• On October 17th, Monero will implement the next major network upgrade that will reduce transaction size by 25% and improve verification performance by 10%.
• Australian crypto exchanges need to remove Monero, Zcash, Bytecoin and other privacy coins due to regulatory pressure.

According to a publication by the privacy activist and Monero contributor known as ErCiccione, the privacy coin will undergo a major network update on October 17th. Network upgrades are technically hard forks and require all participants in the Monero network to update their software to integrate all new features. Regarding the question whether there will be a split and a new coin created, ErCiccione stated:

No. Hard forks in Monero are made to improve the base protocol, and are non-contentious. There will be no split and no new coin will be created.

The network upgrade will introduce a new ring signature construction which is called CLSAG that will replace the current MLSAG. This will allow Monero to reduce transaction size by 25% and improve verification performance by 10%. That way, Monero will be more efficient:

CLSAG signatures achieve the same functionality as MLSAG signatures, but at a much smaller size. And thanks to some optimizations of the underlying cryptography, Monero software can verify CLSAG signatures more quickly.

Additionally, Monero will see an improvement in its security. CLSAG has a more robust security model. Therefore, CLSAG signatures will be smaller and faster, and at the same time have more stringent security. The Monero contributor further called on all users and node operators to update the software in preparation for the network upgrade.

The software, ErCiccione clarified, will be released one month before the network update, on September 17th of this year. At the time of launching the new software, there will be instructions how to complete the update of Monero wallets and nodes. However, the contributor said that users should only replace the monerod, monero-wallet-cli and monero-wallet-gui software with the new version.

Australia tightens pressure on Monero and other privacy coins

While Monero will reach an important milestone in its development, privacy coins are experiencing a major blow in Australia. The founder of Nuggets News, Alex Saunders, has reported that regulatory authorities in the country have made updates that have forced exchanges to remove the following privacy coins: Monero (XMR), Komodo (KMD), Bytecoin (BNC) and ZCoin (XZC).

The above mentioned privacy coins will be delisted by the exchanges by 31 August 2020 at the latest. One of the most popular exchanges in Australia Coinspot has confirmed this news. In response to Saunders’ announcement, the exchange issued the following statement:

Communication was sent to users holding these coins. Further information will be published shortly.

Like Coinspot, other Australian exchanges will also comply with the regulation. These include Coinjar and Swiftx. The former already removed their trading pairs for Zcash in July this year. The second announced that it will delist the above cryptocurrencies as well as Dash (DASH), Zcash (ZEC), Verge (XVG), Groestlcoin (GRS) and Horizen (ZEN). Swiftx will also implement the measures by August 31.