Cryptocurrencies Offer Great Hope, But Present Risks: White House

Washington, United States: The booming cryptocurrencies market offers great hope, but also presents security risks and concerns, the White House said on Wednesday.

Noting that the market was being monitored, a senior administration official said that he was not prepared to say if it needed regulations.

"We do not have a formal position on block-chain currencies and cryptocurrencies at this point. Block-chain technologies operate in a way that there's, I guess, great hope and promise. They also present some security risks and concern for us," Tom Bossert, White House Homeland Security Advisor, told reporters at a news conference.

Bossert said he was tracking and monitoring it very closely from a security perspective as he was responsible for not only advising on cyber but also on counterterrorism policy.

"What we want to make sure is that block-chain cryptocurrencies aren't being used to support illicit behaviour in ways that we can't discover," Bossert said.

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There are other people in the administration equally following it for the promise it provides economically and from a trade perspective.

"We don't have any negative or positive view on it right now, but we have to monitor it closely as this new technology is becoming quite, expensive - lucrative," Bossert said.

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Asked if it needed regulation, he said, "Not prepared to say that now".

In the last several weeks, prices of cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin has increased by several hundred times.

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There is massive increase in other currencies as well.

However, a South Korean cryptocurrency exchange filed for bankruptcy today after it experienced its second cyber-attack in eight months.

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As a result of this, Yapian, which operates a Seoul-based exchange called Youbit, lost a large amount of its digital-currency reserves.