Welcome to another new crypto news summary. All the important news and events within the world of cryptocurrency from last week are summarized for you below so that you are completely up to date again before you head into the weekend. Read on to find out!

Shiba Inu launches Shibarium

In August, Shiba Inu (SHIB) launched Shibarium, a completely new Layer 2 network to help scale the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain. Unfortunately, the network ran into trouble shortly after its launch due to an overly enthusiastic constituency. Shiba Inu has since relaunched the platform and Shibarium is proving very popular after all.

On Monday, Aug. 28, the lead developer, Shytoshi Kusama, announced that the network is again running as intended. Shibarium is now running without problems; the platform is now a fork (a software copy) of Polygon. To prevent further congestion, the Shibarium team scaled up the network by 1500% earlier in August.

The on-chain explorer Shibariumscan.io shows that the number of wallet has already passed the 100,000 mark this week. Also, a total of nearly half a million transactions have already been processed.

Dutchman who stole 56 million and bought crypto arrested by FIOD

The Fiscal Intelligence and Investigation Service (FIOD) of the Inland Revenue has arrested three Dutch nationals in a massive investment fraud case. The suspects' homes were searched, after which crypto, homes, bank accounts, horses, cars, cash, gold, jewelry and other luxury goods were seized.

The two men (31 and 39), like the woman (37), are suspected of embezzlement and money laundering. The woman is also suspected of offering investment services without a license, fraud and forgery. The three suspects were arrested following preliminary investigations and reports by the Financial Markets Authority (AFM).

The AFM received several complaints from victims who were defrauded by the woman over a period of two years. The woman offers investments through the companies Best Choice, Airfeet BV and Xerof BV. These provide returns of 10% to 12% per month, according to the woman. However, few to none of the customers have seen their money back. With this scam, the woman raised 56 million euros in less than two years. From this money, the woman allegedly bought crypto, expensive (sport) horses, homes and luxury cars, among other things.

U.S. payments company enters partnership with XRP

Western Union, a global payments company, is going to venture into the world of cryptocurrencies. Western Union is an established, respected player in the world of international money transfers and operates in more than 200 countries. Their interest in XRP technology could have positive implications for the adoption of cryptocurrencies and blockchain.

Speaking at an analyst conference, Western Union CEO Hikmet Ersek revealed that XRP is the crypto of choice. Western Union is entering into a long-term partnership with XRP and is already actively researching integrations and innovations. One of these innovations is xRapid and is designed for fast international banking transactions. This innovation benefits financial institutions because it can significantly reduce the cost of transactions.

Twitter gets license for crypto payments

Elon Musk, as owner of Twitter, now X, is taking another step closer to his goal of turning the giant platform into an all-in-one app. Elon Musk has owned Twitter since October 2022 and wants to add several things to the platform, including a payment service for digital assets.

Services related to digital assets require licenses in the United States. On Aug. 28, Twitter Payments LLC, the financial arm of X, obtained a license that covers cryptocurrency payments. Twitter has already obtained seven licenses related to payment processing since July 2023. These licenses are for seven U.S. states.

The platform X now has 450 million users, many of whom are waiting for the approval of crypto payments. Elon Musk regularly lets it be known via Twitter that he is a big fan of the popular memecoin dogecoin (DOGE).