer guidance on the implementation of the VASP Bill. One industry leader told CoinGeek that this could be the most critical step, as this guidance “gives practical effect to the VASP Act and defines how the law works in day-to-day operations.”

Despite the regulatory gap, Kenya remains a hub for digital assets. According to one study, Kenyans moved Ksh 426 billion ($3.3 billion) through digital assets in the year ending June 2024.

Atlantic Council: Africa’s digital IDs pose privacy, surveillance risk

Elsewhere, a new report from the Atlantic Council has warned that Africa’s rapid implementation of digital IDs exposes millions to privacy breaches and state surveillance.

The report, titled ‘Biometrics and digital identity in Africa,’ lauded the accelerated rollout of digital IDs on the continent, now being used for voter rolls, SIM registrations, national IDs, and smart-city services.

49 African countries now have some form of biometric system, with 35 using it for national elections.

However, this widespread rollout comes with risks that could expose critical information about hundreds of millions of Africans, says the Washington-based think tank.

One of the main concerns is vendor concentration, with the Council identifying Huawei, Idemia, Semlex, and Veridos as the dominant tech providers in the region. Public familiarity also remains relatively low, with only one in three Africans aware that their governments were issuing digital IDs. Dependence on foreign governments and organizations, led by the World Bank and the European Union, also interferes with oversight and procurement decisions.

These factors leave digital ID in African nations at risk of state surveillance and political abuse, with most governments having access to vast amounts of citizens’ critical data.

Most countries have yet to implement comprehensive legal protections, exposing citizens to privacy breaches in which criminals or government entities can access sensitive information.

“Cyberattacks, data leaks, or intentional misuse of information can have severe consequences for individuals, particularly in authoritarian or politically unstable contexts,” the report states.

“Without strong legal and technical safeguard mechanisms, state critics, journalists, and members of the political opposition remain especially vulnerable to surveillance, harassment, and repression.”

Watch: Tech redefines how things are done—Africa is here for it

title=”YouTube video player” frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen=””>

Source: https://coingeek.com/crypto-atms-grow-in-kenya-regulators-warn-of-unlicensed-ops/

Piyasa Fırsatı
PUBLIC Logosu
PUBLIC Fiyatı(PUBLIC)
$0,02811
$0,02811$0,02811
+1,77%
USD
PUBLIC (PUBLIC) Canlı Fiyat Grafiği
Sorumluluk Reddi: Bu sitede yeniden yayınlanan makaleler, halka açık platformlardan alınmıştır ve yalnızca bilgilendirme amaçlıdır. MEXC'nin görüşlerini yansıtmayabilir. Tüm hakları telif sahiplerine aittir. Herhangi bir içeriğin üçüncü taraf haklarını ihlal ettiğini düşünüyorsanız, kaldırılması için lütfen service@support.mexc.com ile iletişime geçin. MEXC, içeriğin doğruluğu, eksiksizliği veya güncelliği konusunda hiçbir garanti vermez ve sağlanan bilgilere dayalı olarak alınan herhangi bir eylemden sorumlu değildir. İçerik, finansal, yasal veya diğer profesyonel tavsiye niteliğinde değildir ve MEXC tarafından bir tavsiye veya onay olarak değerlendirilmemelidir.

Ayrıca Şunları da Beğenebilirsiniz

The Channel Factories We’ve Been Waiting For

The Channel Factories We’ve Been Waiting For

The post The Channel Factories We’ve Been Waiting For appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com. Visions of future technology are often prescient about the broad strokes while flubbing the details. The tablets in “2001: A Space Odyssey” do indeed look like iPads, but you never see the astronauts paying for subscriptions or wasting hours on Candy Crush.  Channel factories are one vision that arose early in the history of the Lightning Network to address some challenges that Lightning has faced from the beginning. Despite having grown to become Bitcoin’s most successful layer-2 scaling solution, with instant and low-fee payments, Lightning’s scale is limited by its reliance on payment channels. Although Lightning shifts most transactions off-chain, each payment channel still requires an on-chain transaction to open and (usually) another to close. As adoption grows, pressure on the blockchain grows with it. The need for a more scalable approach to managing channels is clear. Channel factories were supposed to meet this need, but where are they? In 2025, subnetworks are emerging that revive the impetus of channel factories with some new details that vastly increase their potential. They are natively interoperable with Lightning and achieve greater scale by allowing a group of participants to open a shared multisig UTXO and create multiple bilateral channels, which reduces the number of on-chain transactions and improves capital efficiency. Achieving greater scale by reducing complexity, Ark and Spark perform the same function as traditional channel factories with new designs and additional capabilities based on shared UTXOs.  Channel Factories 101 Channel factories have been around since the inception of Lightning. A factory is a multiparty contract where multiple users (not just two, as in a Dryja-Poon channel) cooperatively lock funds in a single multisig UTXO. They can open, close and update channels off-chain without updating the blockchain for each operation. Only when participants leave or the factory dissolves is an on-chain transaction…
Paylaş
BitcoinEthereumNews2025/09/18 00:09
XRP ETF’s bereiken belangrijke mijlpaal: $1 miljard aan netto instroom

XRP ETF’s bereiken belangrijke mijlpaal: $1 miljard aan netto instroom

De markt voor crypto-exchange-traded funds (ETF’s) heeft opnieuw een belangrijke mijlpaal bereikt. XRP ETF’s hebben gezamenlijk meer dan 1 miljard dollar aan netto
Paylaş
Coinstats2025/12/16 21:01
XSGD And XUSD Launch On Solana’s Blazing Network In 2025

XSGD And XUSD Launch On Solana’s Blazing Network In 2025

The post XSGD And XUSD Launch On Solana’s Blazing Network In 2025 appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com. StraitsX Stablecoins Unleash Power: XSGD And XUSD Launch
Paylaş
BitcoinEthereumNews2025/12/16 20:59