India’s IT Minister to crypto startups: ‘Innovate but respect our forex laws’; Lentra raises $60 mln

Crypto startups in India are not barred from any innovation but must adhere to the country’s laws on foreign exchange, IT Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar told Inc42 in an interview, according to a report from the startup news and analysis site. And SaaS action continues in India, with Lentra raising $60 million in Series B funding that includes Citi Ventures’s first investment in an Indian fintech company, valuing the Mumbai startup developing AI-based embedded finance solutions at more than $400 million, TechCrunch reports. Notes: Crypto startups in India are not barred from any innovation but must adhere to the country’s laws on foreign exchange, IT Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar told Inc42 in an interview, according to a report. For a startup, whether you are innovating for crypto or blockchain or Web3, there is absolutely nothing in the law that prevents you from doing it. There is nothing in the IT Act that stops you from doing it. We welcome any investor or startup to innovate in crypto or Web3, the minister said, according to Inc42. The restrictions involve exchange control. Some startups have made the mistake of becoming full-blown crypto brokerages and exchanges without getting the required permissions from the RBI and SEBI, he said, according to the report. Australia is considering banning the payment of ransoms to hackers, following recent cyberattacks affecting millions of Australians, Reuters reports, citing the country's Home Affairs Minister Clare O'Neil. Australia's biggest health insurer, Medibank and Optus, Australia's second-largest telco, owned by Singapore Telecommunications, and at least eight other companies, have been breached since September, according to Reuters. The country has also bolstered its cyber police, with a new joint task force, according to Reuters. Apple is facing a class action lawsuit for allegedly harvesting iPhone user data even when the company’s own privacy settings promise not to, Gizmodo reports. The suit, filed on Nov. 10 in a California federal court, comes days after Gizmodo exclusively reported on research into how multiple iPhone apps send Apple analytics data, regardless of whether the iPhone Analytics privacy setting is turned on or off, according to the report. The problem was spotted by two independent researchers at the software company Mysk, who found that the Apple App Store sends the company exhaustive information about nearly everything a user does in the app, despite a privacy setting, iPhone Analytics, which claims to “disable the sharing of Device Analytics altogether” when switched off. Lentra, a Mumbai startup developing AI-based fintech solutions, has raised $60 million in Series B funding, TechCrunch reports. The investment values the startup at “over $400 million,” D Venkatesh, the founder and CEO of the startup, told TechCrunch in an interview. Existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners and Susquehanna International Group led the round with participation from Citi Ventures, a subsidiary of Citigroup, according to TechCrunch. This is Citi Ventures’ first investment in a fintech from India. Lentra, founded in 2018, is profitable and offers tech solutions to commercial banks for their digital loan services. HDFC Bank, Federal Bank, Standard Chartered and IDFC First Bank are some of its customers. Theme music courtesy Free Music & Sounds: https://soundcloud.com/freemusicandsounds