China’s Alibaba Says New P2P Platform Is Not Crypto-Related

[mayuri27]

Following recent reports that Chinese e-commerce conglomerate Alibaba launched its own cryptocurrency mining platform, the company has issued an official statement Tuesday, Jan. 16, denying that its platform is related to either virtual currencies or their mining.

According to the official statement, published on the microblogging platform Weibo, Alibaba’s recently launched platform ‘P2P Nodes’ has been mistakenly reported as cryptocurrency-related.

The statement further clarifies that the platform is actually a peer-to-peer (P2P) Content Delivery Network (CDN) service provided by Alibaba Cloud designed to allow users to improve their network speed by sharing unused broadband connections with each other.

P2P Nodes credits users with points for validating data on its network, a concept which might sound similar to how Bitcoin miners earn bitcoins for processing transactions.

However, according to Alibaba’s statement, the points in P2P Nodes are not cryptocurrency-based, cannot function as a currency and can only be exchanged for items in the platform’s own gift shop.

The company’s statement further reads:

“We reiterate that Alibaba Cloud has never issued a Bitcoin-like virtual currency, and it will not host any [cryptocurrency] mining platforms”

Amidst continuing reports of Alibaba’s new “mining platform”, the P2P Nodes website is no longer online, according to the CnLedger news outlet.