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Hightop Finance

Latest release: 0.2.7 ( 16th June 2022 ) 🔍 Last analysed 15th November 2021 . Custodial: The provider holds the keys
4.4 ★★★★★
54 ratings
9th May 2020

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Do your own research!

Try out searching for "lost bitcoins", "stole my money" or "scammers" together with the wallet's name, even if you think the wallet is generally trustworthy. For all the bigger wallets you will find accusations. Make sure you understand why they were made and if you are comfortable with the provider's reaction.

If you find something we should include, you can create an issue or edit this analysis yourself and create a merge request for your changes.

The Analysis 

(Analysis from Android review)

External Custodian

According to public information from this provider, they use an external company such as BitGo, Gemini Custody or Coinbase Custody as their custodian. Many of the products listed here do the same.

While this might be a good thing:

  • External Custodians are usually highly specialized in securing assets
  • External Custodians will care about fixing issues with one client, to not lose others
  • External Custodians are usually registered businesses under regulatory oversight
  • External Custodians will try to protect your funds even from your wallet provider: With fraud detection, they will certainly try to avoid the emptying of all users' wallets at once
it also has its down-sides:
  • External Custodians are extra intermediaries: Even when the wallet provider wants to let you use your money, they might turn out to be uncooperative
  • External Custodians holding custody of many wallets are interesting targets for hackers and thieves
  • External Custodians, being publicly registered will not be able to resist if in their jurisdiction rules on the use of Bitcoin get tightened

As External Custodians usually don't publish lists of companies they are working with and past information might be outdated, we have no way of assuring claims by wallet providers to be using their custody solution. Please let us know if you found proof that the provider is being dishonest about their business relation to External Custodians!

App Description

  • Genesis Block offers digital banking that’s powered by crypto. It’s a full-service FDIC-insured banking experience built for the digital generation.
  • Be earning interest on all your deposits (crypto or fiat). Your money should grow even while you sleep.
  • Get Bitcoin-back rewards on all spending with your Genesis Block debit card.
  • Tap into the value of your crypto without selling it. Get instant loans directly from your phone.
  • A true bank replacement. All funds deposited into the Genesis Block Cash Accounts are covered by FDIC insurance.

Google Play Critical Reviews

According to the reviews, there’s a waitlist for using the app.

Dhanarajesh J
★☆☆☆☆ July 16, 2021
How long I have to wait for wait list? Hot to get golden tickets?

lestatnl Nuij
★☆☆☆☆ April 15, 2021
How do you spell useless: Genesis block You need a “golden ticket” to use the app or be 900000 in the waiting list. Talk of a dead app

ESPT
★☆☆☆☆ April 11, 2021
Looks like this idiots is a scam team… Collect all the info about you and put u in the line of 2k+ people waiting for something… offer u a game “to jump 100 spots’ that same scam is this whole thing.. BEWARE. REPORTED. U SHOULD REPORT TOO

Custody in Terms and Conditions

Section 9. Digital assets you deposit with us will be stored in one or more unsegregated omnibus wallets, via one or more third-party custodians that we may elect in our sole discretion. Genesis Block currently custodies digital assets in Genesis Block’s name through an unsegregated account with BitGo Trust Company, a South Dakota chartered trust company and money service business, but may change or use additional custodians from time to time.

The App

We installed the app. Instead of an option to register, we must first “request access.”

The app then asks the user to “rank the following from most important to least important.” These are the services Genesis Bank claims to offer:

  • Earn money
  • Borrow money
  • Debit card with BTC rewards
  • Digital banking

After sending an OTP to the provided email address, the platform requires you to enter your full name and Country of residence.

Once this is done, the app states that you are “in The Queue.” It suggests users may play a game to jump spots, invite a friend, or request a golden ticket from a user already inside the app. You are not given access to the app beforehand.

Verdict

Bitcoin related apps with lending services are usually custodial services. This makes their app not verifiable.

(dg)

Verdict Explained

As the provider of this product holds the keys, verifiability of the product is not relevant to the security of the funds!

As part of our Methodology, we ask:

Custodial!

Is the product self-custodial?

If the answer is "no", we mark it as "Custodial: The provider holds the keys".

A custodial service is a service where the funds are held by a third party like the provider. The custodial service can at any point steal all the funds of all the users at their discretion. Our investigations stop there.

Some services might claim their setup is super secure, that they don’t actually have access to the funds, or that the access is shared between multiple parties. For our evaluation of it being a wallet, these details are irrelevant. They might be a trustworthy Bitcoin bank and they might be a better fit for certain users than being your own bank but our investigation still stops there as we are only interested in wallets.

Products that claim to be non-custodial but feature custodial accounts without very clearly marking those as custodial are also considered “custodial” as a whole to avoid misguiding users that follow our assessment.

This verdict means that the provider might or might not publish source code and maybe it is even possible to reproduce the build from the source code but as it is custodial, the provider already has control over the funds, so it is not a wallet where you would be in exclusive control of your funds.

We have to acknowledge that a huge majority of Bitcoiners are currently using custodial Bitcoin banks. If you do, please:

  • Do your own research if the provider is trust-worthy!
  • Check if you know at least enough about them so you can sue them when you have to!
  • Check if the provider is under a jurisdiction that will allow them to release your funds when you need them?
  • Check if the provider is taking security measures proportional to the amount of funds secured? If they have a million users and don’t use cold storage, that hot wallet is a million times more valuable for hackers to attack. A million times more effort will be taken by hackers to infiltrate their security systems.
The product cannot be independently verified. If the provider puts your funds at risk on purpose or by accident, you will probably not know about the issue before people start losing money. If the provider is more criminally inclined he might have collected all the backups of all the wallets, ready to be emptied at the press of a button. The product might have a formidable track record but out of distress or change in management turns out to be evil from some point on, with nobody outside ever knowing before it is too late.