Huoxun Finance reported on January 18th that, according to CryptoPolitan, Vietnamese police arrested five suspects in Da Nang for allegedly operating a cryptocurrency scam syndicate. In a statement, Vietnamese police stated that the suspects, based in Cambodia, operated the cryptocurrency scam. The scam allegedly imitated the Nasdaq exchange, and the suspects misappropriated 14 billion Vietnamese dong (approximately US$532,800). Police also mentioned that the suspects possessed a powerful telecommunications network and electronic devices, enabling them to conduct illegal activities from their residence in Da Nang. The syndicate used Zalo and Telegram to create dozens of fake accounts, posting fake trading activities, impersonating investment experts to lure victims into investing, and falsely reporting profits. After misappropriating the funds, the money was transferred through multiple bank accounts and ultimately converted into cryptocurrency to conceal its origin.

According to an article published on the X platform by Vitalik Buterin, protocol simplicity is crucial for trustlessness, passing the escape test, and autonomy. Even with extremely high decentralization, a protocol bloated with hundreds of thousands of lines of code or complex cryptography will eventually fail. Vitalik Buterin's concern about Ethereum protocol development lies in the fact that excessively adding new features to meet specific needs can compromise long-term autonomy. To address the issue of backward compatibility causing the protocol to become bloated over time, the Ethereum development process needs explicit simplification and garbage collection mechanisms. Simplification standards include minimizing lines of code, avoiding unnecessary dependencies on complex technical components, and adding more invariants. Garbage collection can be implemented piecemeal or on a large scale, such as replacing PoW with PoS, or using Rosetta-style backward compatibility to downgrade low-frequency complex functions to smart contract code. Vitalik Buterin hopes that the pace of Ethereum's evolution will slow down in the long run and strives to prevent useless parts from becoming a permanent drag on the protocol.

According to Odaily Planet Daily, Emmett, the project lead for Solana Mobile, stated in a post on the X platform that prior to the SKR release, in addition to existing anti-Syllabic measures, the team was actively identifying additional Seeker clusters. These claim shares will be removed from the initial SKR distribution and returned to future airdrop pools. The team did not disclose specific detection details, but stated that this move aims to ensure the fairness of SKR distribution, directing it to users and developers who drive the platform's growth.

According to Odaily Planet Daily, Galaxy Research Director Alex Thorn stated in an article on the X platform that the U.S. Senate Banking Committee will vote on the Crypto Market Structure Bill on January 15th. Currently, the Senate majority is 53 to 47. Since a bill typically requires 60 votes to pass, Republicans still need to secure the support of 7 to 10 Democratic senators. Thorn stated that the bill addresses the classification of DeFi under anti-money laundering rules, the handling of stablecoin reserve yields, protection of non-custodial developers, and SEC authorization or restrictions on token issuance. If the bill passes, it will be a major bullish catalyst for cryptocurrency adoption; if it fails, while the overall impact on industry fundamentals will be relatively small, it could lead to negative market sentiment.

Huoxun Finance reported on January 18th that Binance founder CZ denied rumors circulating in the community about a relationship with actress Sydney Sweeney on the X platform, stating that he does not frequently participate in social activities and has "never met Sydney Sweeney." CZ also mentioned that it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish which "news" is not credible, but if one can do so, "you will be richer."