Mining income up by 41.2 percent www.montsame.mn

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ As reported by the Ministry of Mining and Heavy Industry, MNT 981 billion has been accumulated to the state budget from the mining sector in the first four months of 2019.

Bitcoin hit $8,000 again. What's behind the rise www.cnn.com

New York (CNN Business)Bitcoin just surged past $8,000 on Tuesday, hitting its highest mark since last July. It tapered off slightly by mid-afternoon, but is still trading at its highest level in nearly a year.

What's going on?
Bullish experts say the strong showing could signal that bitcoin has a future as a worthy investment opportunity. But the currency's volatile and controversial history has prompted plenty of skepticism.
Bitcoin has typically been regarded as risky, said Dan Held, co-founder of Interchange, a company that advises businesses on how to manage their crypto assets. But he said the currency's resurgence might be the first inkling that it holds weight as a "risk off" trade — an investment treated as a safer bet when markets are tumultuous, like bonds or gold. After all, the currency skyrocketed in value Monday when the Dow plunged 617 points, perhaps suggesting that investors turned to bitcoin as a safe haven asset.
"It's bitcoin's moment to shine when people momentarily give up on the government or the banking system," Held added.
But the bitcoin rally didn't end when the markets were plunging. The currency continued to climb early Tuesday even as the major indexes did well, and it held steady for much of the day.
That could have been because Monday's bitcoin trading frenzy spurred additional investor interest, said James Putra, head of product strategy at brokerage firm TradeStation Crypto.
"When the market started to rise, it drew more people in," Putra said. "Larger players started to take bites out of the marketplace; it's a common and familiar approach."
Still, bitcoin has been here before. It hit $20,000 in December 2017 before crashing the next year. Some experts called the downturn a correction after a period of "speculative mania."
Bitcoin has soared 60% this year. Meet the new buy-and-hold investment
Bitcoin has soared 60% this year. Meet the new buy-and-hold investment
The currency also faced accusations of price manipulation: Two academics at the University of Texas at Austin studied the possibility bitcoin had been manipulated and said they found evidence that it had been during its massive 2017 run-up. The shadow of price manipulation continues to loom over bitcoin.
"Manipulation could very well be behind the recent market moves. To act like bitcoin and crypto currency prices are purely driven by supply and demand of little traders ... ignores the specific mechanics of this marketplace," said John Griffin, a finance professor at the University of Texas at Austin and one half of the duo that penned the paper on price manipulation last year.
"It would not be a stretch nor surprising to find that manipulative activity is behind the recent runup when the underlying market mechanics are similar to before," Griffin added.
Griffin isn't the only one with that suspicion.
"I don't think anyone really knows what this is due to," said Tim Massad, former chairman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission, speaking about the latest rally. "But you worry that manipulation could be a contributing factor given the lack of regulation and transparency in this market compared to other markets."
Massad said he lauded the Securities and Exchange Commission for stepping up oversight of cryptocurrency, but added that "you still have gaps in regulation."
Another, simpler explanation for the price rise: It's Blockchain Week, an unofficial holiday for bitcoin. The event, which is also called Consensus 2019, draws in more buyers for bitcoin and other major currencies, according to Lennon Sweeting, the director and head trader of Coinsquare, a Canadian cryptocurrency trading platform.
There's also the fact that bitcoin and blockchain — the underlying technology that acts as a public ledger — have steadily become more mainstream. JPMorgan Chase (JPM), the nation's largest bank, announced a new digital coin earlier this year. JPMorgan and Microsoft (MSFT) recently announced plans to partner and expand on blockchain platforms. And ICE (ICE), the owner of the NYSE, launched a futures exchange for bitcoin and other cryptos.
All of that could make the digital currency and its technology appear more credible to investors. And it gives bitcoin's backers a reason to remain optimistic.
"The $10,000 mark remains firmly in sight over the coming months," said Vaibhav Kadikar, founder and CEO of a decentralized prediction market platform, CloseCross. "And the possibility of surpassing the previous high in the coming half year still remains."
-- CNN Business' Anneken Tappe and Paul La Monica contributed to this report.

UNICEF donates measles vaccines to Mongolia www.news.mn

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Mongolia has donated 577,000 doses of measles vaccine, syringes and safety kits worth USD 500,000 the Health Ministry reported on Tuesday.

Engineers India Ltd secures order from Mongolia www.equitybulls.com

Engineers India Limited (EIL) has signed a contract with 'M/s Mongol Refinery, State Owned LLC' for providing its PMC Services for Construction of a Crude Oil Refinery Plant in Mongolia. The Contract was signed in the presence of Mr. D. Sumyaabazar, Hon'ble Minister of Mining and Heavy Industry of Mongolia.

Mongolia attaches great importance to Mongolia-China expo: agriculture minister www.xinhuanet.com

ULAN BATOR, May 14 (Xinhua) -- Mongolia attaches great importance to the biennial Mongolia-China expo, which is a great platform to showcase Mongolian products to Chinese consumers, Agriculture Minister Chultem Ulaan said Tuesday.

Working group on ‘World Expo 2020’ holds meeting www.montsame.mn

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ The Government made a decision regarding Mongolia’s participation in the ‘World Expo 2020’ to be held in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. A working group was established with Foreign Minister D.Tsogtbaatar as Commissioner-General and T.Duuren, CEO of Mongolian National Chamber of Commerce and Industry, as Deputy Commissioner.

Inner Mongolia’s Trade with Belt & Road Countries up 13.6% www.beltandroad.news

North China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region saw a year-on-year foreign trade growth of 13.6 percent to 23.8 billion yuan (about 3.48 billion U.S. dollars) with countries along the Belt and Road in first four months of 2019.

Indian leading companies introducing their products and services www.montsame.mn

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ India-Mongolia Oil and Gas Exhibition yesterday opened at Buyant Ukhaa Sport Palace. Present at the opening ceremony were Cabinet Secretariat of the Government L.Oyun-Erdene, Minister of Foreign Affairs D.Tsogtbaatar, MP L.Bold and representatives of some Embassies in Mongolia.

WhatsApp discovers 'targeted' surveillance attack www.bbc.com

Hackers were able to remotely install surveillance software on phones and other devices using a major vulnerability in messaging app WhatsApp, it has been confirmed.

WhatsApp, which is owned by Facebook, said the attack targeted a "select number" of users, and was orchestrated by "an advanced cyber actor".

A fix was rolled out on Friday.

The attack was developed by Israeli security firm NSO Group, according to a report in the Financial Times.

On Monday WhatsApp urged all of its 1.5bn users to update their apps as an added precaution.

The attack was first discovered earlier this month.

How was the security flaw used?
It involved attackers using WhatsApp's voice calling function to ring a target's device. Even if the call was not picked up, the surveillance software would be installed, and, the FT reported, the call would often disappear from the device's call log.

WhatsApp told the BBC its security team was the first to identify the flaw, and shared that information with human rights groups, selected security vendors and the US Department of Justice earlier this month.

"The attack has all the hallmarks of a private company reportedly that works with governments to deliver spyware that takes over the functions of mobile phone operating systems,” the company said on Monday in a briefing document note for journalists.

The firm also published an advisory to security specialists, in which it described the flaw as: "A buffer overflow vulnerability in WhatsApp VOIP stack allowed remote code execution via specially crafted series of SRTCP packets sent to a target phone number.”

Who is behind the software?
The NSO Group is an Israeli company that has been referred to in the past as a "cyber arms dealer".

Its flagship software, Pegasus, has the ability to collect intimate data from a target device, including capturing data through the microphone and camera, and gathering location data.

In a statement, the group said: "NSO's technology is licensed to authorised government agencies for the sole purpose of fighting crime and terror.

"The company does not operate the system, and after a rigorous licensing and vetting process, intelligence and law enforcement determine how to use the technology to support their public safety missions. We investigate any credible allegations of misuse and if necessary, we take action, including shutting down the system.

"Under no circumstances would NSO be involved in the operating or identifying of targets of its technology, which is solely operated by intelligence and law enforcement agencies. NSO would not or could not use its technology in its own right to target any person or organisation."

Who has been targeted?
WhatsApp said it was too early to know how many users had been affected by the vulnerability, although it added that suspected attacks were highly-targeted.

According to Facebook's latest figures, WhatsApp has around 1.5bn users worldwide.

Amnesty International, which said it had been targeted by tools created by the NSO Group in the past, said this attack was one human rights groups had long feared was possible.

"They're able to infect your phone without you actually taking an action," said Danna Ingleton, deputy programme director for Amnesty Tech. She said there was mounting evidence that the tools were being used by regimes to keep prominent activists and journalists under surveillance.

"There needs to be some accountability for this, it can't just continue to be a wild west, secretive industry."

On Tuesday, a Tel Aviv court will hear a petition led by Amnesty International that calls for Israel's Ministry of Defence to revoke the NSO Group's licence to export its products.

Strong gold results point to further potential in Mongolia www.mining-journal.com

Standouts included 112m at 5.9g/t gold from 13m at Bayan Khundii's Midfield zone; 3m at 40g/t at depth in Striker West about 210m west of the proposed pit boundary; and 1m at 51.9g/t at depth beyond the resource perimeter in southern Bayan Khundii.