News linked to both this project and an event.
NEAR Protocol announced that NEAR accounts now support the post-quantum ML-DSA signature scheme, enabling users to complete key upgrades without any asset migration. Meanwhile, the NEAR One team is advancing the NEP-655 proposal, which derives implicit accounts via an initial state hash, storing assets behind the hash so that no public keys or key hashes are exposed on-chain. It is currently live on the testnet and expected to launch on the mainnet within weeks. Additionally, the team is designing NEAR Intents Wallet Contracts that support custom signature extensions (including ML-DSA and hash-based schemes), and developing a NEAR-based Q-day recovery registry for external chains that have not yet deployed PQ keys, allowing users to submit recovery keys in a rotatable hash format. NEAR noted that its quantum-safe design philosophy was integrated into its architecture planning as early as 2018.
Illia Polosukhin stated that as on-chain tools expand, users no longer need centralized exchanges for many crypto activities. near.com integrates cross-chain spot trading, tokenized stocks, yield products, and perpetual contracts into a single interface, and plans to add more fiat-related features, including bank withdrawals, tax transaction records, and selective disclosure for confidential transactions. NEAR has partnered with Monerium to support users in converting between euros in bank accounts and EURe via IBAN, with the ultimate goal of enabling NEAR Intents to support "any asset to any asset" swaps. After integrating Ondo Finance in September, near.com already offers tokenized stocks and plans to add stocks from more global markets; NEAR's Agent Market allows users to describe their needs in natural language, with the platform finding agents capable of executing the task, and funds will be released after the task is completed and verified.
NEAR co-founder Illia Polosukhin posted that the recent increase in developer activity and further reduction in development barriers within the ecosystem center on what applications to build and how to establish distribution channels. In response, he proposed a series of potential building directions, including AI virtual pets combining NEAR AI’s on-chain verifiable inference with non-fungible tokens (NFTs); a universal checkout component supporting cross-chain intent payments; a decentralized encyclopedia integrating prediction markets with AI-generated content; a privacy-oriented OTC market based on NEAR Intents, alongside liquidation-resistant lending and perpetual contract management; a cross-chain event registration escrow tool backed by staking deposits; a privacy-preserving code review agent; a corporate cap table management tool; Delta-neutral strategy management; private copy trading utilizing view keys; an end-to-end encrypted medical auxiliary diagnostic system; a privacy-focused voice transcription desktop application; and AI benchmarking based on private test sets, among others.
Illia Polosukhin stated that the attack involving approximately $3.8 million only affected USDT on BSC. NEAR Intents and near.com are now back online, and affected users will receive full compensation.
Odaily News: According to monitoring by Bitget CEO, Bitget was hacked on September 24, with approximately $387.5 million in funds stolen, a large portion of which was transferred across chains and primarily consolidated on Ethereum. A report released by NEAR Intents shows that its risk intelligence layer SHIELD detected over $50 million in suspected money laundering transfer attempts; of this, $166,000 in funds went through, while $503,000 was frozen during execution. The frozen funds remain restricted pending subsequent legal and recovery proceedings.
Ondo Finance has announced its tokenized securities platform, Ondo Stocks, has launched on the NEAR mainnet and integrated with NEAR Intents. The initial rollout supports 20 tokenized U.S. stocks, ETFs, and commodity-related products, including shares of Tesla, Nvidia, Apple, as well as QQQ, gold, and silver ETFs. Eligible users can access these assets through the NEAR mainnet and distribute them to wallets and applications on connected networks via NEAR Intents. The NEAR mainnet supports access to over 30 blockchains. Ondo stated that its tokenized securities platform has surpassed $1 billion in total value locked, with cumulative trading volume exceeding $26 billion.