On Friday (KST), the ICON Foundation published another five announcements; their fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth for the week. Also, ICON – represented by Hoon Lee (Co-Founder & Council Member) – featured prominently on CNBC Africa’s exclusive piece on the flourishing South Korean blockchain and cryptocurrency sector. Will Lee, the co-founder and CEO of Blue Whale Foundation – the first decentralized application (dApp) built on the ICON blockchain – also received some quality airtime.

Announcement #1 – Class in Session

On Friday, the ICON team provided details of the ‘Certification Strategy Seminar’ which was co-hosted by theloop and Raonsecure (a leading information security companies).

Held on May 3 from the South Korean district of Gangnam, “participants discussed how to leverage blockchain technology for biometric authentication.”

I just published “theloop-Raonsecure, Certification Strategy Seminar” https://t.co/d3ZPO0IbRP — ICON (@helloiconworld) May 11, 2018

Before concluding with a Q&A session, the seminar comprised three sessions. These were presented by Hang-jin Kim (theloop; Chief Business Officer, ICON), Young-min Cho (Raonsecure), Tae-jin Kim (Vice President & CTO, Raonsecure), respectively.

Back on February 12, both theloop and Raonsecure signed an MoU to co-develop a FIDO (Fast Identity ONline) system using blockchain technology.

Announcement #2 – Class (Soon To Be) in Session

Sticking with Friday’s educational theme, the ICON team also announced that theloop and aSSIST (Seoul School of Integrated Sciences & Technologies) Business School had signed an MoU on Thursday.

The result of this MoU, per ICON’s announcement, is that “the two parties have agreed to develop and provide blockchain training programs.”

A drawcard of the prestigious aSSIST Business School is the fact they offer MBA courses specializing in “strategic planning in digital technologies such as AI, blockchain, fintech and digital marketing.”

The South Korean-based ICON Foundation has certainly been intent on collaborating with local universities; already having signed discrete MoUs with Sogang University, Pohang University of Science and Technology, and Korea University.

Announcement #3 – Let’s Talk CHAIN ID…

The ICON team published a blog post that, for the first time, thoroughly explored another of their projects, CHAIN ID – “the world’s first blockchain joint authentication service;” developed using loopchain (a proprietary blockchain engine).

Since October last year, CHAIN ID has been adopted by a total of eleven securities companies. In the future, the ICON team expects the “blockchain joint authentication service to extend its use into other industries as well.”

CHAIN ID is currently being co-developed by the Korea Financial Blockchain Consortium (KFBC), thanks to theloop having recently joined the KFBC as a technical partner.

CHAIN ID, developed using loopchain, to be used in “Samsung Pass” servicehttps://t.co/Oa33qzX9mA — ICON (@helloiconworld) May 11, 2018

Notably, the ICON team preluded Friday’s post noting that, led predominantly by financial institutions, “discussions are underway in Korea regarding a regulatory shift away from the certification system currently stipulated by the Digital Signature Act (1999).”

This certification system – as administered by government-approved institutions – appear ripe for disintermediation, according to ICON. And with CHAIN ID developing “a more diverse and flexible standard for personal authentication,” the blockchain project believes their solution will provide users with “a more convenient and reliable environment for making financial transactions.”

Announcement #4 – … Oh Yeah, We Got Samsung

In a busy day for ICON’s PR team, it was announced that, on Friday:

Korea Financial Investment Association (KOFIA), which theloop is participating as a technical partner to develop CHAIN ID, has signed an MOU with Samsung Electronics to incorporate CHAIN ID in Samsung’s ‘Samsung Pass’ service.”

“Honored to be recognized by a corporation as reputable as Samsung,” the ICON team believes that the MoU represents “a big step towards both real-world adoption and globalization of blockchain technology.”

Announcement #5 – Launch of ICONest

As the last of their Friday announcements, ICON declared the on-schedule opening of the webpage dedicated to their token launch platform, ICONest.

Webpage of ICONest, ICON’s token launch platform, is now open. https://t.co/B6zofZ9wPg — ICON (@helloiconworld) May 11, 2018

Here at CryptoCoinSpy, we covered the introduction of ICONest back on April 30.

ICON, Blue Whale Foundation, Featured on CNBC

Also on Friday, one of the most popular crypto-specific shows – CNBC Crypto Trader – uploaded an exclusive video that featured host Ran Neuner travelling to South Korea in an effort to learn more about what is one of the most pro-crypto societies in the world.

Taking up a sizeable chunk of the insightful near-fifty-minute video was two separate interviews with one of the co-founders of ICON, Hoon Lee, and the CEO of Blue Whale Foundation, Will Lee.

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