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Bitcoin While China tightens its grip on its cryptocurrency community, Japan is openly embracing cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology, legalizing bitcoin, and encouraging and funding blockchain research. Even Japan’s banks are onboard, working collaboratively to develop a blockchain platform specifically for the financial sector. With its 120 member banks, the  Japanese Bankers Association  (JBA) is creating a Collaborative Blockchain Platform and is actively looking for a company to supply its blockchain technology on an ongoing basis. Experimenting with the Collaborative Blockchain Platform, the JBA will initially determine which financial services best lend themselves to the new platform, likely including settlement/transfer services, know-your-customer (KYC) systems and financial infrastructure such as their Zengin System and Densai Net System. Japanese bitcoin exchange bitFlyer is stepping up to the plate to take on tech giants including Fujitsu, Hitachi and NT...

KCNA/REUTERSKim Jong Un at the test of a strategic submarine ballistic missile in an undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency in 2015. As tensions reach a boiling point between North Korea, the US, and the North's neighbors, Japan's government has issued a guide for its citizens on how to survive a missile attack that would take less than 10 minutes to hit Japan,  The Washington Post reports . The guide  warns specifically of nuclear ballistic-missile attacks, as North Korea continues both nuclear and ballistic-missile programs. The guide instructs people to keep calm, keep roads clear, and maintain communication with the outside world through radio or TV in the event of a nuclear, chemical, or biological attack. It recommends that in the event of a nuclear explosion, people not look at the flash, which could be blinding, and have the least possible amount of skin exposed to the blast of radiation. Paranoia or real concern? North Korea  stu...

Japan’s largest banks Mitsubishi UFJ, Mizuho and SMBC are now investors in bitFlyer, Japan’s largest bitcoin exchange. Samburaj Das Less than a year after  raising ¥3 billion ($27 million)  in a record funding round by a bitcoin and Fintech company in Japan, Tokyo-based bitFlyer now sees all three of Japan’s ‘mega-banks’ as investors in the bitcoin exchange. In an announcement today, bitFlyer, Japan’s largest bitcoin exchange and blockchain services company, revealed fresh funding from Mizuho Capital and SMBC Venture Capital, both of which are the investment arms of the Mizuho Banking Corporation and the Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation respectively. The two banking corporations join Mitsubishi UFJ as investors in bitFlyer. Mitsubishi UFJ Capital  participated in a ¥510 million ($4.5 million) round  of funding in August 2015. Altogether, all three of Japan’s megabanks have now invested in the country’s leading bitcoin exchange. Interest in Bitc...

President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe delivered an abrupt joint statement Saturday night, addressing reports that North Korea test fired a ballistic missile into its eastern sea. "I just want everybody to understand and fully know that the United States of America stands behind Japan, its great ally, 100%," Trump said. In his remarks, Abe called the launch "absolutely intolerable." Trump and Abe made their remarks from Mar-a-Lago, Trump's estate in Palm Beach, Florida, and did not take questions from reporters. The launch was North Korea's first such test of the year and an implicit challenge to Trump's new administration. But details of the launch, including the type of missile, were scant. There was no immediate confirmation from the North, which had recently warned it is ready to test its first intercontinental ballistic missile. The reports come as Trump was hosting Abe and just days before the North is to mark the birth...