With the widespread usage of mobile devices and their applications, many areas of innovation have created a multitude of opportunities for mobile technologies to be deployed with very interesting effects. One such new area that emerged in the last few years is mobile commerce. It represents a system where various entities create real–life or digital assets, distribute information about them to interested consumers, execute transactions, accept various types of compensation methods, and finally deliver these assets; all of it in a secure and trusted manner, respecting users’ privacy. Since mobile devices are increasingly used for m-commerce, it is important to ensure that users’ data on such devices are kept secure. Mobile devices contain many of our personal and private data and information, since we nowadays use them for all kind of activities, both personal and professional. However, such data and information are not always treated in a secure and privacy friendly way. The goal of this thesis is to identify and provide solutions to security related problems found on mobile devices, such as communications, storage and mobile application design, and with the use of cryptocurrencies to combine the findings in the design of a secure mobile commerce system. As a result, this thesis describes a design and architecture of a secure e-commerce system, called eAgora, primarily exploiting mobile technology. The system is innovative as it treats digital goods, classified and called mobile commerce objects. Based on the attributes and anticipated use of such specific m–commerce objects, different security and privacy measures for each of them are needed and enforced. The goal was to design a system that deals with mobile commerce in a secure and privacy friendly way in all the lifecycle of the transactions. As users are mostly using mobile devices to connect to the proposed services, research first focused on mobile device security and privacy issues, such as insecure storage on the mobile device, insecure handling of user credentials and personal information, and insecure communications. Issues not only coming from the device itself but also from the nature of it; being mobile it is used in a different way that the classical desktop computers. Mobile devices are used in public, in an environment that cannot be controlled, and are interfacing a variety of networks that are not under the mobile device user’s control. Potential attackers’ interest was analysed in different mobile commerce scenarios in order to understand the needs for security enhancements. After having analyzed the possible threats, a methodology for mobile application development that would allow many common development errors to be avoided and security and privacy mechanisms to be considered by design was specified. Moreover, in order to provide secure storage and guard against active and passive intruder attacks, a secure Mobile Crypto Services Provider facility that allows storage of data on the UICC cards was designed and implemented. In order to secure communications, a secure e-mail application was designed and implemented. The application provides a user-friendly way to encrypt and sign e-mails, using the users’ already working e-mail accounts. The security functionality is completely transparent to users and ensures confidentiality and integrity of e-mail exchange. For the mobile commerce system, an architecture that enables exchange of m-commerce objects between different merchants, customers and retailers is proposed. Inthe architecture, policy enforcement and the feature to detect suspicious events that may be illegal and to cooperate with law enforcement was embedded. The newly defined technology of virtual currencies is used as a payment facilitator within the proposed architecture. Many of its innovative features are adopted but some are also extended, such as the secure use of the user wallet files, i.e. the files that link the user with the virtual currencies and enable payment transactions between customers and merchants. Although there is no distinction between different virtual currencies, Bitcoin is used as an example of a market valued trading currency to validate and evaluate the proposed secure e-commerce architecture and the findings have been applied on it. The thesis provides detailed use cases that demonstrate how the proposed architecture of eAgora functions in different complicated e-trading circumstances and how different security related mechanisms are used. The thesis concludes with the analysis of the research results and with proposed directions for future research and development works. / <p>QC 20150521</p>

Payment settlement systems are constantly developing, however, the emergence of Bitcoin in 2009 created a whole new ball game for regulators. This new type of currency did not play by the same rules as other currencies, with the crypto-currency being borderless (not created by any country) and transferable almost instantaneously. Further, its users remained anonymous. This currency therefore became a breeding ground for illegal activities and disappointment. Users of the currency could use it as a form of payment system for illegal activities, by completely circumventing financial regulators. Other users took advantage of the lack of knowledge surrounding this new type of currency, running Ponzi schemes and defrauding ignorant users of their crypto-currency. Then there were the unfortunate users who, attracted to the notion of reaping large profits from the volatile nature of the currency, often found themselves disappointed when the volatile nature of the currency resulted in large trading losses. Crypto-currency is not all that bad however. Although many risks exist with this new type of currency, there also exist benefits which conventional fiat currency cannot provide. Regulators are therefore placed in a tricky position in which they must try to regulate this new currency to mitigate the possible risks without completely side-lining the benefits posed by the currency. However, regulators cannot create legislation without first understanding how crypto-currency functions. The ever-growing popularity of crypto-currency requires that regulators act fast but also provides many global regulatory lessons which South African regulators can learn from and use in drafting the appropriate legislation. This dissertation considers the nature of this new currency, the way in which it functions and the risks which it comes burdened with, while looking at other regulatory approaches in order to propose legislation which should be adopted in South Africa. / Mini Dissertation (LLM (Banking))--University of Pretoria, 2020. / Mercantile Law / LLM (Banking) / Unrestricted

Resume In my graduation thesis I concentrated on the comparative characteristics of the legal regulation of crypto-currency in three countries: Switzerland, the United States of America and Japan. Because it is a very crucial and challenging topic today and many governments are trying to find the solution for it. These countries and their legal regulations are considered to be the best in the world in many aspects, that other countries are trying to be equal to and they took leading position in the creation of the legal base for crypto-currency. The goal of my graduation thesis is to provide comparative analysis of the legal regulation of crypto-currency in the countries that I selected. This problem was solved by wide spread usage of laws and regulations of these countries, internet resources that are studying this question as well as the knowledge obtained during my studies at the faculty. Comparative, descriptive and synthetic-analytical methods were used to resolve the given problem of my thesis. My graduation work is divided into parts for easier comprehension of such complicated and specific topic. The thesis includes introduction, the first part which gives general knowledge about the crypto-currency, the second part which is dedicated to the principals of crypto-currency functioning, Bitcoin is...

Magister Legum - LLM / Financial crimes are transnational in nature, and no country is immune from them. They are an international problem that can best be solved through international cooperation on a global scale. It is therefore necessary to have rules and norms that apply worldwide in order to deal with these crimes comprehensively.1 Of particular prominence is the crime of money laundering (ML), which may be defined as the processing of criminal proceeds to disguise their illegal origin.2 This term is relatively new and is broadly defined, with the definitions varying from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. In Zimbabwe, money laundering acts are listed in the Money Laundering and Proceeds of Crime Act 34 of 2013 (the Principal Act).3 The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is the main international inter-governmental body formed specifically to set AML standards and to promote their implementation globally.

The monetary policies of states and systems built upon them do not naturally allow transactions of a very small value, as the transaction costs exceeds the actual value of the transaction. These types of transactions are called micropayments. This is problematic as it removes the possibility to monetize content that has a valuation that is so low that the costs of the transaction exceeds the value of the content. In this thesis we aim to create a system that allows micropayments to monetize low value content. We do so by developing a design theory based on Gregor and Jones conceptual model for design theories within Information Systems research. The system that we develop will use the end users computational power to generate a value, by running a cryptocurrency miner. We present the background knowledge required to fully understand the presented design theory. Within the design theory, we present a theoretical framework to base systems on that enables micropayments through cryptocurrency mining. We also present a developed proof of work prototype that proves the validity of the theoretical framework. Lastly we discuss our design theory. We conclude that the design theory enables transactions of a very low value, such as 0,0001 \$ cents. Transactions of such small value is not possible with systems built upon states monetary policies. We also conclude that the proposed design theory can be further developed to function independently of cryptocurrency mining. Instead the value for the transaction could be generated through solving complicated problems if institutions are willing to pay for computational power to solve them.

This study looks at the price mechanism of the digital quasi-currency bitcoin. Through statistical analysis of secondary data a probable significant results regarding correlation and regression between price and different independent variables have been established. The final analysis is pointing towards network effects being a part of the determinants for the crypto-currency’s price. Complimentary to the quantitative study explained above, an implementation of hermeneutic analysis based on secondary theoretical sources, journalistic opinion and a professional qualified judgment has aided the author and study in conceptual understanding. This interpretation has semantic character, and takes a Socratic kickoff regarding the nature of bitcoin as a financial instrument. The analysis runs back and forth throughout the course of the study and finally intertwines with qualitative results in the discussion. It is the author’s impression that a significant dimorphism surrounds bitcoin, calling for a conceptual differentiation leading to practical rethinking. The study takes the shape of a case-study conducted over four months. The author’s location during the process of writing was Stockholm Sweden, but the gathered data is of transnational character. / Den här studien tittar på prismekanismen hos den digitala kvasi-valören bitcoin. Genom statistisk analys av sekundärdata har sannolikt signifikanta resultat angående korrelation och linjärregrission mellan pris och olika oberoende variabler ettablerats. Den slutgiltiga analysen pekar mot att nätverksvariabler är delaktiga i avgörandet av krypto-valutans pris. Komplimentärt till den kvantitativa studen förklarad ovanför så har en implementation av hermeneutisk analys basserad på sekundära källor, journalistiska åsikter och ett professionellt kvalifiserat uttalande hjälpt författaren samt studien i dess konceptuella förståelse. Denna tolkning har semantisk karaktär, och tar Sokratisk avstamp gällande bitcoins natur som ett finansielt instrument. Analysen går fram och tillbaka genom uppsatsens gång, för att slutligen sammanvävas med de kvantitativa resultaten i uppsatsens diskussion. Det är denna förfatares intryck att en signifikant dimorphism omsluter bitcoin och kallar för en konceptuel differensiering som leder till praktiskt nytänkande. Studen tar formen av en fallstudie som genomförts om loppet av fyra månader. Författarens plats genom skrivandeprocessen var Stockholm Sverige, men den samlade datan har transnationell karaktär.